Finals week

I have finals this week at college, so my stress meter is pegged. I have been taking a couple of the toughest classes in my major concurrently, since that's the only time they are available, and that has been limiting my time lately, including time for blogging. I knew you would understand.
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The Rhinebeck show was mediocre, and true to form, it eventually rained on us. It's too bad, I have so many good memories of my younger days there, but it has rained on that weekend for probably the last 10 years, so now I almost dread it. Amazingly I did not buy any parts I do not need for a project I do not have. It's a good place to get supplies, like grinding wheels, and sanding discs, etc, pretty cheaply, so that's what I got. I have really been getting the bug lately to get back to my EV project. If you remember, about a year ago I kicked off this blog to document the construction of a battery powered electric vehicle. For various reasons, the project has been temporarily shelved, but the fire still burns within to do this project. Lately I have been convinced that my original idea, a classic truck converted to EV, is still the coolest way to go (better than the buggy). I have had a lot of time to think about this, and the one major thing I would do differently is to start with only a solid cab and doors for a 53-55 Ford pickup. Buying a whole truck in good condition seemed like the way to go last year, but so many body parts for these are available in lightweight fiberglass, that I would rather use them then the heavier original steel parts. By the time I decided on a full frame swap, there was not much of the original truck I really needed. Unfortunately, I have absolutely no funding in place for this, and no prospect of any, anytime soon. Perhaps if someone wanted to offer a no-interest loan, or better yet a grant, that would be great.

I have also want to build a new dragster, based upon this 1963 Tony Nancy car. I would do the complete fabrication on this one. I've been hot on this idea for about 6 months now. Again, no funding or reason, it's just a desire.

I hope to get to the '58 Biscayne soon. I plan to spend the last of my car fund on a new brake system for it, since there's no reason to get it driving if I can't get it stopped. I already have this leaky brake master cylinder out of there, just waiting for something better. Unfortunately, that is the lasty-last of my car money, so I hope nothing else big needs replaced.

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So I've been pretty busy, but not making money, so not much is getting done. At least dreaming about car projects is still free.

Year in review 2008

I began blogging this year about March or so, well intentioned and bursting with enthusiasm to build The Electric Vehicle That Would Revolutionize the World, or something like that. I was very excited to build a workable commuter vehicle that was 100% battery powered around a classic 1955 Ford F100 pickup. I purchased a suitable pickup from Florida, and had already purchased another donor vehicle to use for a full frame and component swap. I lost my job quite unexpectedly in July, and have basically shelved the EV project for now. I sold the F100.

I decided to simplify my life, so I took the money from the F100 sale, and immediately bought a 1958 Chevy Biscayne. See, for a car guy, somehow simplifying your life equates with buying another vehicle. I swear this made sense at the time, although I can’t recall how. The plan for the Biscayne is to eventually turn it into a daily driver. Hopefully it will take the place of whatever I would need to buy when my 2000 Dodge finally bites the dust. This project is stalled due to the job loss also.

I had adamantly planned to sell my Altered Roadster drag race car. I have reversed course on that as well, and decided to keep it for the time being. Since the economy is in the toilet, I doubt I would sell it for anywhere near the amount I’d like to get for it, and there’s no need to take a big financial loss on it right now. I did zero drag racing this year, and I really miss it. That’s not so cool.

I did get to do some work on EV-Steve’s electric vehicle: brake system, new cab mounts, new battery boxes, removal of unneeded 4WD parts, and hydraulic clutch system. This will get him a little closer to getting back on the road.


In the fall, we did the famous plow project. There was 9” of snowfall last week, and let me happily report that the plow “works a treat” as they say in England. It is truly a joy to use, 1000 times better than the snow-blower. Well worth the cost, although you will spend probably $10,000 on a decent truck to attach it to. I already had one. I will reinforce the corners of the plow blade this spring; they got a little benty-bent.


I think my new idea to do my EV as a dune-buggy style vehicle is a good one. The donor S-10 chassis sits abandoned in the far corner of my backyard, cut off from civilization by what is now a vast flood plain. I have not yet been motivated to row out and rescue it, get it inside, and get started on it. I thought I’d let K park her car in the warm garage for this winter instead.




