I love the idea of taking old iconic cars and updating them with modern EV drivetrains, Gattica-style, so that they may live on well into the forthcoming Electric Era. There’s a number of companies out there doing just that, and if these companies have one thing in common, it’s that what they end up making is never cheap. Converted air-cooled Volkswagens tend to go for around $85 to $100,000 or more, for example. Converting a combustion car to an EV is kind of an involved process, and components like batteries are pricey, which means that to make money, the only way to do it is to make your conversions fancy-trousers premium things, which you can then demand a lot of money for. That’s the approach taken by David Brown Automotive, which just announced their Mini eMastered, a really luxuriously finished and appointed Mini with an electric drivetrain and a range of about 110 miles that costs over $150,000. It’s terribly cool, but I really look forward to the day when EV-converted classics don’t demand six-digit prices. I mean, I can sit on vinyl. My ass doesn’t need hand-stitched vegan mushroom leather!
The name, eMastered, is a derivation of Mini Remastered, which is the line of extremely expensive and high-end original combustion-engined Mini restomods that the company has been selling for a number of years. The eMastered leverages all of the work the company has done to modernize and enfancify old Minis, including dashboards that incorporate a center-stack touchscreen, integrated A/C units, jewelry-like knobs and other switchgear, and lots of leather trim and seats and all that stuff.
Really, it all looks pretty fantastic, as you can see in the nearly reverential cinematography of their promo video, captioned by us.
I mean, I can think of far worse ways to spend $150,000 than on a really charming electric city car like this. Specs-wise, I think a lot of smart decisions were made; the weight of it all is only about 1,400 pounds, an absolute featherweight by EV standards, in large part thanks to the quite small 18.8 kWh battery pack. Just for comparison, the smallest pack you can get on a Nissan Leaf is 40 kWh (but an old BMW i3 came with a 22kWh pack). The small pack I think makes sense, because this is mostly going to be used as a city car. Even with that small pack 110 miles of range are possible, and given the context this car is designed to be used in, why haul around a crapton of battery you just don’t need? It’s a sensible approach.
Another nice thing about a smaller battery is that it only takes about 3 hours to fully charge at 6.6 kW AC charging. That’s about a quarter of what most mainstream EVs take on a home charger.
That sensibly-sized battery is pumping electrons through a 96 horsepower Zonic 70 electric motor (for comparison, a 1968 Mini was making around 58 hp) which is good enough to get this little gem from zero to 60 mph in 8.5 seconds, which should be plenty, and it’ll eventually hit 92 mph if you keep that pedal down, whizzing off into the stylish sunset.
Design-wise, this thing looks pretty much like a very nicely-sorted original Mini, just with a different grille mesh and some modern projector headlamps, the one element of the design that I don’t think really works. You see this on a lot of resto-mods, and I think we’ve given these sorts of headlights a fair chance and we can just call it. Isn’t there some way to make modern LED lights with fluted lenses? Or do they all have to look like this kind of Amazon aftermarket crap? I’m asking!
These interiors are pretty great, and the attention to detail you can have when dealing with a small car is very evident here. Just look at that leather-slathered trunk there, with the stainless steel runners. I bet it smells fantastic in there. I want to put my whole head inside that trunk and just breathe.
The taillights I’m not too crazy about, though. I mean, they’re not bad, and I don’t mind the three-round-lamp look, but on a car this fancy, I’d like to see something more than three off-the-shelf lights set into a custom housing.
Those knobs look satisfying to hold and turn, although I think those lower two probably could use some kind of label. And, with all those nice knobs, it’s kind of a letdown that an important control like the volume control is that fussy little rocker button on that Pioneer head unit instead of another nice chunky knob. I mean, which are you using more, volume control or… what is that, the rear window defroster? Come on, for $150K, David Brown can figure something out.
There’s no question this is a lovely thing, and very appealing. But, like so many other lovely things in the automotive world today, I can’t help but think the high cost just makes it kind of irrelevant. It’s a lovely toy, but until there’s a good means for EV converting old cars for, say, half this price or less, then what’s the point?
