I’ve picked up a pair of electric scooters for free. I’m not quite sure how I’ll use them, but they have motors, drive belts and wheels. I should be able to get some sort of reverse gear out of the parts. One scooter has a fried controller and a motor that got wet, but the other scooter is in much better shape.

I’ve been thinking of gearing arrangement with the drive shaft to get a reverse gear, but am thinking that it might work to have a supplemental wheel that is lowered to the ground just for reversing. A separate system would be easier to execute, but will take up space and add weight, and the scooter wheel might not have the grip to move the car except on the flattest of terrain.

I’ve been wanting to experiment with electric vehicles for a while, and getting these for free will let me have some hands on experience for little money. They need batteries, and perhaps a new controller board, but those are easy. The other drawback is that electric power here is 38 cents a Kw hour, one of the highest in the nation. That works out to the equivalent of paying $3.80 for gas so electric vehicles don’t save you much money here.