Canadian Kids Are Building An Electric Drag Racer

Today’s “green car” article comes from Canada where a bunch of students at a high school near the north border are working on a EV drag racing version of a 1989 Toyota pickup. These high school students at the Delta Secondary School in Ladner, BC have started working on the car in 2009, and according to their automotive instructor Casey Mynott, the car will be up and running in about a month, ready for some serious drag racing.

Most of these students never seen an electric car before, let alone worked on one, which means that the work put into this project is incommensurable taking into consideration that they didn’t have any previous experience with an EV. Mynott added that the “students are totally blown away when they see under the hood. They are equally blown away to watch the rear tires move with no noise.”

Mynott’s ambitious team got a large part of the drivetrain from sponsors, including here the DC motor that is coupled directly to a custom-built aluminum driveshaft. Out in the back, this Toyota pickup truck has been fitted with 20 lead-acid AGM batteries that provide 240 volts of power. These batteries are most suitable for drag racing taking into consideration that they allow for deep discharges but also put out lots of amps straight away.

Due to the reason that it has been tuned for racing, this EV will not offer an impressive range. Mynott said that it will do approximately 40 miles while driving normally, but the most impressive thing is that it will be able to do the quarter mile in less than 14 seconds, which at first might not sound that great but it is a good starting point.

We’ll be able to provide more information once the car is ready for racing. Stay tuned.

Source: Wired.com

Post tags: Tags: electric drag racer, Green