What's your opinion about electric trucks??

I'm considering getting one of these small maintenance type trucks just for Craig list pickups and trash nights.

http://electrictruckindustries.com/w...x1-300x225.jpgThis one would be very helpful for unloading shred at the yard.

http://electrictruckindustries.com/w...ar-300x225.jpg

The only cons would be the range about 30 to 40 miles without being loaded down less if your hauling. So I would have to limit my CL pickup to only those that are close to me and I would only be able to do a few neighborhoods on trash nights before i'd have to switch back to my regular truck. And the initial cost they cost about 10g to 12gs new, I was only able to find one used one on ebay going for 4g. But the truck would defiantly pay for itself and then some over its lifetime.

The pros being fuel would cost next to nothing.

Maybe I should just wait a few years for Ford or Nissan to come out with an electric truck with a better range, what do you guys think?

I think that thing is freakin' awesome. If you can buy it and not put yerself in a pinch doin' it, go for it.

Think about it this way too, if you got a company goin' on, that's another sellin' point. Another "green" aspect to what you do.

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Originally Posted by Dru702

The pros being fuel would cost next to nothing.

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So how much would it cost to plug it in every night? Don't get me wrong, that thing is cool, but too many people think that just because the don't feel the "pain at the pump" that it cost next to nothing to drive.

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Originally Posted by TheHoss

I think that thing is freakin' awesome. If you can buy it and not put yerself in a pinch doin' it, go for it.

Think about it this way too, if you got a company goin' on, that's another sellin' point. Another "green" aspect to what you do.

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Not to mention all the fed and state tax incentives :D. Here's a link so you guys can check to see what intensives your state offers. http://www.afdc.energy.gov/afdc/fuel...city_laws.html

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Originally Posted by KZBell

So how much would it cost to plug it in every night? Don't get me wrong, that thing is cool, but too many people think that just because the don't feel the "pain at the pump" that it cost next to nothing to drive.

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I'm not sure how much it would cost to charge that truck, but I do know that it only cost 1.32 to go 100 miles in the Mini E Mini Cooper's electric car. So I'm guessing less than half of that b/c the range is only 30-40 miles per charge. Maybe like .50 a charge.

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Originally Posted by Kris Kringle

I wouldn't even consider it to much limitations. I would consider getting a Older Truck that has a Carb and convert it to propane or Natural gas.

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What other limitations are there besides the short range? I believe that truck could do everything a normal truck could do. The short range is really the only thing that bothers me so maybe ill wait for ford to make a electric truck with a better range.

You'd be better off getting a diesel. You'll buy, it turns out to be crap, the company goes under, leaving you with a worthless pile of scrap. Well, at least you can scrap it.

You are thinking of spending $12K so you can dump at the yard, rather than get out and unload it yourself? I would rather do the work, and save $12K. Propane is an awesome idea. It would be cheaper than that truck.

I bought a Jeep Comanche 2 years ago for $700 to run scrap. It paid for itself in about 5 loads, and every load there after was profit. It only cost me $10 to do a 50 mile round trip. I have since made about $17K in scrap hauling with this truck over the last 2.5 years. Had I sprung for that fancy truck (which would be trash with all the scrap you would use it for, unless you only pick up 'clean' scrap) profit would be less than $3000 total.

Simple math.

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Originally Posted by Kris Kringle

If I was going to live within a 40 mile radius of my home I guess it would be ok But for 10 - 12K to only be able to drive I would say it is cost effective for what I do.

Charging Time.

Battery Cost and Replacement

Charging Station Cost.

Everytime You dump you use battery power.

Everytime you use A/C or Heat you use Battery Power

Lights use battery.

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Charging time kinda.. takes about 7 hrs to charge so I would only be able to use it once a day and I would plug it in before I go to bed each night. But I would still save alot of money even just using it once a day. In my current truck it cost about 10 bucks to drive 30-40 miles more if I'm hauling scrap where as it would only cost me .50 with this truck if I use it once a day I'd save 9.50 a day, 66.50 in a week, 3,458 In a year.

