Some interesting electric car developments went down in England recently -- Liberty Electric Cars announced plans to convert "tens of thousands" cars and SUVs to electric operation, starting with the Range Rover, and NICE previewed a scissor-door concept it'll be showing at the London Auto Show. Liberty's pumping £30M ($59.3M) into a new factory that will start converting Range Rovers to electric vehicles using a "state-of-the-art" drivetrain good for 200 miles on a single charge. You'll have to pay for the privilege, though -- pricing is expected to run between £95,000 ($188,128) and £125,000 ($247,537).
Similarly, English outfit No Internal Combustion Engine (NICE, very cute) is previewing an all-electric sports car that it plans to show off at the London Auto Show in July. Although it's just a prototype, the company says that it hints at a future production model. Details are pretty light, but here's hoping those hot scissor doors make in into production.
Read - Liberty electric Range Rovers
Read - NICE prototype
[Via
Electricpig and
InventorSpot]
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Eh @ May 24th 2008 7:18PM
looks nice
Genjinaro @ May 24th 2008 7:21PM
I beg to differ...
Or we're seeing 2 different pictures...
Jason @ May 24th 2008 7:25PM
yeah that car looks pretty good but i think its a like it or hate it type of thing.
genji: i think your looking at a mirror....
- OHHHHHH BURNNNNNNN!!! lol
Christian Martin @ May 24th 2008 9:24PM
And it will look exactly the same until after the first rain storm, when it will proceed to look and smell like WET ASS.
Ellianth @ May 25th 2008 11:12AM
If I ever saw one of those monstrosities on the street, I think I'd laugh and point.
jere @ May 25th 2008 5:39PM
Am I the only one who caught the fact that he used "nice" to describe it?
xobmo @ May 26th 2008 1:33PM
you spelled internal wrong buddy. @ps3~
nak @ May 24th 2008 7:26PM
I love scissor doors (uh but I've always heard them called gull-wing doors.)
At any rate, there's one serious problem -- garages. Your home garage may be tall enough, but a lot of underground garages and parking structures don't have the height to open the doors.
nak @ May 24th 2008 7:29PM
Especially the underground garages in Beverly Hills, where residents might actually be able to afford this car.
Reader @ May 24th 2008 8:06PM
Gullwing doors are a little different, this is what they look like: http://www.motorera.com/dictionary/pics/g/gullwing.jpg
Almighty- @ May 24th 2008 9:25PM
It's called Lambo Doors ;)
ddub @ May 25th 2008 3:38PM
Lambo Doors are so 80's even Lambo's don't have them anymore.
gabe @ May 24th 2008 7:36PM
hmm - a reliable english car?
hah
The_Steven @ May 25th 2008 12:57AM
Sure it is, it has a genuine Lucas electrical system.
You can rely on it to give you trouble from day one.
fanman @ May 25th 2008 10:17AM
http://video.aol.com/video-detail/top-gear-british-leyland-challenge-by-husyk/371825701
Howard @ May 24th 2008 7:45PM
The doors are pretty much the only "hot" thing in that picture. The front end looks like a Hyundai Tiburon that drove into a wall.
paul34 @ May 24th 2008 7:45PM
A drivetrain capable of keeping a lard Land Rover going for 200 miles? If that is true they have either passed every other manufacturer on the planet or they expect people to go around at 2 MPH with no hills whatsoever.
nikola @ May 24th 2008 8:50PM
It says a top speed of 90MPH.
Also the fact that the converted cars cost around 200K might explain why tech isn't currently used in crap ass GM cars. Of course, mass production may cheap the tech..and then licensing deals come...and then....AND THEN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
polvadis @ May 24th 2008 7:46PM
Wow, that is butt ugly. But I'm sure it will sell. I mean look at Land Rover and what a piece of engineering crap that is. But at $50k+ it still sells like hot cakes.
Artie Lange @ May 24th 2008 7:48PM
It would be great if all these small start-ups (Tesla, Fisker, et. al) beat the Big 3 to the punch and put them in the ground once and for all. GM could have built a commercially viable electric car nearly two decades ago, and decided to shelve it. Imagine where EVs could be now if they hadn't.
Bring on $6-a-gallon gas. Its time to end Detroit's monopoly in America. They assumed government/OPEC/Detroit collusion would keep them in business for another century, and they were wrong.
polvadis @ May 24th 2008 8:06PM
That's true. I especially liked when Bush just last week went to Saudi Arabia to ask for more oil and one of US' biggest allies in the region said NO. The days of artificial government controlled oil price are over.
But I believe what will happen is that GM, Ford, or Chrysler will simply buy someone like Tesla and rip apart their technology to use in their own cars. It also probably means that the creative engineering to get Tesla like company will be very limited adding years to good designs.
Reader @ May 24th 2008 8:07PM
Detroit has a monopoly here in America? Weird... I could have sworn on my way home today that I saw a shit-ton of imports.
bartoron @ May 24th 2008 9:14PM
I think it depends more where you live. I've noticed that in less financially well-off communities American cars are more common than in affluent communities. Also, I'm sure that US cars are a lot more common in Michigan than they are in other parts.
Mark @ May 24th 2008 8:19PM
sigh, yet ANOTHER company that just 'doesn't' get it. Everyone wants electric cars to *save* money, yet they can't do that because almost every company with an electric car sells them for what a house costs..
fanman @ May 25th 2008 10:20AM
Correct.
Evan @ May 24th 2008 8:24PM
NO! NO! NO! Don't give me fancy doors. Don't give me Ferrari performance. Just give me a normal looking, normal performance electric car for $20,000.
bartoron @ May 24th 2008 9:11PM
Indeed. Besides, I would be afraid that the doors might accidentally swing down while I'm getting into the car and decapitate me. o__O
dreamscape86 @ May 24th 2008 9:15PM
The reason electric car designers only make sports cars that cost as much as a house is that you can mark up a performance car much more than a sedan. They need to cover their (very extensive) R&D costs before they can afford to produce a reasonably-priced sedan and sell it a a narrower margin. That's why Tesla made the Roadster first and their sedan is coming later.
