* picture is not my new car but a similar one from the net

 

Well I just put down a deposit ($100) on a 1980 Commutacar today with a sales price of $2,500--the seller still needs to grab the title from a safety-deposit box and should deliver the car Monday morning sometime.

 

When I got there he apologized for the trouble but that I may have just wasted my trip--the car wouldn’t work and he thought some of the electronics might have blown. He invited me to take a look anyway.

 

Externally the car I think looks great--it is grimy from being out in the elements a while, but no cracking and looks like under the grime it will be very nice. There is a crack on the little piece that illuminates the license plate but that was the only problem I could see. Less than 2,900 miles on the odometer. The seats look fine but the interior looks like an old car--reminds me of my old '72 VW Beetle.

 

He had the car up off the ground to test the motor without running around. He had the seat bottom out so we could look at the electronics and he pointed out the car ignition solenoid he figured was blown that is supposed to run the big relays for connecting the batteries to the motor. In reading up about the car (in the more than a month since I first saw his ad) I ran across someone pointing out that the solenoid is actually run by the 12v battery and as he had already mentioned that his battery was dead I pointed out this fact and he realized that that was why his friend who had just checked everything out had needed to use the car charger. So we hooked up the charger and it worked.

 

I looked at the contactors and they were correctly modified to have the wires come out of the bottom instead of the top. As I described the issue to him, he said I already knew more about these cars than he did.

 

Given that it was on the charger, we couldn’t actually drive around, but he did show that the motor turned the wheels. The left rear brake is a bit sticky so being off the ground, the left slowed down and the right started spinning twice as fast. The running lights seemed to work, but the headlights draw too much power for his little 6 amp charger.

 

He mentioned that he wanted to sell the car to someone who is interested and he would make them a deal. I asked what kind of deal he was thinking of. He thought about it and then said he didn’t think he could go below $2,500. I was excited--his original ad had said $3,500 and I had recently looked at a EV Porche for $4,500. So I replied that I thought I could do that--asked what kind of deposit he would need and how soon could he deliver it.

 

So I will finally have an Electric Car--but not until a week after I quit the job that I had to commute to.