The batteries last avg of 30000 miles avg person drives 10000 miles a yr. but I wouldn't be using it as a daily driver so It would be less than that. Not sure exactly how many batteries this truck has but the most I've ever seen on an electric vehicle is 12 so ill use that. 12 batteries so Id have to replace them every 4 years or so it would be about 1200 every 4 years. Id save 13832 on fuel In 4 years so minus 1200 for the batteries and I'm saving 12600 in 4 years. So replacing batteries is not a limitation.

The charging station would be my garage lol.

I seriously doubt that dumping one load of shred at the yard would use a huge amount of energy. I mean the limit on this thing is half a ton and the truck it self weights half a ton. Dumping a load would prob use the same amount of energy it would take to drive the truck a few feet.

Yes a/c would use energy I believe it is already factor into the range.. i.g. using a/c 30 mile range, without a/c 40 miles or I could always roll down the window. I live in Vegas so i'd never use the heater.

I can really only see 2 limitations and considering that i'd save almost 4 grand a year the truck would pay for itself within 3 years less than that if I could find a used one.

they are cute and fun
they have much more tork than a gas engine
they will do amaizing things for their size
BUT

they are only practlcle for yard use

the 40- mile range is reduced because it is used

because of size they are limited in volume hauled

you really need two one working one charging
kinda like having a family of 5 and one jet ski

you can buy a used golf cart for 1000 and convert it to a truck for 500 and you have the same thing.

I would see if I could rent or lease one for a month before buying.

just my .02

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Originally Posted by WeWillPrevail

You'd be better off getting a diesel. You'll buy, it turns out to be crap, the company goes under, leaving you with a worthless pile of scrap. Well, at least you can scrap it.

You are thinking of spending $12K so you can dump at the yard, rather than get out and unload it yourself? I would rather do the work, and save $12K. Propane is an awesome idea. It would be cheaper than that truck.

I bought a Jeep Comanche 2 years ago for $700 to run scrap. It paid for itself in about 5 loads, and every load there after was profit. It only cost me $10 to do a 50 mile round trip. I have since made about $17K in scrap hauling with this truck over the last 2.5 years. Had I sprung for that fancy truck (which would be trash with all the scrap you would use it for, unless you only pick up 'clean' scrap) profit would be less than $3000 total.

Simple math.

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umm so this truck cost about 11k more than the truck you bought and 17k - 11k is 6k profit not 3k.. not trying to be rude but, where did you learn "simple math"?

Edit:
When you consider all the variables such as, how often would I be able to use this truck vs a regular truck. cost of fuel. amount of scrap you could haul with this truck vs. a normal truck.... etc. the math would be anything but simple.
And I stated in my original post that I would be using this truck for CL pick ups and trash nights not just for dumping at the yard, i'd get a regular dump truck if that's all I was gonna do with it.

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Originally Posted by olddude

they are cute and fun
they have much more tork than a gas engine
they will do amaizing things for their size
BUT

they are only practlcle for yard use

the 40- mile range is reduced because it is used

because of size they are limited in volume hauled

you really need two one working one charging
kinda like having a family of 5 and one jet ski

you can buy a used golf cart for 1000 and convert it to a truck for 500 and you have the same thing.

I would see if I could rent or lease one for a month before buying.

just my .02

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Buying a golf cart and converting it would be a great idea. This company is actually a subsidiary of a golf cart company and they sell pre-owned carts.. I might try to rent one just to test it out but in the long run purchasing one would be more cost effective.

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Originally Posted by Kris Kringle

You asked a question I gave the Opinion. Go buy the truck you Don't need no Opinions on it If it works for you cool. It wouldnt work for me.

