Based out of Canada, Taiga Motors is a company founded in 2015. Currently they are accepting reservations for an all-electric snowmobile. They are also taking reservations for their all-electric personal watercraft. For more information, be sure to check out their website at https://taigamotors.ca/
A Tesla GT Race Car with heavy custom modifications. Does it showcase what could be available in a future aftermarket for EV’s? The Plaid power-train for Tesla is expected to be available later this year on the Model S and possibly the Model X. Back in June of 2018 however, the Lovecars YouTube channel posted this video of this heavily modified P100DL Model S.
The Switch Lab is a classroom which challenges students to build road-worthy electric vehicles. It’s essentially and electric vehicle school. The course is structured around learning, building, testing, and then driving the finished Switch EV. It takes students through a complete project-based learning process. Founded in 2013, the Switch Lab practices what they teach. The core concept of the program is building their 3-wheeled vehicle from kit, and at the end of a course, the vehicle is then disassembled and used again for the next class. Students learn the various components of an EV along with the install and everything else that goes along with the build. Switch Lab Instructor Training For anyone interested in becoming an electric vehicle school instructor, the Switch Lab currently offers two different programs. The first is a 4 day workshop for lead acid batteries. The second workshop spans 4.5 days and covers advanced topics for lithium ion and goes into controller programming. High Schools and Community Colleges The majority of their training is done in their Sebastopol, California shop. However, it doesn’t end there. They have an instructor training program where trainees have gone on to teach curriculum in high schools and colleges. It’s a modern day auto-shop. You can check out their school locations here to see if one of their customers have offered an electric vehicle school near you. While there are other electric vehicle workshops out there, I find it intriguing that the Lab Switch has a fairly wide spread. Looking at their school locations, there’s a good amount of schools using their program across the US. Currently only one international school in Thailand, but that could certainly change over time. The only one in my home state of Washington is at Friday Harbor which is located in the San Juan Islands, although it’s at a high school. When we bought our used Nissan LEAF back in 2015, I remember the sales person ask me if I knew where the most EV’s were registered in Washington. At the time, it was in the San Juan Islands. It makes sense if you’re on a fairly small island, you wouldn’t need a lot of range. A vehicle with even only 84 miles (without battery degradation) such as the Gen 1 Nissan LEAF should be more than enough. If one pops up at a local community college, I’d likely look into attending the course. The Kits Currently on their website they show four kit options, ranging in price from $27,994 up to $39,994 at the higher end. It also shows that you can contact them for custom quotes. The lower end has a 72 volt lead acid battery system, where as the next three kits have a 96 volt lithium ion. On the Lithium Ion kits, prices of the kits vary based on the motor: DC Drive (same as the Lead Acid base model) ADC Drive Hyper 9/Drive A couple additional options are also offered. Instead of a bare metal frame for the “glider”, you can have it powder coated. You can also opt for a 3rd seat or bench. Check out their workshop calendar for events in other locations as well. For anyone looking to learn more about electric vehicles and how to build them, it’s worth a look to see if what they offer is the right fit for your needs. More Electric Vehicle Posts on Fabville! Check out more of our posts on electric vehicles: https://fabville.com/category/automotive/electric-vehicles
Posted by “Elon McFly”, this is a great Tesla Cybertruck visual effects update to the classic Back to the Future scene. This is the scene at Twin Pines Mall where Doc Brown first gets the time machine up to 88mph.
When Tesla unveiled the Cybertruck in November 2019, they expected mixed reactions. It has been described as anything from polarizing to ugly. It’s very unlikely any other major automotive manufacturer would have been daring enough to build something so different. One thing is for sure, it is definitely grabbing attention. It’s also inspiring some fabricators to build their own version of the Cybertruck!
Rivian shows off their “tank turn” capability on their all-electric R1T pickup truck. The quadmotor system allows independent control of each wheel. Very similar to a tank that can put one set of tracks into reverse, the other set forward, to help control turning, the Rivian R1T is able to perform a true on a dime turn, although not sure how much control you have with it or if part of it is based on a loose surface.
Meet the Rivian R1T electric adventure truck. Rivian is a startup company that began in 2009. However, they did a good job of staying under the radar in the automotive industry until recently. A video of their upcoming pickup truck the R1T made it onto YouTube. Shortly thereafter, a debut at the L.A. Auto Show. Rivian has since released a new video of the truck. The specs are fairly impressive, at least by today’s standards. At the top end with a 180kWh battery option, the truck is expected to have a range of over 400 miles per charge. The base model, with a 105kWh battery pack will have a range of over 250 miles. Even the smallest battery is larger than any other EV on the market today. Of course, the 2020 Tesla Roadster is expected to have a 200kWh battery.
This appears to be a short-lived user interface change to the Suspension Settings. The Tesla Model S/X with air suspension the screen showed a submarine type vehicle. This update was rolled out in the initial V9.0 of the software. Soon after the v9 software received a minor update about a week or two later it was reverted back.
Track Mode was just announced to start rolling out as an over-the-air update by Tesla today. So far it looks like it will only be available for the Model 3’s with the Performance package.
In this video from Engineering Explained, the debate of carbon footprint of electric vehicles is visited. Are electrical vehicles worse for the environment? There’s certainly several variables to consider, and it’s not necessarily a straight forward answer.
