ZAP Truck PK
by Sean Fisher, Cincinnati, Ohio on 03.20.07
ZAP, the electric car company that has its hand in everything from microcars to dirtbikes to high-performance vehicles, has added another notch to its manufacturing belt - the ZAP Truck PK. With the ability to be used as a pickup truck, dumptruck or a flatbed, the PK serves triple duty to help transport some of the larger and bulkier items that most cars can't. With a top-speed of 40mph, you won't find yourself on the freeway, but the PK should be useful for both city streets and rural areas. The other major limitation for the PK is its small range, only 25 miles per charge and about 40 miles per day, so this is certainly not for long-distance hauling. However, if you want the opportunity to transport larger items without having to succumb to a noisy, dirty gasoline pick-up, this ZAP is a relative bargain at just over $10,000.
Price good. Range bad.
You aren't going to convert any hardcore pickup fans with three wheels, either. Won't work too well on unpaved or mountain roads.
Phoenix has their pickup at something like 7x the price though.
I'd love one of these cars. My commute's only about 6 miles a day, and on roads where the speed limit is 35. However, I can't get one because I don't have a garage and never have the same parking space twice.
Now if the batter pack was removeable and I could plug it in on my porch overnight, then we'd really have something.
Maybe they are not very appealing in the US, but tricycles like this one (powered by motorbike engines from 50cc to 600cc) are the most common transport vehicles in some places of Italy. The range is a bit short though, if you use it all day long in the city you may need something like 100 miles.
If it can haul construction materials and motorcycles between my house and their respective vendors, then I might be interested. The price is nice.
How much does the load effect the range? When I haul a heavy trailer with my 2.5L 4-cylinder Ford Ranger, the fuel efficiency goes from as high as 25mpg to as low as 17mpg.
But, this ZAP thing looks a lot more like the Gators and other small vehicles that apartment maintenance folks use to go around the complex -- I wouldn't be at all surprised to see one of these in that role.
They should put a box on the back it would then work well for someone like the USPS in the neighborhoods where the mail person parks and walks around to different houses then drives a street over and parks and walks again.
They also have a ($13000) version with a solar panel on top for charging the batteries. This makes it the first commercially produced car to have a totally renewable fuel source. You can probably only drive a couple of miles on a days worth of solar charge, but that is about all I would need for my minimal commute.
Re the 25mi limited range: for long trips, with a little hacking I suppose you could put a gas generator in the back to make a hybrid car.
A friend of mine wrote a pretty detailed review of these. Worth a read, for sure.
Still need price list