Just The The Victim (a.k.a. The Donor Vehicle) Part 1

Most people think that picking the donor vehicle is the first step in an EV conversion. For me choosing the donor vehicle occurred later in the process. Before even thinking about, "what vehicle", I needed to answer the question, "what do I need from a vehicle"?

There are tons of variables in picking a vehicle. How far do you need to travel. How much "stuff" is being added and removed ("stuff" meaning engines, motors, batteries, etc.). As this is not meant to be a comprehensive blog on how to convert (just how I do my conversion) I'll leave it up to the reader to follow some of the links to gain more knowledge. I will however go over my process (in no particular order of importance).

Range-- my typical daily range to and from work is about 15 miles with occasional forays of 30'ish.

Size--I'm 6'2" so I needed something that was comfortable.

Safety--Airbags and modern safety equipment a must. So much for that '67 Galaxy 500 :-)

Donor condition--One thing that I read over and over is that a junky ICE car makes a junky EV. If you get an old rusty donor car your going to end up with an old rusty EV (unless you put a ton of work into it).

Likeability--You might as well like what you are driving. For instance, originally I was going to convert a late model BMW 3-Series. But after driving them several times I just did not like it.

The above list is not exhaustive, but rather a starting point. I needed to narrow down the donor selection somehow. Each of the above points are pretty general. For instance range alone entails a discussion on vehicle weight, carrying capacity, battery chemistry, and more. Which is again why the donor car decision was not the first decision.

And the winner is....