Electric Vehicle (EV) conversion guides review and information from the web

Prepping VW Beetle Electric Donor Car

An old Volkswagen VW Beetle is a great donor car if you are planning a Do It Yourself (DIY) electric vehicle conversion. It is inexpensive and has ample space to store the lead acid batteries.

To save cost, most people will get a busted VW Bug. If its faulty, you can always negotiate with the seller for a lower price.

When you get the donor car, there are a few prepping works that you have to do. The idea of an electric car conversion is to remove the internal combustion engine (ICE) and replace it with a DC electric motor.

To propel the car forward, the motor will be connected directly to the existing transmission unit. When the engine is taken out, all its associated component such a exhaust pipe, fuel pumps, gas tank, radiator etc are removed as well.

Here is the dangerous part. When removing the gas tank and fuel lines, make sure you drain them dry.

Even with a damaged VW Beetle donor car, there might be some gasoline residue in the system. As you know, gasoline is highly flammable and you should put extra precaution when handling the component.

This is important because in the later part of the electric car retrofitting, you my have to do some welding work. Welding sparks and gasoline fume is not a good combination.

Using an electric VW Beetle can save you a lot of money. However, if you are not familiar with car components, it is better for you to outsource the conversion work to a professional mechanic.

To be prudent, you should know some basic information on electric vehicle. At least you will know you are being charged of unnecessary parts or work done on you car.

For information on homemade electric car, check out VW EV conversion guides review.

How much does it cost to convert a VW Beetle to electric?

Some people have been wandering, how much does is cost to convert their old VW Beetle to electric. The video below shows a pastor with his VW electric vehicle. He got his Bug converted to electric with an investment of $6000. The EV runs on 72 Volts of electricity and has a top speed of above 50 mph. Mileage per charge is about 30 miles. I’m sure you can extend the mileage by adding more deep cycle batteries into to the batteries bank.

$6000 investment to convert a gasoline driven VW Beetle to electric seems a bit high to me. The whole retrofitting job can be done at a cheaper cost. But there is some preliminary work you have to do. You will need to source for cheap electric motor at EBay and also source for used or reconditioned batteries. If you are keen to find out how you can save cost in your EV retrofitting, you can check out these electric car conversion guides on the web.

VW Electric Conversion Video

I found the following VW electric conversion video on Youtube. The gentleman converted his 1975 VW Bug to run purely on electricity. He brought up 2 very interesting questions.
1) Where aren’t we all driving electric cars?
2) Where aren’t we driving on sun light via solar power?

It’s an interesting thought. I’m keen to find out what the answer would be. Feel free to comment.