On a personal note, my handyman side business is a complete bust. I did a couple of jobs for what amounted to like $5 per hour, if that. I was hoping Hudson Valley Hot Rods would take off when I introduced my EV project to an appreciative public, but I wussed-out and declined to risk spending the money on completing it once I lost my job. Based on my experience doing vehicle repairs this year, I don’t think I want to do vehicles for a living now anyway. Frankly, it’s tough work, and you can’t really charge for all the problems that arise. I have decided to get a real job, and to continue to do my own vehicle projects as a hobby.

On a more personal note, I have decided to be productive this next year by returning to college yet again, for an accounting degree, and hope to take the CPA exam by this time next year. I figure it’s better than sitting home doing nothing. I enjoy going to college more than I do working anyway; if it paid anything, I’d be a full time student forever. After I graduate, I hope to get some experience in accounting and open my own office within 5 years. Then I’LL be the boss and I’LL get to make the stupid decisions. Gonna have my own office, and commute in my EV, and my ’58, and make a lot of money, and life will be great. And I can never get laid off again since I own the place. That’s the plan anyway.

On a most personal note, K and k and I have had a fun year, and we are thankful for our great friends and families. We have more than we do not have, and for that we are grateful. We miss those whom have passed on this past year, and we pray for those that are struggling, and in a worse situation than ourselves. At a time when the world is in more flux than ever, we optimistically look forward to next year with great hope. I have enjoyed blogging, and I thank everyone that tunes in to read this. I hope I have been at least entertaining, and at best informative. Love to all, and Happy New Year 2009!!!

The electric car lives again!

Well it never lived the first time, but what I mean is that I have a new plan for my ill-fated EV conversion project. For those of you just tuning in (where have you been?) I was building a 1955 Ford F1 pickup into a battery-electric vehicle. When I was laid off from my day job, I halted the project, since I did not know how far from home my next day job would be. I wanted to use this vehicle for commuting, and BEV’s are notoriously limited in range.
I basically had abandoned the project and sold off the F100 to recoup my investment. I still have the S-10 chassis, which I diligently POR-15’d, and I have a load of other S-10 parts to outfit the eventual vehicle. This got me to thinking: What was some other way I could make my EV? What would be simple, cheap, eye-catching, retro, and different? I am now going to go…dune buggy!

The original dune buggies were fiberglass tub-bodies put onto modified VW chassis. This was a very popular kit car conversion in the mid-60’s; cheap, easy, available, and cute. I will use the chassis I have since it will sturdy enough to support the battery weight. I plan to move forward with construction without actually buying any of the expensive electrical components, such at the controller or the batteries. I will just find out the dimensions of these components and use mock-ups of them, or just “leave room” for fitting them later. Not the ideal way to do design, but sometimes the necessary way to do it.

I plan to make a dune buggy-style fiberglass body myself from scratch. I plan to make the entire body in cardboard (!) first, and then cover it with fiberglass. The fiberglass dune buggy design has some advantages. First, it has no opening doors, this simplifies things greatly. It can be very light, I would save probably 2000 lbs over the F100 conversion I was planning. That’s a lot, and a big help to a BEV. The shape would be familiar, retro, and yet morphed into what I need to fit my plans. Finally, it is a fun vehicle. I am getting into the beach-y Jeep-surrey mode I spoke about before. Very cool.

I had settled on the idea that as a dune buggy, it would be a seasonal vehicle. So it’s a summer run-about, oh well. But after thinking even more, I thought about perhaps a removable canvas soft-top, with zipper-closing plastic side windows like you see on some Jeeps. If I did that, this would still potentially be a year-round vehicle, albeit one that requires the proper attitude to endure in the cold. Would I be up for it? I don’t know. But I won’t know if I don’t try, and at least I would be moving forward. The best part is that I think I can keep going in this direction without a big financial investment.

So, what do you think? Cool or stupid? Overambitious or easy? Let me know. Bye for now.

