Texas Teen Builds His Own Electric Car on $10,000 Budget
This fall, Texas teenager Lucas Laborde will be driving to school in an electric car he built himself. The 17 year old spent last summer converting a conventional gas-powered car to run on batteries. Total cost? Around $10,000.
Luke’s EV is based on a kit car, known as a Bradley GT II, which his father bought on eBay for just $5000 splashing out a further $5700 on electric conversion parts and batteries. The rest was left up to Luke’s ingenuity and technical know-how.
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After 150 hours of work, Luke had hooked up eight 80-pound lead-acid batteries in the space left after removing the fuel tank, as well as several other ‘creative locations.’ He finished up with an EV capable of travelling 40 miles between charges, a top speed of 45mph, (more than enough for the local school run), and heaps of low-end torque. As Luke told reporters, “it has a lot of power.”
The car isn’t without a few ‘quirks’ though; the weight of the batteries has caused the fiberglas body to twist slightly, meaning that the gull-wing doors don’t completely close. However, by using his own initiative, and making use of widely available existing components, Luke Laborde has put many global car companies to shame by creating a working, highway-ready EV, in far less time and on a much lower budget.
Image Credit - Steve Striharsky at bradleygt2.com
Let’s clear some stuff up.
1. The blue Bradley is not the car that was converted. Luke’s car is metalic silver with black stripes.
2. The car has already past 60 mph. and been on the highway. The motor and batteries are still breaking in.
3. Lead acid batteries are recyclable!
4. “Floodies” are the cheapest way to go. With an unlimited budget Litium Phosphate bats would have been ideal.
45 mph is not highway ready, by any measure. In fact, driving at that speed on a highway is hazardous, as it disrupts traffic flow to the point where the potential for accidents jumps dramatically.
Given the size of the ‘installed user base’ (i.e. people with gas powered cars) any credible entrant will first need to be compatible with the existing system, if it has any aspirations about becoming the system.
Top speed : 45mph
plus
“a working, highway-ready EV”
What highway do you know of with a speed limit of 45?
Take this thing on the freeway and your new nickname will be “Speedbump”.
Slow down to save gas?
Be careful with that. My Mazda 3’s optimum speed is 63 miles per hour. Drive any slower and you’re getting worse gas mileage than if you were at 63.
640 pounds of lead-acid batteries? That sounds about as environmentally friendly as the light bulbs full of mercury they are trying to shove down our throats. Better hope the kids aren’t around when one of those babies breaks.
to the kid who built it, do some investigation on good rechargeable batteries for your electric car, there has to be some better things out there than lead-acid.
I’m sorry, a 40 mile range and 45 mph top speed do NOT qualify for a highway ready (your words) car. I could use that car for my daily work commute but when I get home from work and the spouse wants to go to dinner & a movie, I’d have to fire up an internal combustion powered vehicle to take her because this thing would need to be plugged in for the night and would be out of action for the night.
This EV would not make the round trip to to her Dr’s office for appointments or carry anthing home bigger than a single Wal-Mart bag. Fail
I want to know what part of Texas this young fellow lives in. He should be with us Electric Auto Assoc folks. There are many in Texas.
Lead acid batteries are nearly 100% recyclable. Also, those who say he should have put in lithiums might want to step up and finance him for them. So many folks set back and tell these type of “DOERS” what they should have done. Contradulations for a job well done. Don’t listen to the ney-sayers. I have a lifeP04 powered Fiero and an AGM powered Sparrow. The lithiums cost over three times the lead acid and are still a mystery to operate.
So, how fast does YOUR EV go? Yes, I thought so, you’re waiting for the technology.