"lundgren hopes that if nothing else, ‘the powers that be’ within electronic corporations will notice ITAP’s effort and will feel motivated to start practicing what he calls ‘hybrid-recycling’."
Good luck with that. Regulatory issues, safety, insurance issues, quality control, and not to mention issues with sourcing and the cost of upfitting to electric means that there is never going to be a sizable market of "recycled" old cars converted to electric and resold as new.
There's a whole raft of vehicles out there that have had drivetrains and powerplants "upgraded," and AFAIK a lot of them are street legal. I have to think that the PtB quote is riffing on that idea.
Generally, from what I understand, street legal means that it still has the brakes it started with and the rollcage hasn't changed. Also it has seatbelts. You can pretty much do anything to a car after that.
Technically all welds have to be done by a certified welder.
Apparently the trick, if you are starting from scratch, is that you go to the engineer at the state troopers for your state who would approve the design before you start. Or you just start with a VIN'd frame and then you don't even really change anything. If the engineer doesn't seem down, try and find another. If you can't find one maybe you should move because you're not going to get it road leagal very easily otherwise.
Source: Looked up how to do it when taking a fab shop class at a tech college in WA last year. Asked the interent and the fab shop teacher (who had built several motorcycles from scratch).
Yes good point. I was talking about this article which is currently a one off. I believe even if they did this at a mass scale it's an aftermarket modification and is still legal.
Good luck with that. Regulatory issues, safety, insurance issues, quality control, and not to mention issues with sourcing and the cost of upfitting to electric means that there is never going to be a sizable market of "recycled" old cars converted to electric and resold as new.