15 September 2009

MGB goes electric in South Carolina

Roger Dougal became a Ph.D. in electrical engineering in 1984, and he also purchased a 1972 MGB to drive to work at the University of South Carolina. What he did not know was 25 years later those two events would become even more intertwined.

Over the years, Dougal thrived in his work researching power sources and systems in the college of engineering. His car, on the other hand, sat idled in his garage collecting dust.

Dougal sits in his old but new electric powered MGB.

“I’ve always played with cars as a hobby,” said Dougal. “I bought the car to rebuild it, but just ran out of time. I decided to do something useful.”

He took the car out of retirement and turned it over to electrical engineering students at the University of South Carolina’s College of Engineering and Computing. He gave them the opportunity to turn the British Leyland Motor Corp. vehicle into a car of the 21st century—a car run on electricity.

The “Electric MG” is a reality.

“It can go really fast for short distances,” said Dougal, who estimates they spent $10,000 in making the changes.

About 15 students have worked on the car since Dougal began the experiment, which has left some MGB fans aghast. But the professor wanted to create an electric vehicle in the machine shop of the College of Engineering and Computing.

“I said, ‘We can do this before GM can,’ ” said Dougal, who guessed he and several groups of students have worked on the project for about 18 months. “It didn’t move along quite as fast as I’d planned. When you think about how many people are working at the major auto manufacturers, we’ve probably made pretty good progress.”

Tyler Price, a senior from Lexington, S.C., is one of the students working on the car, which has had the convertible top removed and a roll bar added.

The original engine is in Dougal’s garage, and an AC motor with a custom driveshaft replaced it. In its place is a bank of more than 100 supercapacitors, resembling soft drink cans encased in a plastic box and loaded into the trunk for the power source. A lithium battery will go onboard later and united with the supercapacitor bank to improve range and efficiency.

“The changes take the car from one century to another,” said Price. “Like all projects, it’s been an evolution.”

The car is waiting on some modifications, including a paint job, LED lamps to replace the headlights, a sports windshield, and new carpet. Because it is electric, the car sounds much like a golf cart. The students want to add acoustics to give the MGB-EV, as they call it, a sound more closely resembling a car.

Dougal and the student team are looking forward to testing it for speed, acceleration, and economy.

“This was a famous British sports car back in its day,” said Price, who was not even born when Dougal acquired the car. “Now, it will have some fame in another century.”

For related information, go to www.isa.org/environment.