Sorry to Offend you

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I wasn't offended at all.. sorry if I came across that way. I respect your opinion, I just don't see that many limitations to owning this truck. I have a very high amount of respect for any man or woman who is willing to take matters into their own hands and start their own business.

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Originally Posted by Kris Kringle

He said he Purchased a Jeep for $700
He said He made the Money Back That he paid for the Jeep in in 5 Loads
He said he had the Jeep for 2.5 Years
He said in that 2.5 Years he had Made $17000

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He said profit would be less than 3k, if he bought the electric truck vs his jeep. What I'm saying is 17k minus 11k (what he would have spend if he got a new electric truck) is 6k profit not 3k + whatever he would have saved on gas - what he would not have been able to pick up due to the range restriction of the truck,, its really impossible to tell exactly what the profit would be. But his math is flawed as is his business scene, just because he made back the initial cost the jeep in 5 loads doesn't mean that every load thereafter is pure profit. You still have to minus the cost of fuel and maintenance on the jeep. Even something as small as putting air in the tires is an expense and must be subtracted from the gross profit. WeWillPrevail is 17k your gross profit or net? This post kinda offended me, I can read lol. I'm not really offended I'm a real easy going guy life is to short for me to trip over every little thing.

http://www.americasminitruckcenter.com/products/
what about something like this??

I like the idea of electric with all the savings and such but I wonder about a failure of all the specialized components on this ride.
If a part should fail, and we all know they will in time, what will be the cost to repair or replace parts? Can you even find parts? You must also consider when you have troubles you can't just drop the part on the local Napa dealer and be on your way.

Just things to consider. I like the idea but will it pan out? Good luck.

If I had 12k I would find a diesel and a dump trailer.

I do get why you're wanting to do this though.

i like the idea of going electric, but this looks like an E-Ride, which has no room for storage. we have some of these at my job and with minimal weight in the back one of them blew out a differential, company told us we were carying to much weight in it. not really practical for a scrap metal buisnes, even if you are going to go out and pick up a washing machine from CL. if you do get one never let the battery go completely dead or let it stay dead for prolonged periods of time. the ones with Li batteries if left dead like to burn, if running lead acid i dont know if they like to burn or not when discharged for extended periods of time.

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Originally Posted by Dru702

He said profit would be less than 3k, if he bought the electric truck vs his jeep. What I'm saying is 17k minus 11k (what he would have spend if he got a new electric truck) is 6k profit not 3k + whatever he would have saved on gas - what he would not have been able to pick up due to the range restriction of the truck,, its really impossible to tell exactly what the profit would be. But his math is flawed as is his business scene, just because he made back the initial cost the jeep in 5 loads doesn't mean that every load thereafter is pure profit. You still have to minus the cost of fuel and maintenance on the jeep. Even something as small as putting air in the tires is an expense and must be subtracted from the gross profit. WeWillPrevail is 17k your gross profit or net? This post kinda offended me, I can read lol. I'm not really offended I'm a real easy going guy life is to short for me to trip over every little thing.

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I didn't keep receipts. All I know is I would have less profit with an $11K truck starting out with. Until that was paid off, you are making NO profit, simply trying to pay off your electric, low range, light hauling fancy truck. It would cost me $10-$20 for a round trip, and I would get AT LEAST $100-$150 at the yard. That's a pretty good ratio. I don't need exact number, as this is not a pissing contest.

All I am saying is you won't be in the black for awhile, way longer than if you buy a beater and run it until it dies.

Also, I could get 1800lbs in my truck. It sounds like the payload of your electric truck is nowhere near that. I also got a ladder rack with the truck, allowed me to cut longer sections of frame rail, and strap them up top.

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Originally Posted by Mechanic688

http://www.americasminitruckcenter.com/products/
what about something like this??

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Those all look pretty sweet and would be more fuel efficient than my current truck a ford ranger v6, not sure how much more efficient tho,, and have a better range than the electric truck. The main reason I'm considering an electric truck is gas is my biggest expense as a scrapper and I'd like to max my profits. I'll have to look into these mini trucks more. Thanks for the info and the link.

