MANUAL Electric Porsche 356 Review: An EV For Petrolheads! 4K

as the world goes electric there's a real danger that ice engine dinosaurs will have no further part to play but there is a small company based near oxford that thinks differently electrogenic is working hard to bring these ancient beasts into a new age replacing their archaic powertrains with something a little more up-to-date this is one of their latest efforts the electrogenic 356 is based on the 1965 original the grandfather of the 911 it once used a 1.6 liter boxer 4 internal combustion engine but that's now been replaced with an electric motor however this is no ordinary engine swap this 356 stands proud as being one of only a handful of electric cars to use a manual gearbox [Music] look at this i'm changing gear in an electric car that just completely fries my egg four down to third into the corner send it round oh my god hit the brakes into second that is so weird i'm used to one continuous surge of power in electric cars but in this i'm rowing up and down the box at will by myself and that's because this car uses the same four-speed transmission that you've got in the original porsche 356 honestly whoever said electric cars couldn't be engaging i'm sorry you're gonna have to think again talk about driver involvement knob gang stand up [Music] if you're wondering how this is even possible well if you ask electrogenic it's all very simple they start with the body of a classic in this case an authentic 356c the last of its kind next they strip out the fuel tank and 1.6 litre 95 horsepower push rod boxer at the rear replacing it all with electric components at the heart of it a hyper 9 motor making 80 kilowatts or 120 horsepower and 235 newton meters of torque this is what's connected to the original four-speed gearbox the motor has been fitted with a top hat that marries it to the flywheel this is connected to friction and pressure plates in the clutch followed by a custom designed adapter that allows it all to be fitted to the original gearbox it's very much a case of old school meets new school this car obviously doesn't make the same sort of noise that the original 356 made so you don't get that raw from the engine you don't get that sound as the car splatters into life when you turn the ignition key however i wouldn't say it's silent not by any stretch of the imagination firstly you hear a few squeaks and a few rattles because let's face it it's an old car but secondly electrogenic have chosen to use an electric motor that doesn't have a ridiculously high rpm i believe i'm shifting gears it only revs to around seven eight thousand rpm which means that as you reach the red line i'm talking about red lines in an ev it does start to make more noise up to a crescendo and that means that every time you change gear you feel and hear this car making more and more sound and that encourages you to roll up and down the box that gives you a better sense of involvement [Music] it might seem like quite a strange meeting of two very different worlds but i think it happens to work i love the fact that it's still rear-wheel drive just like the 356 it's still rear-engined just like the 356 and it's also air-cooled just like the 356. i haven't always been a fan of this generation of porsche it does look like a beetle from a lot of angles particularly in the bonnet and the headlights and the front bumper but there's a lot to like about this car for example the gold porsche lettering beautiful you might also notice it's got twin exhausts which are left over from the original car which they couldn't remove because it's part of the rear bumper assembly not even mercedes can top that level of fakery regarding batteries the 356 wasn't designed to accommodate any but electrogenic has managed to squeeze them in every spare nook and cranny they could find including under the floor at the rear behind the rear seats and in the bonnet at the front in total the battery has a 36 kilowatt-hour capacity that's apparently good for miles a 15 kilowatt on-board charger should give you a full recharge in around two and a half hours the interior is very special as well it looks pretty much spotless looks like it just rolled off the production line it's so clean i particularly love this red on the dashboard the red leather on the seats and the matching red on the carpets and on the door cards something else i find really interesting is that even though it's an electric car it's still got the original manual wind down windows which is a bit odd it's also got this little quarter panel here for letting a bit of breeze into the car which is um quite a sweet little touch i think it's also got all the original gauges which have been modified to work with the new electrical systems so your fuel tank is related to the amount of battery power you have left the rev counter is wired up to the motor so that tells you how fast the motor is spinning and obviously you've also got your speedo on the right hand side it's also got the original bla punk stereo system the original clock and if i pull this that operates the windscreen wipers very cute look at that you know that is children never learn but i'll give you a clue it goes with that little ashtray thing in the center very nice obviously it's also got the piester resistance a four-speed manual gearbox three pedals which is very weird and also if you notice it's got this little lever at the front if you push that forward the car's ready to go forward if you pull it backwards it goes backwards or if you leave it in the middle then it goes into neutral and interestingly when you rev it listen it spins the motor it works just like an internal combustion engine if i hit the brake it slows it down too it's all very quirky and interesting what i want to know though is how electrogenic's decision to electrify this car have affected the way that it drives you can drive this car in a couple of ways you can either leave it in third gear as i am now and let the car do its thing you get a decent amount of acceleration and it will keep going up to motorway speeds essentially or you can choose to take matters into your own hands and using the gearbox essentially allows you to choose exactly how much torque is sent to the rear wheels so for example i'll slow right down for you right now and i'll put it into first gear and if i pull away what you'll notice is that i get a really good surge of acceleration before i hit the red line alternatively i just realized there's no head rest so your head does get smashed back towards the back of the car but alternatively if i put it into let's say fourth gear for argument's sake and then i accelerate nothing it bogs down that's flat to the floor so there's a big difference back to third between fourth third second and first it's like driving a proper internal combustion engine car this makes all the difference there's actually a fair amount of skill involved in changing gear as well because even though you don't have to feather the clutch you can just basically lift off if you have too many engine revs on too many motor revs then the car complains it shudders equally if you downshift when you've got too many revs on car doesn't like that either it won't explode for example but there is an art to getting your gear changes right there's driver involvement in this thing trust me you might have noticed that this car doesn't have the same ridiculous headline power figures as the likes of a tesla or a porsche tycan for example but electrogenic say that it doesn't matter what's really important in a car like this is torque and there's bags of it when you accelerate you really do feel it shift and trust me i'm not sure you'd want more power in this particular chassis [Music] the steering is very interesting it's not power assisted which means that it's a lot of weight in this even when you're up to speed and that means that you're constantly having to wrestle the car around corners and believe me it's a bit of a workout also you might have noticed these seats eight don't have any head restraints but b don't have any side supports this track is predominantly right-handed so that means that i'm constantly being shoved up against this window here praying begging and hoping that this door doesn't fly open because there's only a lap belt the chassis is really nicely balanced they've managed to lay the batteries out in such a way that this car has a 60 40 weight distribution which is pretty similar to the original 356. it might be a bit heavier than the original but i'm certainly certainly having a lot of fun in this car more way more than i thought i would in the beginning the tires are a little bit sketchy i must say it's using the original rubber that the 356 first came on and that means that it's i mean it's a little bit more unpredictable through the corners it moves a bit more although i actually prefer that i wouldn't want this thing to have top twos for example where there's way more grip than you have the power and torque to overcome the 356 uses disc brakes so they stop the car nicely the first two inches or so of travel essentially do nothing i would say and then they firm up quite dramatically but they do stop the car but there is no region i lift off the brakes and it rolls it coasts like you would expect an internal combustion engine car to do and i actually prefer that especially in a sports car because one pedal driving is okay around town but out on a race track for example or when you're driving enthusiastically it's not what you want believe me it's not what i want so should you buy one of these i mean if you're in the market for an electric car that is fun to drive really really engaging the answer's got to be absolutely it's not going to come cheap though first you have to find a donor car and 356's aren't exactly inexpensive and then the cost of swapping the ice engine out for electrical components is going to run you somewhere in the region of 30 to 50 000 pounds depending on how much power what speed of recharging you want and a load of other factors so not the cheapest thing in the world but my god is hilarious you could argue that this conversion is slightly sacrilegious unnecessary even but i can see the advantages classics such as this in their original form are notoriously unreliable they break down they need lots of tlc and are simply not ideal for day-to-day use with an electric powertrain you go some way to making a machine that's usable year-round on any trip food for thought this car shows without a shadow of a doubt that electric vehicles don't have to be boring that's number one but the second thing is they don't have to rely on outrageous power and torque and straight line speed in order to be interesting there's a whole world out there in which you can have fun in an electric car where it's enjoyable and engaging and fun to drive and i wish more manufacturers would just take risks like this companies please whack a manual transmission on your electric car people will love it this single-handedly i think will convince people around the world who are skeptical about evs that they're a lot of fun to drive [Music] [Music] you

