DIY Hybrid Car Kit

Hybride And The Groom writes "Building hybrids uses machinery that pollutes the environment. The solution? Ship the parts of a hybrid individually and get your customers to put the car together themselves. That's exactly what Robert Q Riley Enterprises is doing, according to a story on CNet today, with its XR-3 hybrid. It'll cost you $25,000 for the bits, plus zero dollars in manufacture, I hope. Better yet, cough up $200 for the blueprints and schematics and even build the parts yourself. It's no secret that many hybrid drivers are smug enough as it is. Allow them to brag about having built the damn cars themselves and we might be entering obscenely smug territory."

Comments

buy an old S10 and convert it to electric

[scarbelly]

there are plenty of people doing nice electric S10's for under $10k including the donor car. The 40 miles round trip per charge is almost twice what I need.

Why stop there?

[earthforce_1]

Why not design the car yourself - using bits and pieces found at your local junkyard? Better yet - smelt the metal in your garage and take up blacksmithing to make all the bits. Sort of like building your own computer from discrete transistors.

uh, no, that's not the reason

[Ancient_Hacker]

Uh, building a hybrid at home probably makes more pollution than making it in a factory.

The reason they sell it as a kit is to avoid all the federal vehicle rules. By passing on assembly to the end-user, it becomes THEIR problem to get the car licensed.

Also I don't quite get the "zero dollars to manufacture". Lots of the steps involve lots of time, welding, painting, trips to the hardware store. That all costs many $$$.

Safety

[HalAtWork]

So has this thing been crash tested? Do you have to get the car certified after you build it, so that you can drive it on the road? Are you any more liable if anything happens to a passenger, motorist, or pedestrian, in such a car?

Re:"Zero dollars in manufacture"

[Qzukk]

Only if your time is worth zero dollars.

Or the entertainment you receive from putting together your own toys is greater than the cost of your time, in which case you might even "profit".

Spare time

[phorm]

Well, if you enjoy tinkering with stuff and would otherwise have the time free anyhow, then it might even be that the time is of a negative cost.

That is to say, if you spend $25k for the unit, but spend 200 hours being rather entertained by putting it together, then you've just spend $25k on the parts and saved $x on whatever else you might have spend that money on (movies, video games, trips, etc).

I do a lot of the additions/repairs around the house. If might cost *more* than a plumber/carpenter/etc if you count what my day job's hourly rate is, but for me the cost of supplies is paying for both the renos and the entertainment of doing them.

One man's burden is another man's leisure, I'd rather be working on neat projects around the house than baking under a hot sun swinging a stick at a dimpled white ball.

Re:"Zero dollars in manufacture"

[Shotgun]

Having nearly completed building a one-off airplane, I can attest to the fact that a one-off greatly increases the amount of 'stuff' going into the waste stream. It seems that each part made for the airplane requires a mold, jig or custom clamp to hold it in place. Buy the time I finish, I will have built the equivalent of 2.5 airplanes, and none of those molds, jigs or clamps will be useful to anyone else.

Let there be no doubt. Massive manufacturing operations really do decrease the waste-stream volume on a per unit basis.