Time to dust off the Model T… no speedo.
Or, maybe convert one to electric?
Battery power autos are not new for Ford.
As early as 1903, Henry Ford was aware that his friend Thomas Edison was experimenting with battery technology for vehicles. But it wasn’t until 1914 that Ford began openly working on a low-cost electric car. According to news accounts, the goal was to sell the so-called Edison-Ford for as low as $500, only slightly more than a Model T in the day.
“Within a year, I hope, we shall begin the manufacture of an electric automobile,” Mr. Ford told
The New York Times in January 1914. “The problem so far has been to build a storage battery of light weight which would operate for long distances without recharging.”
Fred Allison, an electrical engineer, with a Ford experimental electric car. Circa 1914.
The batteries under the seat on the first couple of electric prototypes were capable of somewhere between 50 and 100 miles on a single charge. Ford was also rumored to be establishing a Detroit-based facility to produce the first Ford EV for introduction in 1915.
During this era, electric cars were particularly appealing to women. Unlike gas cars that started with a hand-crank, battery-powered automobiles didn’t take a lot of muscle to operate. EVs were reliable, and they didn’t produce foul-smelling emissions. Henry Ford’s wife Clara, who drove an 80-mile 1914
Detroit Electric, was an early EV advocate.
By May 1914, Mr. Ford said, “It’s coming.” And he was proclaiming an EV revolution in the works. “The electric automobile will be the family carriage of the future.”
Historians aren’t certain why Ford never delivered on his promise for the Edison-Ford car. Some say that he was pulled away on other projects. But others believe that the electric self-starter was the culprit. When internal-combustion cars started replacing hand-cranks with electric-starter devices, EVs were robbed of a key selling point: ease of use. So, despite Clara’s encouragement and an investment of about $1.5 million in his electric-car project, Ford shelved his plans for a new, affordable electric vehicle.