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Originally Posted by injunjoe

I like the idea of electric with all the savings and such but I wonder about a failure of all the specialized components on this ride.
If a part should fail, and we all know they will in time, what will be the cost to repair or replace parts? Can you even find parts? You must also consider when you have troubles you can't just drop the part on the local Napa dealer and be on your way.

Just things to consider. I like the idea but will it pan out? Good luck.

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Yeah biggest thing would be the motor. Anyone have an idea as to how many miles I could get out of an electric motor before it has to be replace? I still have a lot of thought to put into this before I make my final decision.

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Originally Posted by brandon

i like the idea of going electric, but this looks like an E-Ride, which has no room for storage. we have some of these at my job and with minimal weight in the back one of them blew out a differential, company told us we were carying to much weight in it. not really practical for a scrap metal buisnes, even if you are going to go out and pick up a washing machine from CL. if you do get one never let the battery go completely dead or let it stay dead for prolonged periods of time. the ones with Li batteries if left dead like to burn, if running lead acid i dont know if they like to burn or not when discharged for extended periods of time.

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Thanks for letting me know about the batteries I'm not sure if this truck uses Li or lead ill have to find out. If it uses Li, can these be charged the same was as lead batteries or not? If you don't mind me asking what kind of job do you do? Like what kind of materials do you haul in the truck? And how much did it cost to have the differential replaced. I'm assuming because electric vehicles are fairly new it would be more than replacing the deferential on a normal truck but how much more?

Who would you call if it broke down, and electrician, or a mechanic?

:-)

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Originally Posted by WeWillPrevail

I didn't keep receipts. All I know is I would have less profit with an $11K truck starting out with. Until that was paid off, you are making NO profit, simply trying to pay off your electric, low range, light hauling fancy truck. It would cost me $10-$20 for a round trip, and I would get AT LEAST $100-$150 at the yard. That's a pretty good ratio. I don't need exact number, as this is not a pissing contest.

All I am saying is you won't be in the black for awhile, way longer than if you buy a beater and run it until it dies.

Also, I could get 1800lbs in my truck. It sounds like the payload of your electric truck is nowhere near that. I also got a ladder rack with the truck, allowed me to cut longer sections of frame rail, and strap them up top.

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I'm looking at this as a long term investment. I'm trying to figure out if, over the course of the trucks entire life time, it would be better than a gas powered truck. I would save tons in fuel and get many tax credits. But maintenance would be more costly and btw I would not be buying a new one for 11k, I would get a used one. Does anyone know what a used one would cost? I've only been able to find one used on ebay going for 4k. If I get a used one for 4k the truck would pay for itself in about a year.

My yard is less than 5 mins away so it might cost me like .25 cents round trip and this truck payload rating is 1000lbs. My yard pays about 200 per ton so I'd be profiting 90.75 per trip - whatever it cost me to collect that scrap. And if I got the dump truck model it would save lots of time at the yard.

Your thinking in terms of how many trips would I have to make to the yard before I'm in the red. There are really so many variables in calculating this; i.g. how long would it take me to gather a full load using this truck vs a reg. truck. How much would I make for each load (this is impossible to tell as in sure you know the prices are always changing) how much would I save in gas, how much would it cost in maintenance. etc. If I was to actually calculate all this it would take a long time to figure out. But consider this,,

Why are many company such as Staples or General Electric, who plans to switch their entire fleet to electric starting with 25,000 electric vehicles by 2015, switching to electric vehicles? Because over the course of their entire life they save tons of money on gas. Here is a link to an article about a company called, KCATA, they estimate that just ONE electric truck will save them 100,000 over its entire life. http://www.kcata.org/news/kcata_adds...ruck_to_fleet/ I'd sure like to save 100,000G's. Maybe this particular truck is not a good idea for a scrap metal business, this is why I'm also considering waiting till a major motor company, i.g. Ford, to come out with an electric truck.