EV-Steve's S-10 update; it's now rear wheel drive only

In our last episode, Super-Dave came over and helped me get the front axles out, remember? We weren't done.
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EV-Steve helpfully reminded me to reinstall the outer axle stubs to support the inner bearing races. I disassembled the outer CV joints of the axles and reinstalled the outer axle stubs. Pretty easy.
What was not easy was getting the front differential out. After a few hours disassembly and fighting sometimes nearly inaccessible rusty bolts (you were correct again, Steve) it became clear that the differential was put in the chassis from the top side, before the engine would have been put in above it. It was like one of those bent nail puzzles where you keep rotating the parts, but you can't get them apart because something is always in the way. Bottom line: it was not going to come out the bottom easily. A quick poof-poof of one little bracket with the torch and it fell out. Yes, I not only got a nice new torch tip, I got a spare one as well.
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I put the unneeded parts on the digital scale I bought for weighing packages right before I stopped ebaying stuff, and the grand total was 95+ lbs. With gear oil, fasteners, cut-off brackets, and rust flakes, call it 100 lbs even. Doesn't sound like much, but in EV's as in drag racing, every little bit of weight removed helps.

Some work on EV-Steve's EV

My friend EV-Steve was kind enough to give me some work doing some mechanical fixing on his EV. It is a 1985 Chevy S10 that was converted to electric by a college as an engineering project, and he bought it sometime afterwards. I have been enjoying working on it for him. I have an affection for these little S10's, as I owned one for 12 years and 219,000 miles.Here's my little tip for today: Sometimes I like to set up my little doctor's operating-tool table. It's just a scrap of plywood set on a stand. I use this to set my tools on while I'm working. As I fetch tools from my toolbox in the rear of the garage, I put them on this table so they are handy, yet out of the way. I stand between the car and the table, so I just have to turn around to get what I need. You can lay parts, supplies, or whatever, on the table. On this piece of wood I even have some numbers markered on as notes from some other project.
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This is WAY better than the lay-the-tools-on-the-car-as-you-work method. I hate doing that. Yes I eventually have 50% of my tools out on the table, but it's still the 50% I need.

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I redid most of the brake system so far on this truck. Another project I did was to replace the alternator. I had to take some electrical components out to get to it, but it wasn't so bad. Not the worst I have ever done. In this view, you are looking into the "engine" compartment (now motor compartment) from the front of the truck. There is a set of 4 batteries up front.

Behind the batteries is the main component board, lifted up slightly here. You can see the body of the electric motor, it has a slight coating of rust on the outside of the case. As a point of reference, the brake booster and master cylinder are at top right, in their stock positions.

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I do dig working on this thing. The familiarity of the S-10, and the coolness of the EV. It'll be here for a while, so if anyone wants the 5c tour, come on over and check it out.

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Talk to you soon.

Free your mind

A bonus entry today. On a topic I was not going to discuss in too much detail. But I will touch on it briefly, since it does come up. The topic is: "The concept of the electric car project; what it is, what it is not, and why". Big enough for ya?

I was going to let readers just sort of figure it all out for themselves as the project progresses. And I still think that's the most interesting and instructive way to go. If I just tell you everything that's going to happen right at the beginning, the story is over; why keep reading?

So I will go this far: Yesterday I had a car-person-friend over the house briefly, and this person was looking over the '55. I had previously told him in great detail about the project, and indeed the whole concept, and my various motivations behind it. Finally he says: "it's a shame you're going to convert this nice truck into an electric vehicle".

Normally I would be highly insulted and angry. But I'm on great medication now. So instead, I blame myself that I have not conveyed my grand vision effectively. I know this project is out of the ordinary. That of course, is one of the prime motivations. And the concept itself is multi-faceted and complex (also what I dig). But I have a vision. I am looking way out there; years into the future. And I think this project will be appreciated eventually.

I definitely don't see this project as the desecration of a classic vehicle. I see it as an elevation, a tribute to this vehicle's heritage, to bring it into the 21st century, as part of a revolutionary way of looking at personal transportation. It was selected in part for it's potential to get attention.

I know that this person (and there have been others) would have been more satisfied if I had said I was going to drop a 500hp big block gas motor into it and burn up the roads. And I well understand that has been the accepted paradigm for decades.

Sigh. Couldn't have missed the point more. Build a hot rod? Been done thousands of times before. I hope I'm not being condescending when I ask: What's interesting about that? What's in it for me? I know, it's the essence of hot-rodding. Nothing against it. Love it. Probably do it again myself someday. But it's just not where I am right now.

So am I a visionary, or merely a crackpot? We will see when, as they say, the rubber hits the road. 'Nuff said.

photo: unknown