Electric Dune Buggy

[David Head]

I think I remember Hawkeye building an electric Powered dune buggy a few years back. Has anyone else thought of checking into how feasible that would be.

[Hawk]

That was a strange feeling to drive, you didn't hear the motor but you could hear the stones under the tires. It had a 65hp 72 volt motor thru a VW 4 speed trans. It was fun to build!

[Russhebert]

I have done a lot of investigating on this and the problem is just the batteries. You just cain't get good batteries to give you enough time to drive anywhere. The cost of the motor and controller is about $2000 and to get Lithiun Ion batteries if you could is about $10,000.

[David Head]

Neil. Where did that buggy end up?
After I posted, I found a lot of info here.

http://e-volks.com/

[Bill K]

And how about some photos of the electric buggy if you have any? I'd love to see it.

[Hawk]

I will look and see if I kept a copy of the build pics. I have one of the boxes that the experimental batteries came in. The customer was from North Dallas and he had bought all electric parts and sent them to the shop. We built the buggy and installed his parts and then I got to drive it on the road and was impressed with the power it had. I didn't get to see how far it would go before needing a charge. It had enough room for 12 batteries and he wanted to start with 6.

[Aquabuggy]

Hey Neil, The electric motor is connected to the VW trans but do you shift gears other then reverse? Then again did it even need reverse or does the motor reverse? Also did it use a clutch?

Looking forward to seeing the pics, if ya have any.

[David Head]

I read that you don't need the clutch, pressure plate or TO bearing. If you need to change gears you just let off the peddle and change gears. Most people leave it in second gear. Using a different gear uses more amps and therefore it lowers how far you can go without a charge.

[Hawk]

We used a clutch, and the motor did not reverse. Out here in the country I used all the gears for the speed and was only going a couple of miles for test run and didn't walk back. Most of us thought it was too quite and had an idea about making a cd of motor noise. A quite buggy just isn't right.

[Aquabuggy]

Most of us thought it was too quite and had an idea about making a cd of motor noise.

Too funny

A quite buggy just isn't right.

Yea I couldn't agree more but if the greenies have there way running an air cooled VW engine will probably carry a prison sentence.
Electric will be our only choice, better get that CD ready.

[Hawk]

And I can tell the greenies the spotted owl taste like chicken with a hint of game.