Ford did build an electric truck.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ford_Ranger_EV

Dru,
I am a vehicle mechanic in the Air Force, we have a couple of these trucks on our base, i do not remember the cost for the repairs of the diff, sorry. they are being used to haul parts around.
in our vehicles the problem with the catching fire has been corrected, the company took them back and removed 1/2 of the batteries, now we have less range (i dont think anything was wrong in the first place the batteries were abused which is what caused the fire) but you cant tell the higher ups that so we lost range on it.
if you are lucky to find one with the Li batteries for a good price i would get it.
if nothing else use it as a platform to build a better one...take one tired S10 or Ranger with manual transmission, pull engine swap all E-parts into S10/Ranger lock trans into 2nd gear add axtra batteries for more range and have fun.
as far as charging, plug it into the wall, the ones we have, have a built in charger Li batteries should be charged after each use and generally charge up fast. our trucks the way we use and charge them the battery life has actually been extended by charging them after each use, the one that cought fire was fully drained then let sit for a while then when they went to charge it that is when it had its melt down.
fyi max speed in the ones we have is 25mph, but gets ther in the blink of an eye, lots of torque.
if you want to know anything more, ask, i wil do my best to get info for ya.
brandon

You guys are thinking WAY too hard about this. The money will never equal out. First time you have to replace a battery or motor, you'll be cashed out. Large companies can run them because they have the $$$ to do so, but I guarantee, they are operating at a loss.

If this is all daydreams, so be it.

The trucks I have use a deep cycle RV/marine type. Whether that is OEM or not, I don't know. It apparently worked at the time, as 2 of the 3 trucks have that type. 3rd is missing the batteries.

If what the OP wants to get takes an RV/marine type, then replacement isn't going to be too bad.

I just had a thought. You live in Vegas, it's sunny a lot right? Slap some solar panels on the roof. I know they make battery solar trickle chargers but who knows if they make anything beyond 12 volt. If you got it set up just right I would think it would keep the batteries topped off.

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Originally Posted by IdahoScrapper

The trucks I have use a deep cycle RV/marine type. Whether that is OEM or not, I don't know. It apparently worked at the time, as 2 of the 3 trucks have that type. 3rd is missing the batteries.

If what the OP wants to get takes an RV/marine type, then replacement isn't going to be too bad.

I just had a thought. You live in Vegas, it's sunny a lot right? Slap some solar panels on the roof. I know they make battery solar trickle chargers but who knows if they make anything beyond 12 volt. If you got it set up just right I would think it would keep the batteries topped off.

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Solar sounds good but would not be effective to charge the batts. nor would the cost to have three 12 volt panels wired in series to obtain 36 volt.

It would maintain the charge when not in use but would not charge fast enough to pay for itself or be effective.

he said, she said...yaddah, yaddah!!!!!!!!!!

make your own call I say, buy it if its what you really want to do, and be happy with the decission :)

Thanks.

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Large companies can run them because they have the $$$ to do so, but I guarantee, they are operating at a loss.

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They also get one h*ll of a tax write-off for buying them, I'd still opt for the baby Suzuki gas trucks, they been building them for quite a few years now.
http://www.americasminitruckcenter.c...mini-truck.jpg Mick, they even have one for you when winter hits,
http://www.americasminitruckcenter.c...ks-hunting.JPG

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Originally Posted by Mechanic688

They also get one h*ll of a tax write-off for buying them, I'd still opt for the baby Suzuki gas trucks, they been building them for quite a few years now.
http://www.americasminitruckcenter.c...mini-truck.jpg Mick, they even have one for you when winter hits,
http://www.americasminitruckcenter.c...ks-hunting.JPG

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THIS^^ would be a much better choice.

look what popped up in neck of the woods:

http://chico.craigslist.org/cto/2704750427.html

Daihatsu 4x4 Pickup