DVLA do's and don'ts for EV conversions

[AleNod]

DVLA's Dos and Don'ts: The risks of modifying your classic car | Hagerty UK

If you're thinking making modification to a car, doing an EV swap, or making changes to a chassis, check with the DVLA first. Here's why.

www.hagerty.co.uk

Thoughts ?

 

[Jack Ratt]

Jobsworth ??? I read a while ago that it would become increasingly difficult to modify/customise older vehicles to meet modern standards/regulations.

 

[IainP]

Someone from the DVLA hasn’t read their own guidelines, which is not unusual. Lots of stories like that, resolved after lots of letter writing and expense. Usually.

 

[t-tony]

Absolutely unbelievable.

Tony.

 

[Pingu]

I think the problem is that it's a Mini and the transmission can't be used by the EV, so that's 2 points that other EVs wouldn't lose.

Imagine putting a 400bhp V8 in it. They could leave the monocoque unmodified. It would have been ok if it split in half, because DVLA said it was ok.

In all seriousness, this could be the end of a new industry, before it has really got off the ground.

 

[Dxbolton]

Dvla don’t want any modified cars. End of.
I think the mini case is still being appealed though.

 

[Pingu]

Dvla don’t want any modified cars. End of.
I think the mini case is still being appealed though.

It's not up to DVLA. It's up to Parliament.

If Parliament don't want modified vehicles, they could pass a law to that effect. They haven't - and because millions of £s are spent by people modifying their cars - they won't.

 

[Andyboy]

DVLA do not want DIY electric conversions, end of. For good reason....

There are some excellent conversions, and then there are the ones that catch fire. That guy in Ireland who has been bodging bits from written off Teslas into various ropey old BMW's is one - the E31 8 Series had a 'thermal incident' that you can see on YouTube. Do you want that heap of crap combusting in heavy stop start traffic next to you? When the flames reach the battery, you want to be nowhere near it.

Check out this little honey;

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5CkW9yW2yOg&t=11s


Then we have the small matter of crash testing. What happens to the battery on your home made EV when it's hit up the arse by a Transit?

There is a good reason electric BMW's being serviced at the dealers are cordoned off so that nobody but the qualified technician goes near it.

EV conversions are not an engine swap. I hope the government brings in legislation quickly where a DIY conversion has to be subject to a very detailed inspection before it can be used.

 

[t-tony]

TBH I've thought that these cars should really have to pass an the test required on a kit car build for just these, and other reasons.
It's not that much different from rebuilding a written off vehicle.

Tony.

 

[t-tony]

Let alone combustion in heavy traffic, what about underground in nose to tail traffic in a tunnel?

Tony.

 

[Andyboy]

Exactly. When Honda or Toyota build an EV you know it's had millions of pounds and countless hours of research and testing.

 

[Nodzed]

Archived Petition: Introduce new vehicle registration rules for electrifying classic cars

We believe current vehicle registration rules are operating as a barrier to the electrification of classic cars, because they are being required to be reregistered and undergo an IVA. New rules for electrifying classic cars, without the need to reregister or undergo an IVA, should be introduced.

petition.parliament.uk

 

[Nodzed]

Well worth reading the comments under this article.

 

[IanA]

DVLA's Dos and Don'ts: The risks of modifying your classic car | Hagerty UK

If you're thinking making modification to a car, doing an EV swap, or making changes to a chassis, check with the DVLA first. Here's why.

www.hagerty.co.uk

Thoughts ?

The article mentions Electrogenic as an EV converter. I was given a tour of their facility recently and was very impressed by their approach. The range of options is large, their battery packs are contained in custom modular frames and the conversions always retain the ability to restore the car to its original ICE format if required. Their control circuitry is comprehensive and their commercial offering uses new motors, not re-purposed Tesla units.

 

[Andybpowell]

Exactly. When Honda or Toyota build an EV you know it's had millions of pounds and countless hours of research and testing.

You could say this about any production vehicle but you're not arguing against people modifying their fuel systems or fitting glowing hot turbochargers into their engine bays or fitting nitros oxide the amount of converted EV's out there must be miniscule compared to modified petrol or diesel cars and I would guess due to their limited range probably spend no more than a couple of thousand miles on the road per year and being one of those particular nut jobs I've read or heard all of the scaremongering if a petrol car goes up in flames you hear nothing if an electric car goes up it's all over social media and on the news

TBH I've thought that these cars should really have to pass an the test required on a kit car build for just these, and other reasons.
It's not that much different from rebuilding a written off vehicle.

Tony.

with many EV conversions the DVLA will inspect the vehicle when you try to register it as electric if they are not happy with the details you supply and as much as I would like to disagree with you on this I can't

 

[Andyboy]

An ICE car fire is bad but nothing like an EV going up.

The converted Mini (done very, very nicely) here is effectively scrap. Despite various protests and even his local MP getting involved, DVLA will not budge. He can't even convert it back to as standard 1960 Mini as the car is recorded as scrapped. All he can do is break it up and sell the parts.

 

[Andybpowell]

research into actual cases has shown that EVs are much less likely to combust than their petrol or diesel equivalents. That’s not to say that all those pictures on social media never happened; you just don’t see an equivalent number of photos of petrol cars burning to the ground…
Yes "if" it goes up it will probably burn longer
Most people doing an EV conversion will belong to at least one EV forum the total members of the biggest EV forums totals under 100,000 members worldwide and many of those members are just there out of interest and have never built an EV the total number of cars in the world is about 1.4 billion the chances of you coming across a converted EV are remote yes it's a higher risk than a production EV but so is a modified petrol or diesel car which is more likely to go up in flames.
So if we are going to stop people converting cars to electric then we should stop the bigger risk of people modifying cars full stop
or are you saying that doing this to my 350Z which involved modifying my fuel system from the fuel pump all of the way forward fabricating everything myself is ok

But doing this myself is not

I'm not being argumentative just putting my point across that's a big can of worms is all I'm saying