Electric Vehicle Conversion

I have noodled several times with the notion of converting one of my cars to electric power. There are plenty of kits out on the market but in the end they are just to expensive. You often spend as much as you would for a new car and this is just for the parts. Currently I wouldn't consider spending that kind of money as it would only net a short range car that took hours to re-charge. However, after reading about toshiba's new battery it has me thinking about a conversion again. I also remembered reading about these and it occurs to me they provide a very interesting easy conversion option.

The idea would be just to put a hub motor on all 4 corners. Yank out the motor/transmission/gas tank/drive shaft/exhaust and brakes. Don't worry about tossing the brakes you now have a new system courtesy of regenerative braking. Probably need to rig an auxiliary electric motor to run accessories (AC and Power steering). During acceleration you run everything off the batteries, but when cruising you use two motors as alternators to run the accessories. Batteries go in the engine compartment and where the gas tank was. If you have the space you might also install a 5kw generator for a limited recharging capacity when away from an outlet. This might not really drop the cost. But it would simplify the installation of a conversion system. Battery packs are not hard to wire. Putting a wheel on is simple. Fairly easy methods of interconnecting the pedals and controls are already available. If you didn't insist on power steering and A/C you would pretty much have an electric car at that point. With access to the equipment to pull your motor and transmission you could do something like this in a weekend.

This opens up some interesting design possibilities. After all, car design is limited somewhat by having to deal with the engine compartment and drive train. With this sort of configuration you can simplify the undercarriage a great deal, evenly distribute batteries and have no engine compartment to interfere with more aerodynamic profiles. Additionally.... Motor upgrades, or use on another car is as easy as swapping the wheels. Most parts replacement could be accomplished by plug and play methods.. ie unplug faulty system plug in new system. No more messy oil and hydraulic fluid changes. No brake pads to wear out. No transmission nightmares, no clutch or torque converters, no differential. Most trouble shooting could be accomplished with a multimeter. Suspension would also get a bit simpler since you would no longer need to provide power through the axel... 4 wheel independent would not be simpler and cheaper than the old live axel setup.

You would drastically reduce the number of moving parts and complexity of a car. The concept of a car wearing out mechanically would no longer apply... Restoration would no longer be labor intensive and unable to really utilize new advances. New motors would still fit old designs (think custom wheels). New Batteries could be configured to go in any space available for them, new control boxes would be like exchanging a printer in your home computer system. It is just amazing the possibilities this kind of design could bring. But to me none is more intriguing than the possibility of an easy conversion process of existing gas cars. After all if electric all the sudden becomes viable thanks to new battery technology then there will be all of these gas car chassis available... Reviving a junkyard car with a solid frame and body could be the work of a weekend instead of months/years.