Fuego and I went to see "An Inconvenient Truth" this afternoon... awesome!

I have been putting off restoring my '66 Mustang for a lot of years now because of the environmental impact of putting another V8 on the road -- and the financial impact of only getting around 12-20 miles per gallon!

Having watched this film, I'm pretty much convinced of my previous concerns... thus I spent about six hours this afternoon researching electric conversions for gas powered vehicles =o)

While it will be considerably more expensive to restore the Mustang as an EV (around 10-15k instead of 5k), I will have a uniquely awesome modern classic that I can be very proud to take to the streets.

Performance wise, EVs can easily top 100 mph, and by today's standards, can easily have a range of over 100 miles. They are also capable of doing 0-60 in about 4.5 seconds (in case you were concerned that I'd be taming one of America's great muscle cars), and with the added use of ultracapacitors and regenerative braking systems (see, I have been studying), it will easily outperform it's gasoline internal combustion engine (ICE) counterparts. Of course, there is also the updating of the brakes, heater, AC, etc. that I would have to do anyway, but, with an EV, things like AC don't pose a threat to performance the way they would in ICE's (horsepower is drained every time you add another pulley and belt to an ICE... not so with EVs).

As you can see, I'm pretty excited about it right now... I'll have to get back to you when I get the estimates from the conversion experts (I really don't want to do it myself with a car that's as important to me as the inherited '66 mustang!).

In the meantime, I'll continue driving the life out of my 1990 Integra... which at 225,000 miles still gets an average of 30 mpg in town and up to 40 highway (better than many of the less economic hybrids out there! ;o)

For more information that you can shake a stick at, check out: Advanced Electric Vehicle Conversion Project, or for a quick look at a lot of projects (including a 66 rag top just like mine), check out the EV Conversion Photo Album.