NO-$ ELECTRIC CAR

Electric cars have been buzzing about for over a hundred years, but 
with only occasional unrealised plans for their dominance over the 
internally combusting majority. Regardless of whether it could have 
been done long before, the time now seems to have come for the rise 
of the electric car, finally pushed amongst the traditionally 
petrol-powered pack by the force of painfully high fuel prices and 
climate change guilt.

The idea is certainly attractive to me, as someone who would prefer 
not to contribute to making this already too-hot country hotter, 
and already can't really afford fuel costs. However there's a clear 
problem: the only cars that I can afford are those so old that 
nobody wants them, and no even slightly common cars (in Australia, 
at least) that old are electric. But as long as I'm dreaming about 
these things, I don't really want a bought electric car anyway - 
with my love of electronics and custom designs I of course really 
want to make my own. Not from scratch of course, that would be far 
too much engineering to get right, but by adapting an old petrol 
car to our new electric ways.

That's nothing new, enthusiasts have been doing it for decades, but 
there's a certain entry barrier in terms of cost. Two costs stand 
out in particular, at least for someone with a hope of doing the 
electronics himself: the motor, and the power storage. Frankly I 
don't have an answer on the latter one - Hydrogen fuel cells don't 
seem to be available cheap, and batteries are only cheap when 
they're worn out and useless. Also batteries, and I'm not sure 
about the hydrogen fuel cell, will have a much more regular 
recurring cost for replacement compared to most engines.

The motor at first seems similarly difficult. Cheap motors of high 
power are generally from factory machinary or large pumps, so it's 
efficient for them to be made for running on AC instead of the 
desired DC, plus they are likely to be big and heavy. But there is 
one source of cheap DC motors, and they're already sitting under 
the bonnet of any car: the starter motor.

Now I'm not saying that this is a perfectly calculated idea, but I 
do have a few answers to the most obvious of its problems. First is 
not to use a weak starter motor for a car, but a big powerful one 
from a large truck or other heavy machinery - cheaply available 2nd 
hand from wreckers. Second is not to use one, but a whole bunch, 
driving a common shaft via gears (this will be pretty difficult to 
engineer, I'll admit). This isn't just for greater power, but also 
so that they can be driven with a reduced duty cycle, to reduce the 
likelihood of overheating.

Seeing as starter motors are only meant to work for bursts of 
around 30sec maximum at a time, that won't be a single solution to 
overheating. They will probably also require water colling in some 
form, and maybe replacement of the internal bearings with something 
more robust in continuous use.

Actually the odds of this working are pretty slim. Maybe better to 
find a written-off electric car and use the motor from that. Anyway 
it would be fun to try if I had nothing better to do, and as I do, 
then the idea might as well just get dumped here.

- The Free Thinker.

P.S. This is actually linked to a plan for generating my own 
electricity on a similarly no-$ basis. But while certainly no 
better calculated than the electric car idea, I am passionate 
enough about that one that I really want to do it. So I won't 
describe that here in case I do ever manage to do it, and then want 
to share the idea through less anonymous channels.