- Joined
- Mar 30, 2023
Edison Motors is a company operating out of the (farm) backyard of the compnay owner's parent's house.
Their mission is to make diesel-electric semi trucks, semi truck that have a 100% electric drivetrain but uses an onboard diesel generator to produce power. They started with retrofitting classic truck like peterbuilts or kenmores with their new drivetrain, and have just produced the first prototype of they fully in-house truck and plan to produce more. They are fully privately owned, with their capital investments coming from future buyers invested in the company's future, and not stock traders or mutual funds that only care about making a profit on their return.
Their plan is to build Semis that are extremely easy to repair by the customer, that gain the high torque of an electric vehicle, and the fuel savings from being able to have regenerative braking and a generator that solely runs at it's most efficient rpm. It will not have the range anxieties that a 100% electric vehicle suffers from. They fully embrace the right-to-repair philosophy and use as many off-the-shelf parts as possible to ensure that any company that buys it's trucks can fully repair it as needed.
Also, they are in the process of making a retrofit kit to convert old (or new, but why?) heavy-duty pickup trucks to their diesel-electric platform. There will ba a RWD kit that provides the equivalent of 350hp, and a 4x4 kit that provides 500 Hp, 8,800 ft-lb torque. Thay are in the process of inviting dealers to partner with them, and they will sell the dealers the kits to install into restored trucks. Minimum order is one kit, so you could choose to find a dirt cheap junker that's been sitting since the 60's and restore it into a powerful electric that makes the Cybertruck look like a kid's toy (not that it needs much help)
This I find pretty exciting as it will be much more environmentally friendly to recycle an old truck over manufacturing a new disposable electric. Plus it uses modular components that are easy to service and replace and you can use mass produced parts for the original truck chassis. They're currently in the process of finding shops who will partner to handle the refurbishing of trucks. They think that the cost of the kit will be "33%-50% of the cost of a new truck" whish is disappointing vague as I don't know what they are considering the cost of a new truck, but if one of their partners focuses on finding and refurbishing trucks with good frames but dead engines, that could be a decent supply of trucks at a reasonable price.
If this does well then it's reasonable to assume they will eventually offer kits to convert light duty SUVs or trucks, and even cars.
Honestly I think a lot of people would. If anyone is close with a shop that does a lot of restorations or work on vehicles they might be interested in this.
I'm hoping the number work out enough that it's very profitable to find old trucks with dead drivetrains and retrofit them to be electric.
Take this 1941 international Harvester or this 1939 Dodge you can get for less then a couple grand. If it was restored and with an electric drivetrain it would be an awesome truck.
Their mission is to make diesel-electric semi trucks, semi truck that have a 100% electric drivetrain but uses an onboard diesel generator to produce power. They started with retrofitting classic truck like peterbuilts or kenmores with their new drivetrain, and have just produced the first prototype of they fully in-house truck and plan to produce more. They are fully privately owned, with their capital investments coming from future buyers invested in the company's future, and not stock traders or mutual funds that only care about making a profit on their return.
Their plan is to build Semis that are extremely easy to repair by the customer, that gain the high torque of an electric vehicle, and the fuel savings from being able to have regenerative braking and a generator that solely runs at it's most efficient rpm. It will not have the range anxieties that a 100% electric vehicle suffers from. They fully embrace the right-to-repair philosophy and use as many off-the-shelf parts as possible to ensure that any company that buys it's trucks can fully repair it as needed.
Also, they are in the process of making a retrofit kit to convert old (or new, but why?) heavy-duty pickup trucks to their diesel-electric platform. There will ba a RWD kit that provides the equivalent of 350hp, and a 4x4 kit that provides 500 Hp, 8,800 ft-lb torque. Thay are in the process of inviting dealers to partner with them, and they will sell the dealers the kits to install into restored trucks. Minimum order is one kit, so you could choose to find a dirt cheap junker that's been sitting since the 60's and restore it into a powerful electric that makes the Cybertruck look like a kid's toy (not that it needs much help)
This I find pretty exciting as it will be much more environmentally friendly to recycle an old truck over manufacturing a new disposable electric. Plus it uses modular components that are easy to service and replace and you can use mass produced parts for the original truck chassis. They're currently in the process of finding shops who will partner to handle the refurbishing of trucks. They think that the cost of the kit will be "33%-50% of the cost of a new truck" whish is disappointing vague as I don't know what they are considering the cost of a new truck, but if one of their partners focuses on finding and refurbishing trucks with good frames but dead engines, that could be a decent supply of trucks at a reasonable price.
If this does well then it's reasonable to assume they will eventually offer kits to convert light duty SUVs or trucks, and even cars.
Honestly I think a lot of people would. If anyone is close with a shop that does a lot of restorations or work on vehicles they might be interested in this.
I'm hoping the number work out enough that it's very profitable to find old trucks with dead drivetrains and retrofit them to be electric.
Take this 1941 international Harvester or this 1939 Dodge you can get for less then a couple grand. If it was restored and with an electric drivetrain it would be an awesome truck.
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