Electric Car Sighted on Highway - Who Makes It?

moophus managed to spot an interesting vehicle on the roads: "Spotted: one electric vehicle on the highways of Atlanta, Georgia. Sighted around 6:30pm EDT, going south on I-85, traveling ~60mph (had a cool hum). It was a single seater, three wheeled wonder. Can anyone identify make, model? Any details on this bugger, like: range, efficiency, top speed, acceleration, cost, and cell type? I could only get several pictures which didn't turn out too well, since I had to gamma correct two of them. Another interesting thing that I've heard about electric cars: they have purposely put in noise makers in the wheels (like those plastic tri-cycles back in the day) because they just ran too quiet to be safe. Is this true?" The pictures didn't turn out too badly, as you can definitely make out much of the shape of this thing. It's more like a motorcycle than a car, but it still looks interesting enough. Hopefully more vehicles like this will be making their way on to the markets (and the roads) sometime soon.

Comments

The Sparrow by Corbin Motors of San Francisco

[stefanlasiewski]

Moophus,

I've had my eye on those vehicles for 2 years :)

The car you are looking at is called the 'Sparrow'. . It is manufactured by Corbin Motors of San Francisco (actually, their main factory/headquarters is in Hollister, CA, 30 miles south of San Jose; but few people know where Hollister is). It's a one person vehicle. It has a 60 mile range and can go up to 60 mph. Cost is $14-16,000 It's available in North America, Europe & Asia.

I've sat in a Sparrow, but I've never driven one. It's a comfortable, but spartan interior.

Corbin Motors deal mostly with motorcycles, but has this small electric vehicle business on the side (and good luck to them!).

Their main showroom is located 1.5 blocks from the 'South Park' area in South of Market in San Francisco. They are surrounded by a bunch of former dotcom buildings (and a few surviving dotcoms, like mine :) .