Steel City Project Converts Gasoline Cars to Run on Electricity: Scientific American

Steel City Project Converts Gasoline Cars to Run on Electricity: Scientific American

Steel City Project Converts Gasoline Cars to Run on Electricity
ChargeCar aims to create a kit that makes it easy for local auto shops to convert conventional cars to electric.

By Saqib Rahim and Climatewire
Instead of selling pricey new vehicles, the ChargeCar team wants to create a kit that makes it easy for local auto shops to convert gasoline cars to run on electricity.
PITTSBURGH -- Chuck Wichrowski remembers the first car he ever worked on, when he was just a college graduate and knew nothing about cars: His wife's 1970 Chevy Nova.
The second? A 1964 Studebaker Wagonaire.

"I just sort of applied the college model, which is: You look the things up, you get a book, and then you do it," Wichrowski said.

As the years rolled by, Wichrowski put his wrench to the cars that drove the Steel City through its industrial heyday. But times have changed in Pittsburgh, and while he still runs Baum Boulevard Automotive, his customers have moved on to mostly foreign cars, and increasingly, hybrids.
Wichrowski used to run two gas stations, and he knows electric-drive cars need less maintenance than the gas-driven ones. Yet he has loaned a mechanic to a local university to help it design electric cars for regular Pittsburghers, and he thinks his shop can cash in if the future really is electric.
And for the team at Carnegie Mellon University, which is designing cars to get residents to work without burning a pint of gas or even wasting an electron, the future of electric cars is Pittsburgh.
Designers of the ChargeCar project say that instead of selling pricey new vehicles, they want to create a kit that makes it easy for local auto shops like Wichrowski's to convert a gasoline car to run on electricity.