Specifications
World-saving appropriate technology for urban driving, purpose-designed to let you leave the highway bulk
and horsepower at home much more often.
Why bother investing your money in a car with limited specifications in terms of speed and distance: 35 mph, given sensible laws (see Home page); 25-35 miles of range per charge? (Note: range can be increased dramatically with a short plug-in during the day.)
Answer: Because this kind of car is exactly what you need to take a major step toward helping to save the planet and avoid humanitarian nightmares, right now. The holy grail of the highway electric car that can go 75 mph for 300 miles before it needs a quick recharge is something any thinking person looks forward to. But Medium Speed Electric Vehicles like the ZENN or the Wheego can get affordable and super-efficient cars into the hands of the broad middle class far more quickly, covering 70%, 80%, 90% of many people's driving needs. We are in the midst of multi-faceted environmental and foreign policy emergencies that this product can help lots of us deal with together, NOW.
ZENN Owner In Love With His Car
The ZENN is a high quality 2-seat urban electric vehicle designed to be affordable enough to allow large segments of the American population to up their participation, now, in a crucial societal movement toward sustainable living. The ZENN is virtually hand-crafted and built to order in Canada from high-quality globally-obtained parts. We believe the Wheego will also be an excellent product and look forward to selling their MSEV's and highway vehicles someday soon too.
Watch a YouTube video of the ZENN in action and ZENN Motors' production facilities. Click Here.
Note: In the USA, ZENN's don't have the orange slow-moving-vehicle triangle you'll see in this video.
The vehicle's high tech, full crash cage, pictured at the bottom this page, is of superbly welded aluminum alloy from veteran French car maker, Microcar. The safety of the ZENN stems from the fact that this cage is substantially overbuilt for the impact forces expected to be generated in an accident by a "low inertia" car having the low weight and moderate speeds of the ZENN.
Its 72 VDC (5.69 KW; 7.6 HP) AC motor is manufactured by Advanced Motors and Drives of East Syracuse, New York, USA. The motor offers regenerative braking and costs only about $800 to replace. Its life expectancy is 4-5+ years under normal daily use.
The ZENN also uses an advanced American-manufactured form of the tried and true, easily obtained, affordable, and 93% recyclable lead-acid battery: a fully sealed, military grade, gel-type, absorbed glass mat design. The ZENN uses six in all. The batteries (Discover EV31A-A) have a total of 6.2 Kwh of electrical storage capacity. Battery packs last 2-3 years and the current cost of replacement, for all 6 batteries, is about $1500. Click here for more technical info on the excellent batteries in the ZENN.
The ZENN is a very roomy vehicle with front wheel drive and rack and pinion steering. It offers 13 cubic feet of storage space behind the seats. Seating is comfortable and roomy for big and small people. It has a heater (remember, made in Canada) and power windows. Air conditioning and a great power sunroof are optional, as are custom floor mats. But the biggest point is that the ZENN adds substantially to any person's array of truly progressive Green technology.
Green? "Hey, where do you think electricity comes from, fields of flowers?" I heard the late George Carlin deliver this line in hilarious style almost 10 years ago. But, the fact is that even taking into consideration a typical American mix of electrical power generation sources, driving a ZENN results in a 77 percent net reduction in greenhouse gas emission. Part of the efficiency comes from the fact that you have very few moving parts in an electric drive train, so much less energy is converted to waste heat via friction, and much more into movement. Part of the efficiency comes from the car's lighter weight, well under 1500 pounds, partly due to its aluminum frame (pictured below), but also because its exterior body panels are made of recycled plastic instead of steel, a resilient molded plastic which is highly dent resistent and, of course, cannot rust. Then you've got regenerative braking helping to recharge the batteries on downhill stretches and stop lights, and the basic fact that your engine is not using any power when you are stopped at intersections or drive-thru windows.
Of course, being fully electric, you can freely opt to recharge your ZENN using renewable sources of electric power, such as wind power and solar photovoltaic installations. For example, you can begin to use the ZENN to cut your emissions much more than the average figure above by simply signing up for PNM Wind Power. If you sign up for 90% WInd Power at your residence, your $300 discount from ZENN of Albuquerque should pay the added surcharge to you PNM bill for at least the first year.
