Click above for more shots of this Porsche 911 EV conversion

Sometimes, we find various electric vehicle conversions on eBay to share with our readers. In many cases, the cars are in pretty sorry condition and the work which was done is highly suspect. In the case of this 1973 Porsche 911, though, everything done to the vehicle has been well documented in an online diary. There are also over forty pictures of the completed vehicle including every single dent and paint scratch. Most impressive. The EV conversion was officially started in late '93 and officially finished in late '96. Three years went into the removal of the engine and its related bits along with the addition of a DC electric motor along with 96 volts of lead-acid batteries. A bit later, the voltage was increased to 120, which yielded almost ten miles of range. Yeah... that's bad.

The good news, if it could be called that, is that the brakes were and are dragging, which is not helping performance at all. With a little work and some new batteries, this Porsche EV could be back on the road and getting somebody to work. Take a look at all the pics in our gallery, read the entire diary here and see the car's dedicated website here. Thanks for the tip, Dustin!


[Source: eBay Motors]

Click above for high-res gallery of the 2009 Porsche 911

Stopping an engine when it's not necessary for the operation of the car seems like a common sense move when fuel efficiency and emissions are the main concern. When performance is the biggest priority, though, the added weight and complexity of a stop-start system might not be worth it, at least not for drivers interested in the Porsche 911. Instead, Porschephiles would prefer that their sports cars remain as pure as possible, which means a powerful but conventional flat-six engine at the rear of the vehicle. That said, Porsche does intend to a good number of PDK dual-clutch transmissions as opposed to the traditional three-pedal setup, which seems contrary to the mission of a pure drivers car. Porsche also looks to improve overall efficiency by reducing the weight of its Boxster and 911.

On the other hand, stop-start technology seems like a no-brainer for less-sporty vehicles like the Cayenne and the upcoming Panamera, which are also likely to be given a full hybrid drivetrain as an option. Diesels, long the bane of the Porsche aficionado, are also in the works for upcoming Porsche models.

[Source: CAR via Autoblog]

While Porsche has made it abundantly clear that they have no concerns about trying to meet new corporate average fuel economy standards in the U.S. in the coming decade, that doesn't mean that aren't doing anything to improve the fuel consumption of their cars. Relative to their performance, Porsche cars have always comparatively efficient anyway, with the current 2008 Carrera 2 coupe be being rated at 18mpg city/26mpg hwy. That's a lot better than most SUVs. That's actually better than a V6 Saturn Vue at 16/23mpg.

Nonetheless, in the quest for ever-increasing performance, Porsche has evolved the 911 once again for 2009. This year the fuel is injected directly into the combustion chambers instead of into the intake ports. As with other similar arrangements at other manufacturers, the benefit is both increased output while using less fuel to do it. Output of the 3.6 and 3.8L engines is now up 20 and 30 percent horsepower respectively. In combination with the the new 7 speed dual clutch gearbox, the fuel consumption of these updated drivetrains is reduced by 13 percent. Interestingly, Porsche first developed the dual clutch gearbox in the 1980s for the 962 race car but has never used it in a production model while numerous other manufacturers are now using that setup. Now if Porsche had instead cut the displacement and maintained the current power levels, the efficiency improvement likely would have topped 20 percent. After all, does cutting a couple of tenths of a second off the 0-60 time when you're already in the mid-4 second range really make any difference in the real world where most people driving these cars are posers anyway?

[Source: Porsche]

In the video above, Jeremy Clarkson, host of Top Gear, says the Porsche 911 Turbo cleans the air in polluted cities like LA. While, I have seen concept cars that can clean the air, I seriously doubt any existing car, especially the Porsche 911 Turbo, emits exhaust that is cleaner than air, even air in the most polluted cities. Here is exactly what Clarkson says:

When you drive this car through a really polluted city; Los Angeles, Calcutta, Harrogate(?), something like that; the gas coming out of the exhaust pipe is less toxic than the air going into the engine. And I am not joking, that's true. This then is like a small, efficient, easy to use vacuum cleaner. They should have called it the Porsche Dyson.

So, here's the question for a Sunday afternoon. What do you think? Is he wrong or does he have a definition of toxic that I don't understand?

[Source: YouTube]