When you are planning to start your own electric car conversion project, one of the types of donor car you should look into is a pickup truck.
A truck has many advantages compared to a normal sedan especially for EV conversion projects.
However, there a few things you should take into account when choosing a donor pickup truck.
Firstly, you have to determine if the new electric motor will fit into the truck.
To do that, you have to determine the maximum diameter of the motor before it comes into contact with other transmission components, driveshaft and the bodywork of the truck.
Here’s a simple rule of thumb.
Any electric motor with a diameter of less than 7 inches would be too small for the truck.
In the opposite scale, any motor over 11 inches would be too big to fit into the front of the truck.
Apart from the size of the motor, you also have to determine how long the motor is and the types of clear mountings required.
The next thing you should consider is the voltage you want to run your truck on.
The power output from the battery pack can be from 72 volts to 144 volts or more.
You can run your electric truck on a lower voltage but you’ll end up with poor performance.
When choosing the electric motor, go with 48 volts or higher.
Higher voltage means you’ll get higher speed for your electric vehicle.
Since the pickup has a back bed which can be used to store the deep cycle batteries, space would not be an issue.
Finally, for an electric truck, find an electric motor with a large brush area.
Preferably, look for com bars that are about 2 inches or more long.
Do It Yourself (DIY) Electric Vehicle Guide
Do you want to know how to convert a car to run on electric power? If you do, check out Les Oke’s Convert2EV e-book.
Les is a Canadian and lives a green lifestyle with his family. To move around, Les and his wife use pure electric cars.
Throughout the years, Les has completed numerous electric car conversion projects.
The Convert2EV guide is a collection of his experience working on EVs.