At current PNM electric rates, it costs about 1½ cents per mile to operate a ZENN. A full charge requires about 6.2 Kwh of power, and provides a driving range of about 40 miles. Full charging time is 8 hours, but you get an 80% charge in only 4 hours. Plugging in for a full work day can increase your emission-free range to 60-70 miles per day.
I just purchased a device that measures the power consumption of any plug in device: the "Kill A Watt EZ" by P3 International. Very cool device. I just did my first measurement of a ZENN recharge. Starting with full batteries I drove 24.5 miles with a load of about 220 lbs (me plus some stuff). The CD player was blasting the whole time, I had the running lights on for about half the time and the full headlights on the other half. When I got home, I was down to about 1.5 bars on the 6-bar dashboard energy meter. The ammeter on the charger lite up the 6 bar LED when I first plugged in, and it stayed there for at least 10 minutes. I figure my total discharge was about 80% to 85%. When I looked in the morning, the total cost of the recharge to full cost 34 cents at my electric rate of 9.9 cents per kilowatt-hour. I'll be glad to loan this device to any customer who wants to demonstrate to their boss how much it would cost to plug in your ZENN at work.
ZENN Downloads
NOTE: '08 & '09 ZENN's are nearly identical.
The new 2010 model year will also be extremely similar. This keeps costs down and, besides, why fix it if it ain't broke?!
ZENN Smart Battery Charger Guide
Note: The Zenn's charger is mounted in the very front under the hood, just right of center. It is the model with the 10 LED display. The LED's and decal are on the right side of the unit, mounted horizontally, with the 6-bar ammeter light toward the front of the car and the red fault light toward the back. They are best viewed in a dark place (so you can see the LED's clearly), with a flashlight (so you can see the decal symbols clearly).
ZENN Smart Charger Data Sheet - 391Kb
ZENN 2008 Brochure - 731Kb
ZENN 2008 Press - 419Kb
ZENN 2008 Info - 2.6Mb
BY THE WAY... Our LLC's Sponsorships
(1) We enjoyed displaying a ZENN and sponsoring a movie at Riofest Environmental Film Festival, January 29th and 30th, 2010, at the New Mexico Tech campus, Socorro, NM. This is a unique event that offers informative and inspiring films on urgent environmental issues and the possibility to meet vendors offering goods and services that can help individuals take action to save our planet and improve our health.
(2) We are helping to support Earth Care International with an ad in its 2010 Sustainable Santa Fe Guide. Also check out the web site of Santa Fe Progress, Santa Fe's premier site for GREEN and SUSTAINABLE information and interactions. This site is dedicated to creating a thriving, just, and sustainable community.
(3) We are happy to have sponsored,at the top $500 "Guara" level, the August 22,2009, 5:30-9:00 P.M., "Maya Eco-Center Benefit" at the Mennonite Church, located at 1300 Girard Blvd NE, Albuquerque, NM. For more information on this worthy project, contact Amethyst Luna
Cooperative, 10805 Ralph Ave. NE Albuquerque, NM 87112, and speak to Ms. Martha Dominguez: marthacd@earthlink.net, 505-275-0597, or Linda Bailly: linda@dreamstodestiny.net, 505-974-1352. The Maya Eco-Center project entails development of a sustainable center for green education and spiritual rainforest retreat that will help employ poor indigenous people of southern Honduras.
(4) We are trying to become an official B Corporation and active members of the Move Your Money (to local banks and credit unions) campaign. These efforts are in process. Our family (since 1988) and business (since 2008) accounts are at New Mexico Educators Federal Credit Union, a great place except that they won't lend me, or any dealer, money to buy cars! So I need a local bank to help me with a little "floor plan!"
(5) We were proud to be $500 corporate sponsors of the Thirsty Ear Music Festival. We had a ZENN on display in its Green Village exhibition, at the Eaves Movie Ranch, Santa Fe, June 12-14, 2009. It was a great event and we'll do it again, sales allowing!
(6) We enjoyed playing a vendor-sponsor role supporting Santa Fe Community College's "Green Gala" on the evening of August 14, 2009. The gathering was to celebrate and garner support for the new Sustainable Technologies Center.