Channel: AutoTrader

Views: 214,536

Keywords: porsche, 356, porsche 356, restomod, porsche restomod, porsche restomod review, porsche 356 review, electric restomod, electric classic car, electric classic car review, electric porsche 0-60, electric porsche acceleration, classic car, rory reid, autotrader, rory reid autotrader

Id: OXhOyghwJnE

Length: 14min 11sec (851 seconds)

Published: Fri Nov 12 2021

Reddit Comments

[u/HackeSpitze]

I've driven the Opel Manta EV with the manual transmission. I'm all in for manual transmissions in ICE cars and I'm all in for EV daily drivers but EV's with a manual has to be one of the most frustating and unnecessary things to operate ever created. If we go full EV, then without a manual for me.

Furthermore converting a 356 to an EV is a crime per se.

[u/bsw1234]

I have a 356 Coupe..... I’m not going to use the word blasphemy past this sentence.

I get what they’re doing and the thoughts behind it but that video made me cringe from the beginning. It appears that the car has quite a bit of understeer when pushed. Ummm... that’s not been my experience driving them over the past 30 years or so.

Also looks like the weight really takes a toll on dampening and handling so, nah.. if some of the magic is lost then nope, not for mine.

Oh, and they’re unreliable and break down a lot? Bullshit. I have driven these cars cross country more than once, driven them from NY City to Miami, up to Canada, out across the Great Plains... a well cared for 356 in good condition is very, very reliable. They can totally take daily use, just keep them away from cold and salt. (Cold because the heaters suck and salt because they rust like you won’t believe).

That car does have very, very nice door gaps though.

Interior is totally stock fwiw.

Edited to add, he’s clearly never driven a stock 356 for comparison. And that’s fine.

[u/_JunkyardDog]

This is brilliant.

[u/BonelessChicknStrips]

A manual transmission in an electric car literally makes no sense from a practically or performance standpoint

[u/chucchinchilla]

Will have to watch this one later. One major concern I have with a job like this is having so many batteries in the front it throws off the balance of the car and the light steering these cars are known for (unassisted steering but engine is in back so it's very easy to drive). I did flip through the video quickly and saw they put batteries all over the car maybe for these reasons so I approve.

[u/slr999]

This sounds like a great effort to me. Making a piece of history a little bit easier to use, and keeping the manual around, albeit in a slightly ‘diminished’ way.

Yeah, I could see having one of these.

[u/three_shoes]

I dont think Porsche are the right classic cars for EV conversions really, but with their popularity I can see why these burgeoning companies are creating them for some good marketing reach.

I do like the idea of classic EV conversions though, if I had anywhere near the money I would love something like a BMW E9 Coupe, Merc SL, Mk1 VW Golf, perfect electric city cruisers.

[u/servo1056]

Well, no...if it was for petrolheads it would use PETROL.

[u/opposite_locksmith]

I’m just here for the center of white hot rage that is the Venn diagram of Porsche enthusiasts, classic car enthusiasts and gas enthusiasts.