These Are The Electric Cars You Wish Made It To Production
Along with one controversial car that Jalops seem to disagree on
There's a whole bunch of cool cars out there that stayed in the concept stage and never made it to production, or cars that never made it out to what you could call drivers in general.
That applies to electric cars just as much as it does their combustion relatives, particularly in the past couple of decades because of the, more or less, collective sense that EVs can help us fight climate change. A lot is going to have to change for us to do that successfully, but every bit counts.
That's why it's fun to daydream about the EVs that almost were. I'm a little surprised that no one wants to drive a car made by Sony, but to each their own. We asked readers to tell us about the unrealized electric cars they wish had made it all the way to production, and these were their answers:
(Oh, and there's one car here — you can probably guess which— that we made a judgement call on as far as it counting or not. SPOILER ALERT: It counts!)
Renault 5
Renault 5 EV
Submitted by: King Ginger, not writing for Business Insider
Volkswagen Bulli
VW Bulli
Submitted by: Mehphisto
Genesis Mint
I've posted this car in comments before, but please, Hyundai/Genesis, build the Mint already!!
Submitted by: foolio
MG E-Motion
MG E-Motion
Submitted by: TheDriveress
Morris & Salom Electrobat
The Electrobat!
25 MPH and a 20 Mile range. In 1896!
Had the creators not lost all their capitol in a failed taxi venture, this may have been the Model-T, before the Model-T. And, if the automotive evolution began with an electric car in every garage, think where the technology would be today.
Submitted by: Knyte
Chevrolet Electrovette
The Chevrolet Electrovette. No, not THAT vette. This one:
Oh yeah...sweet, sweet graphics package. And 50 miles of range at 30 mph? Where do I sign up!
Submitted by: SumGai77556
AC Propulsion TZero
Aside from the EV1 (which was already discussed and I would say qualifies since it never technically went on sale), the only one I can think of is the AC Propulsion T-Zero.
[...]
It was either the first or one of the first BEVs to use Lithium Ion batteries.
Of course I'm kind of glad it didn't go into production because that led to the creation of Tesla.
Submitted by: Manwich – now Keto-Friendly
Nu-Klea Starlite
The 1959-1960 Nu-Klea Starlite.
[...]
Sure, it was an electric car from the fifties and therefore crap, but look at it! I'd take that over a Tesla any day. But sadly they only ever built one prototype...
Submitted by: awesomeaustin (from Oppo!)
Gurgel Itaipu
Gurgel Itaipu. A 1974 Brazilian electric city car, could had revolutionized urban transportation in a time electric energy was incredibly cheap, and costing the same as a VW Beetle at the time ($22.7k Cruzeiros, or roughly R$84k BRL in today's money).
Submitted by: edu-petrolhead
GM EV1
This is pushing the limits of the phrase "made it to production" but... the GM EV1.
They did make ~1100 of them but the general public was never allowed to own them. The only way to obtain one was a lease from GM; GM retained ownership and at the end of the program they took them back and crushed nearly all of them, save for a few sent to museums.
It was a practical, useful electric car with a range of over 100 miles... over 20 years ago. Had GM kept the program going and continued development and evolution of the car it would've been a game-changer, and I honestly wonder how much more widespread and affordable (and better!) electric cars could've been if they'd ran with this.
Instead they canceled the program because it wasn't profitable.
Submitted by: As Du Volant