With all the (some would argue: overblown) current [no pun intended] attention on electric vehicles, might be interesting to acknowledge some past efforts. In the very early days of the industry, they met with considerable success, at the detriment to gasoline-powered vehicles, sales-wise. But there were a whole slew of occasional proposals, some which were merely concepts, some which were intended to but never saw production, others which eked out a small run. 

The '74-77 CitiCar : 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citicar
 

Edited May 6, 20197 yr by balthazar

General Motors '69 XP-512 / '73 Citicar ~ 

Makes a SMART look absolutely broughamy. 

BMW's concept, never built. Note the wildly optimistic electric vehicle sales projections - that number (290K in the U.S. in 2001) wasn't reached until 2018. 

Edited May 6, 20197 yr by balthazar

First Hybrid Vehicle:  Lohner-Porsche Mixed Hybrid. (1900-1905)

"First prototypes were two-wheel drive, battery-powered electric vehicles with two front-wheel hub-mounted motors. A later version was a series hybrid using hub-mounted electric motors in each wheel, powered by batteries and a gasoline-engine generator."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lohner-Porsche

Edited May 7, 20197 yr by ykX

.

Edited May 7, 20197 yr by balthazar

I wonder if any of the production ones have been saved... .like that Pope Waverly

Jay Leno has 1909 Baker Electric

 

The Cleveland Museum of History has a couple of vintage EVs, both Bakers IIRC... 

There was a recreation of a 1901 Lohner-Porsche also, Porsche showed it off at the intro of the Panamera Hybrid a couple years ago.  Maybe they will bring it out for the Taycan launch. 

Personally, I think this was and still is the coolest EV vehicle ever built

Edited May 7, 20197 yr by ykX

An early EV off-roader...

8 minutes ago, ykX said:

Personally, I think this was and still is the coolest EV vehicle ever built

I heard those wheels were the early prototype for the airless all plastic / rubber wheels that have been experimented with.

40 minutes ago, dfelt said:

I heard those wheels were the early prototype for the airless all plastic / rubber wheels that have been experimented with.

Not really, similar concept i guess but they were metal

"The wheels were designed and manufactured by General Motors Defense Research Laboratories in Santa Barbara, California.^[20] Ferenc Pavlics was given special recognition by NASA for developing the "resilient wheel".^[21] They consisted of a spun aluminum hub and a 32 inches (81 cm) diameter, 9 inches (23 cm) wide tire made of zinc-coated woven 0.033 inches (0.84 mm) diameter steel strands attached to the rim and discs of formed aluminum. Titanium chevrons covered 50% of the contact area to provide traction. Inside the tire was a 25.5 inches (65 cm) diameter bump stop frame to protect the hub."

21 hours ago, balthazar said:

Never quite caught on back then.

But like EVs today, technology has changed and they're trying them again. 

Tried in the 50s, 60s, 70s, and I’ll bet in the 80s & 90s too. It’s not so much technology as physics, but maybe they’ll find a niche one day.

Technology can eventually overcome physics. 

But physics are basic laws of nature.

And?