SevenKiller @ May 24th 2008 9:41PM
I have a Kia Spectra. It's fine. Just rip out the internal combustion stuff and install electric that goes 200 miles on a charge. That shouldn't be a big trick. It also shouldn't cost more than $20,000, including profit. Greed is a beautiful thing...........................
eric @ May 24th 2008 10:00PM
Well, have fun opening those doors in the rain and totally drenching the interior of the car.
nima @ May 24th 2008 10:41PM
how long do these things take to charge and how do you get around the limitations during longer trips?
Battery transplant stations anyone?
Jake Maheu @ May 24th 2008 10:43PM
"Speeling miztake!"
"No Intenal Combustion Engine"
Should be "No Internal Combustion Engine".
MichaelD @ May 25th 2008 1:24PM
Not to mention--
"announced plans to covert 'tens of thousands' cars"
Good to know these cars will be secretive--tens of thousands [of] cars will now be made stealthy!
iEye @ May 24th 2008 11:08PM
All we need now is that Cold Fusion, then we can just bomb those terrorist countries to kingdom come! oil and ALL!
Ha Ha! USA #1
Kyle @ May 25th 2008 12:08AM
The type of cars within an area vary immensely. all you see in Michigan are cadillacs, hummers, and 300's. It's very rare for you to see any foreign cars except for the few tuners taht dart about everywhere. Then again, It doesn't help that i live in Rochester, Michigan which is home to louds of head honchos of the big 3 either.
eric @ May 25th 2008 2:29AM
Holla!
I used to live in Sterling Heights for like 8 years.
johnmeyer @ May 25th 2008 2:15AM
I truly wish that electric cars were technologically viable. However, unlike hybrid cars which carefully control the extent to which they allow the battery to discharge, these cars will run their batteries over a much wider range of their charge/discharge range. As a result, unlike hybrids which can make their 1,000 pounds of batteries last for 5-7 years, these cars are likely to need complete battery replacement in half that time or less. The cost will be greater than the price of a new transmission, most likely in the $2,500 - $4,000 range.
In addition, unless the electric generation facility uses something other than fossil fuel, one gallon of fossil fuel burned at the electric generation facility will power an electric car less than half the miles than if that same gallon were put in a conventional small car and burned there directly. Thus, absent some large-scale electricity generation substitute for fossil fuel, electric cars will actually significantly increase CO2 emissions and more rapidly deplete oil and coal supplies.
avtolik @ May 25th 2008 4:27AM
"one gallon of fossil fuel burned at the electric generation facility will power an electric car less than half the miles than if that same gallon were put in a conventional small car"
How the **** did you come up with that?!?
According to Tesla Motors, their electric car spends US$0.02 per mile.
abib @ May 25th 2008 9:28AM
did you pull that information out of your ass?
TheWakeUpCall @ May 25th 2008 8:49AM
Fuuuuuuugly!
neurosceptic @ May 25th 2008 10:13AM
Why Why Why! Why would you want an all electric SUV? It's not good for the environment, it makes no sense. I suppose when you want to mow down innocents with your ridiculous car, you can do it with stealth?
Ok, I've just looked at the press release. These f***ing liars claim that it's a zero emission car. Of course, if it's plugged into in wind turbine that is. This is only for the most blindingly hypocritical of rich people, who can lie to themselves to say they are benig green whilst wallowing in excess.
Alex @ May 25th 2008 10:08PM
I would rather take the Range Rover design,
I'm not a fan of these strange electric concept designs...it just seems to retro or something.
But still, it's good to see people making an effort to make a car that is electric.
Jwm @ May 25th 2008 11:58PM
I am going to convert an old Porsche 931 to EV here pretty shortly, it is rather cheap shockingly. Depending on the batter tech that I use that is, I would like to use A123 batteries actually.
Considering the EV motor will cost me about the same as a rebuilt turbo, it baffles me that we have not seen (well there is that Chevy Volt) mass market company with an all electric.
I guess there are many problems when you are a GM or a Ford. I lose people needing oil changes, if the motor is AC I will not even see them for brush replacement, etc. The DC motors only need brushes every 50,000 to 100,000 depending, so that is not great from their point of view. I would still get brake jobs as a GM, but the customer might DIY or go to one of those local brake places.
There are really a ton of pro's to all electric, one thing I did not know is even a DIY EV conversion will get about $.04 per mile, and since your local power station is much cleaner burning per hypothetical mile, even the green's can't complain. If you are on Hydro or nuke even better.
Some con's...LiPo fires after a crash, range, cost of battery replacement (but an EV is likely going to last you longer anyway so think of battery replacement like buying a new car (even thought the batteries are not that high)), etc..
Randos @ May 26th 2008 5:38PM
Wut? Let's say you had to climb into your car during a downpour...
takemetoyourtoaster @ May 26th 2008 9:09PM
it really annoys me that they think that we all need really really nice looking ferrarri style doors on an electric car. I don't need that. I just want a normal looking electric car. the prius is just ugly, just give me one that looks normal
Alex @ May 25th 2008 10:09PM
Thank you.
Prototype @ May 27th 2008 4:29AM
This is just further proof that furthering technology is in the human races' best interest. when humans abuse technology, they dont stop. Even if it would destroy the earth (cough, cough). So not only are top researchers and scientist and engineers making cars for humans in the first place, they are now constructing vehicles so they dont kill us all. So to all those skeptical that technology is the death of us, look at your consumerism and we'll work on environmentally friendly cars.