6 Alternative-Fuel Vehicles Built By Teenagers

Jerry James Stone — Sat, 15 Aug 2009 19:24:57 +0000

Car companies like Tesla, Toyota and Nissan are all scrambling for a piece of the EV market. Heck, even cities like San Francisco and Portland want some. But they all just got pwned by these kids. These vehicles run on everything from solar to soy!

Texas Teen Buys Car Off eBay, Makes It Electric

Luke Laborde turned a 32 mpg gas-burning Bradley GT II kit car into a fully electric ride for just about $10,000. The ride, which was purchased off eBay, has eight 80-pound batteries throughout including where the gas tank used to be. The car gets 40 miles on a full charge.

Student Built Race Car Is Powered By Soybeans

Five kids from West Philly’s high school auto shop class, ex-gang members and high school dropouts built this soybean-powered race car. The car gets 50+ mpg and goes from 0 to 60 in just 4 seconds! But the real win here is how the experience impacted these kids. One of the few still in high school, Kosi Harmon, went from getting D’s to being a straight-A student.

8th Grader Builds Solar-Powered Bike With GPS, iPod Dock

Eighth-grader David S. Dixon built this street-legal quadricycle powered by a solar-charged electric motor. The bike not only carries his dog and three friends, but it has also has an iPod dock and GPS. Ya, it’s that cool!

16 Year Old Converts 1988 Mazda Truck To A Plugin EV

Andrew Angelloti, after saving up $6,000 as a part time lifeguard, converted his very own truck to be a plug-in. Using 20 flooded lead acid batteries to create 120 volts and a 60 HP electric motor, the truck hits a top speed of 55 mph and has range of 40 miles. Best part, he blogs about it so others can mod their cars. You can check out his blog here.

15 Year Old Builds Air-Powered Ride Back In 1989

This air-powered car was covered by KODE Channel 12 of Joplin, MO back in 1989. You can tell by VHS-to-YouTube quality of the video. The idea was pitched to car companies but largely ignored.

Alaskan Teen Converts 1971 VW Super Beetle To Electric Car

While some VW enthusiasts are still waiting for the car company to tap the electric car market (one of those being me), senior Bart Grabman has beat them to the punch. Whether or not Bart can see Russia from his house, he has my vote! Though…can I get mine in one of these?

XR3: 225 MPG Plug-In Hybrid Trike Headed for Production

Jerry James Stone — Sun, 14 Jun 2009 17:58:14 +0000

Robert Riley’s XR3 kit car is an amazing three-wheeled plug-in diesel hybrid. The trike gets a jaw dropping 225mpg on combined diesel-electric power and 125mpg when using only the 23hp diesel engine.

And hey, it kinda looks like that Back to the Future car!

Introduced back in June of 2008, the two-passenger car was designed so it can be assembled using readily available parts. Fully constructed, the car weighs in at 1480 pounds and has top speed of 80mph. And while you can only get 40 miles out of its li-ion battery pack, it can be plugged into any standard wall socket.

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