I *think* so. I've always wanted to find a VW Thing and mock it up as a Kubelwagen. Be fun to drive to the local burger joint on a sat nite!!
So far the leaf is looking like it's going to do everything I wanted. The 120v slow charger is the only thing holding it back. I have a 240v charger here in town, at the post office. I put the trailer hitch on this past weeken, but have not wired in the trailer lights. Mean while gas and diesel prices keep going up.
I converted my 12 amp 120v charger to 240v power. Still only charges at 12 amps but twice as fast. I ordered a charger that will allow for 240v charging at 14 or 15 amps. Also I think I should have a spare charger 1 is none, 2 is one. Charging on 120v power sucks if you want to do anything besides go to work and home. This modification does exactly everything all the warning stickers on the EVSE say not to do. Edit: That charger I ordered charges at 16 amps.
I drove the leaf to work, pulling my trailer, brought home a load of 10 pallets. The leaf battery was getting kind of low by the time I got home. Had to take the firebird to the next town over to go have my fun. To my surprise it's not the small battery and lack of range holding me back it's keeping the car charged. The small capacity battery and slow 3.8kw charger is not a great combination. Now every all electric vehicle I know of besides the 2011 and 2012 leaf have built in 6.6kw chargers. Mainly not being able to charge at work is the biggest obstacle, because when I get home the battery is around half used up. Pulling an empty trailer to work and coming back with a load of pallets uses closer to between 2/3 to 3/4 of the battery. But at this rate I will probably be putting gas in my firebird once every month or 2 and my wifes car about once a month. Before I was putting gas in my car between once and twice a week and my wifes car every one to 2 weeks. Anytime you need something and it's a 20 mile round trip or 50 miles round trip to go work on the rental house really adds up. With gas at $3 a gallon the break even time looks like it will be between 1 to 2 years. Closer to 2 years. When, or how soon gas goes back to the 3.50 to 3.80 mark, means sooner pay back time. That means I will have more money to spend on hookers, cocane and booze.
Glad I'm done with that. I put gas in my wifes car about once every 2 weeks, fill it up from half and my firebird about the same or less.
*giggles* Heres a new thread on sumone buying an EV to Save money on Gas, and a few months ago I bought a gas burner to work on, that is/should be impervious to the EV's kryptonite! EMP!! Makes you wonder which of us two monkeys is more Nuts!
An for the record, since I'm not very good at working on vehicles, good shops around here are hard to find, and I'm always either at work, working at home, or working on a lil piece of land i bought last year. My money is on ME being more Nuts!
Why do people assume just because you buy an electric that's now all you own? I still have my diesel 1985 suburban. It lacks any kind of ignition system its lithium battery pack will out last the 40 gallon tank of diesel if the alternator dies and for some reason I can't get one of the 3 spare 12si alternators to work and my 12si rebuild kits are bad and my solar panels on top are dead too then it will stop. I only put diesel in it 1 to 4 times a year since 2013. I don't drive it much but still keep it. The leaf isn't our only vehicle. Good thing about the leaf is if there was a nuclear EMP that kills everything I wouldn't be more than 25 miles from home. It replaced a 2001 VW bug that we hadn't hardly driven since 2015, it couldn't run over a dead cat with out breaking something. I like the leaf, just have to do a little electrical around the house to make charging more convenient. Plus if it did survive a nuclear EMP it's completely silent, great for sneaking around. The leaf would be uneffected by solar EMP, just the power grid would be gone.
A secondary reason I got the leaf was the battery. I am considering replacing the battery at some point and keeping the old one. The current battery replaced in 2014 is still showing 12 out of 12 battery health bars. But some day it will need replacing. I would disassemble the 400vdc the battery and reassembling the modules for 48v for off grid power.
I was out collecting fire wood with the leaf with my 4x8 tailer and snuck up on some mule deer. This thing is too quiet. The local wild life aren't used to vehicle being so silent. Now I know where they like to bed down during the day.
I'm building up my own little charging network. Not going to wait for the stupid and useless government to do it. I installed a combination duplex receptacle at one friends house a plain 120v nema 5-15r top receptacle and 240v 6-15r bottom. Materials, labor supplies are free but I get to charge there when I stop by. They wanted an outdoor receptacle for their little pool so they didn't have to run an extension cord from the window on the other side of the house. They don't have very many 3 prong receptacles in their old house. Next chance I get I am installing another one coming off the outdoor main panel (real easy install) at another friends house. They're getting pool receptacle on a gfi and a welding receptacle. Now if these people want an electric vehicle or some sort of plug in hybrid they will have a place to charge it. Just going to need a 240v extension cord.
After 6 weeks of constant use I have racked up nearly 1,700 miles saving some where around $233. I expected to save somewhere between $100 and $200 a month. So far it's saving around $150 per month. The first 2 weeks I was stuck with the 120v charger that was really limiting use. The power bill is up $15 to $20 a month. At this rate the payback, including the power used is around 4 years, if gas prices don't go up. I feel bad for all the dip sticks that drive around in 10 to 15 mpg trucks everywhere. On second thought, not really. You reap what you sew.
I can get used to this not buying gas thing. My wifes 2008 Hyundai sonata has 240,000 miles on it, she bought it new. It has a transmission problem that is fixable and a fuel or ignition problem that pops up on really cold days that I have not figured out. But have to keep this car going for 2 or 3 more years. I think I have her talked into getting a Hyundai sonata plug in hybrid lease turn in. I have been watching the resale value of the prius prime, which is the "plug in prius". Resale value on these things goes off a cliff. The Hyundai plug in should follow suit. Which means I should be able to pay cash for for a 3 year old lease turn in. Because I don't really do banks or like them at all. My projection is that a plug in Asian hybrid car will lose a cool $10,000 just after the first year. Approximately 14 to $16,000 at 2 years and by 3 years will have lost a total of around $20,000 and possibly up to $25,000 in value, which puts it into cash and carry range.