Maybe I’m getting jaded. Conceptually, this gets a lot right: smart battery size for the job, great look, great use case for an EV. There just should be versions of this for non-rich people.
Well, another great conversion by professionals. Unfortunately, it deepens the impression that EV conversions need to be (prohibitively) expensive.
But if we skip fancy features and design details, it can be done with an investment that one could consider almost as reasonable.
I converted my Volvo 850 for 18,000 Euro using Leaf and Tesla components. With about 80 miles of range it is just what I need for my commute in Swedish brick style.
$150K On A Fancy Electric Original Mini Boy?
Finally, it’s modern Geppetto’s time to bask in the limelight.
The headlights, taillights and head unit are all, ah, AliExpress Chic.
Okay, I got 30-50k. I want an old Toyota pickup, 70-100 mile range and it doesn’t need to be perfect or super fucking dope inside, just pretty nice and clean.
The base truck might be 20-30. But could you do the rest for another 20-30? Whoever makes a cheap “plug and play” retro car pack that’s legit and gets a tv show to use it or something is going to make alot of money.
I had an old toyota, and I had it in the shop alot to get it back to how it should be. One repair too many and I lost my love for that particular truck and sold it. Electric would have taken away 90% of my repairs.
This only works if you can get a decent used EV battery platform that can match up to an old fun ICE Car and bolt it on. If you want a new battery platform or a new body from an old style 6 figures. EVs are already proving they won’t get as cheap as ICE Cars but they won’t last and a used market will never happen.
I have a 1972 Fiat 500 that is actually smaller than an original Mini. I am rebuilding the head for a refresh but I would love to EV convert it. It is a popular swap in Europe because it actually makes the car much more driveable. Top speed and acceleration are way up and range is not an issue because you would rarely want to drive it more than 100 miles at a time anyway.
If I fabricated everything myself, it would cost about $25k with a HyPer9 or similar motor, Tesla cells, charge controller, battery management, cables, etc. That is a lot of work and expense. When you are done you have a very unsafe vehicle that you would probably not want to commute in. Range is too small for doing tours and rallies so you are left with parades, car shows, errands, dinners out, and the occasional joy ride. Really hard to justify and it is unclear how much it would be worth after construction.
I really like old minis and I really like electromods like this, but I cannot imagine driving an original Mini on modern streets when the average car is larger than what we landed in Normandy – I’m a safety-third kinda dude, but this thing’s outside my risk envelope.
Death comes for us all. I reason that it’s no less safe than a motorcycle in a crash, plus people actually seem to notice the mini due to its cuteness.
Cuteness definitely helps. I had a mini and it’s the opposite of BMW (had those too). People give you room and are super nice on the road.
My current budget for an EV-converted Mini does not exceed $149,995.00 which means, with regret, this is not the car for me.
Gee, British Racing Beige. It looks good. The young lady agrees.
For $150k, I would expect more than a generic, off the shelf Pioneer hear unit. It just looks cheap and out of place.
*head unit. Fucking autocorrect.
In a roundabout way, I suppose it could be called a “hear unit”.
Filed under “If I ever need to kidnap Jason”. 😉
Which, of course, I would only ever do for the best of reasons, like taking him to an undisclosed location to gaze upon some forbidden taillights. 😀
(Did I include enough emojis to make it clear that I have no actual plans to kidnap Jason? Just in case: 🙂 )
Took the words right out of my mouth, but I’ll put them out anyway: I can’t stand those retrofit projector lamps! They just don’t work, especially in something that gets so many details right. Honestly, most “updated” lighting looks dumb on older cars. Some of the worst are the led halos on older Jeeps and led “eye brows” incorporated into aftermarket lenses for older trucks. That stuff makes me cringe. It’s like an older person getting some very noticeable plastic surgery on their face – it just never looks right and doesn’t hold up.
Hate it
Yawn
Go pound sand
LMAO
Honestly I’m starting to think the world would be better off without all these boutique companies taking classics and turning them into absurd restomods that cost as much as real estate. The cars would be better off in the hands of some guy and his Craftsman tool set in his garage.
GTFO with this thing. Absolute waste of money and materials.
Not sure this is considered “a Classic” as you can buy a whole new mini shell built off of the exact same molds mini made them from. if you’re doing this in small number you probably can manufacture your own VINs
That’s exactly what gets me. You can buy a whole-ass HOUSE for the cost of this thing.
Only 4 miles less than the official 2023 Mini Cooper SE
Those are probably wimpy Euro miles. Manly US range miles are larger.
This is like a $1M RV with fine wood and granite countertops. It is trying too hard to justify its cost.
Assuming it costs $20k to fully restore and paint a Mini shell and these very run-of-the-mill EV components are $20k retail, that thing should be well under $100k. Even at that price it is nothing but a very pricey Instagram moment.
It costs more than 20k to refurbish a mini. If you want to start fresh, a heritage shell starts at 14k without anything else included.
Remember you are just doing the shell, not the engine or interior.
There is pretty much nothing in that interior that came from BMC. It is a completely fresh/new car.
I’m not calling $150k reasonable, but I would expect that these things aren’t cheap to produce. It is probably much easier from a manufacturing perspective to buy a bunch of heritage shells, suspension components, and interiors than it is to drag a bunch of rusty hulks into your shop and start patching panels together.
I assumed they had to be built on existing VINs. There are no emissions issues but what about crash testing for brand new cars?
My guess would be that they have some rusty hulks on hand for VIN donation purposes, but I’m speculating about all of this so take it with a boulder-sized chunk of salt. I can tell you that nothing in the promo images matches the interior of my mini, even the air vents are different.
I just don’t see the payoff in welding rusty minis back together for this application. It would be way easier to start with a blank canvas.
I don’t like that they got rid of that weird folded protruding seam on the front of the car.
Agree. It’s not a flaw to be filled in/shaved down.
Am I the only one who read the headline as the car model being a “Mini Boy?”
Yeah a comma would have been nice, but someone must’ve been in a coma during editing.
Maybe he was purging his colon.
Doesn’t that put your asterisk?
I sentence you to death. Period.
Guess I’d better dash away.
Well you have made your mark, unquestionably.
This is turning into a total apostrophe.
Shhhh. Don’t say that umlaut.
My ellipsis sealed.
Look at the demonstration of comma-raderie between you all over this topic.
Yeah we’re a couple of old grammars.
This thread is interrobang out of order.
Gildred Racing (home of the Honda powered Super Cooper) advertises a classic mini EV conversion using Tesla electromechanicals that features 300hp and 150-mile range with a 31-37 kHz battery for $120K. You know, for the budget conscious folks.
Still too much, but you sure get a lot more of the important stuff for your $120k Super Cooper EV than the DB featured in this article!
I’m undecided on the car itself, but agree with the choice of music on the display.
I’m mildly annoyed there is an “Engine Start” button on an EV conversion. The rest is lovely.
Great commentary in the video.
Good news! A coo, lightweight, potentially fun electric car to buzz around the city! It’s just what all Autopians have been saying they want in an electric car!
Oh.
It’s a hundred and fifty grand.
Maybe it’s just news.
Complains about the tail lights, includes 0 pictures of said tail lights in article… The videos won’t load for me at work so all I have is the pics and I can’t see that. Bummer. I will have to look later. Another complaint I have is the “engine start” button. First off, electric motors are not engines; secondly, that button looks identical to one that I used to sell at autozone literally almost 20 years ago. That’s almost as out of place as the pioneer deck there. Oh well.
Ok went back through and there is one small pic of the tails, still hard to see though. Too small to know if I agree or if I like them.
That Pioneer stereo looks way out of place in this
The headlights really really bug me on this. You’re exactly right about needing to make modern LEDs to replace old sealed beams that look better than cheap Amazon units. Singer has done that with their 911 restomods, which sure are $1M+, but for 150K I’d expect something slightly more appealing than a set of $50 Amazon headlights. Heck, for under $400 USD you can pick up a set of Holley RetroBrights like these
Well said, these Halos have become so generic that cars like this and e-bikes that cost $500 have the exact same light. I’m not impressed, and really under whelmed at $150K
What a waste of a perfectly good car. Oh well.