On April 20, 2017 we brought out several of our electric cars to be part of the Earth Day event NASA put on for their employees to attend.  There were many other vendors including Blue Life Florida, Florida Solar, and Master Gardeners.  We were set up right by the front door of the OSB II building right next to the Vehicle Assembly Building at Kennedy Space Center!  It was a treat to get to be “behind the scenes” right there on NASA property and get to talk to a few hundred employees about electric cars.  We might even get a few new members from some of those we talked to.  Here’s a few pictures from the event as well as a link to the full album.

Link to the FULL album!  https://goo.gl/photos/3t53L6YNV7jCLegAA

We were invited to the Space Coast Motor Officers Car, Truck, Motorcycle and Craft Show supporting the Special Olympics of Florida.  This year the show was held at the American Muscle Car Museum located just south of the Melbourne Greyhound Park off of Sarno Road.  We were very surprised to see the solar panels all over the place.  We agreed there had to be enough to generate more than what the museum uses.  We were even more surprised to see the charging stations in the parking lot for electric cars!

There was one station on each side of the front door and each station had two plugs for a total of four charging spots.  They were absolutely free to use since the power was coming from the solar panels.  There was no card swipe or buttons to press on them at all.  Just plug in and start charging.  Easy!

We like to explain to everyone at our public Q&A events about some of our members having solar panels on their house they then use to charge their car.  We explain how they drove to today’s event on pure sunlight.  Now once you can plug into solar charging like this at the place you were going to (like the Muscle Car Museum) you can drive back home on pure sunlight too!  This is the “golden ticket” that needs to be spread around and installed at other places where you’d park for an hour anyway too: movie theaters, shopping malls, and everywhere people work.

There were trophies for the best in show, best car, best truck, etc.  And proceeds from registration fees went to the Special Olympics of Florida.  A very worthy charity!

There were several rows of show cars from almost every era.  There was even a British car from the 1930’s with right hand drive!  Check out the full photo album at the link below to see it!

There were several booths set up from local crafters where you could buy things like hand made purses, scarves, and jewelry among other things.  We had our table and tent set up like normal to hand out informational sheets and business cards while answering questions from gearheads about electric drive trains.  They were very excited when we told them about the all electric Zombie 222.  Made at Bloodshed Motors in Austin Texas (bloodshedmotors.com), it’s a 1968 Mustang Fastback with all of the drive components removed and replaced with batteries, controllers, and two very large DC motors.  It can do 0-60 MPH in 1.79 seconds!

We had a great time there and even got a great idea to check and see if we could have our Drive Electric Week event here.  It makes a lot of sense because there’s plenty of room and they have solar powered charging stations to show to everyone!

Remember to check our upcoming events page to see where we’ll be next and come out to ask your questions about driving electric!

Here’s a link to the FULL ALBUM with tons more pictures of individual cars from the show as well as a few surprising cars: https://goo.gl/photos/jwmMRiyXWjkaNAEn7

We were invited to bring our cars out to the Family Christmas Extravaganza held at the Palm Bay Regional Park on December 17th.  There were thousands of people there to enjoy all the free activities like bounce houses and slides, petting zoo, horse rides, free food, as well as checking out the fire trucks, police mobile command center and fire safety training trailer.  Hundreds of people came by our area to check out the electric cars and ask us tons of great questions.  And since we drive these cars every day we had plenty of answers and then some!  One person even brought their personal electric unicycle.  It still counts as an EV!

Here’s a few more photos from the event:

Here’s a link to the full photo and video album:
https://goo.gl/photos/vCSg2doKx92bcXG89

We were invited to bring our electric cars out to the Ocean Reef Beach (ORB) Festival again this year.  We had one of our most interesting looking cars park at the SemaConnect charging station at the main event area at Pelican Beach Park in Satellite Beach:

Then we had the other cars park on the corner of the overflow parking lot at Desoto and A1A just like last year:

Some cars came in at the beginning and then left after others came in later to park in their spot. We talked to at least 100 people just at the overflow lot and many hundred more at the main event.  Lots of people learned about electric cars today!  We even gave a test ride in one our Chevy Volts.  And once again their mind was forever changed after driving it.  They admitted to wanting to get an electric car for their next vehicle.

The weather couldn’t have been nicer and we had some really nice clouds to keep the direct sun off of our heads.  It made for a pretty spectacular day and we look forward to next year’s ORB.

Keep a lookout on our Upcoming Events page to see when our next event will be so you can come out and take a look at and even sit in and ask questions about our electric cars.

Here’s the album full of all the pictures from the event:

https://goo.gl/photos/Hz8vkbSsFtdLQ9bQ8

We had a great turnout of EVs at this Sunday’s Space Coast Veg Fest.  There were two of each kind: 2 Chevy Volts, 2 Nissan Leafs, and 2 Tesla Model S cars to show a good difference in the available makes and models.  We had to explain how there are so many different ones from nearly all the manufacturers that it almost requires a visit to one of our events to have one or more of our members to explain all the differences in range, range extenders, size, number of seats, charging capabilities, etc.  Everyone that visited our tent had the same questions on how much they cost, how far do they go on a charge, how long does it take to charge them, and the very popular “how much does it cost to replace the batteries.”  Thanks to our patron saint of Chevy Volts, Erick Belmer, I was able to explain every time that the Volt’s battery pack is good for AT LEAST 350,000 miles!  Most gas cars need to be rebuilt by that time in some capacity.  We are starting to think the rest of the car will fall apart around the battery and electric motor since they are so well taken care of by the car’s charging and temperature (liquid coolant) management system.  And electric motors have just the one moving part so there’s nothing to maintain or fix or replace like all of the many replacement parts and tune ups required to keep a gasoline engine running smoothly.  We changed a lot of people’s perspectives on driving electric and might have even made a few converts after today’s event – which is right in line with our mission to make sure the public understands as much as possible about driving electric!

Here’s the full photo album:  https://goo.gl/photos/pd3DprXfSGypYupy7

West Melbourne welcomed us to join in the fall festival celebration honoring our veterans and Thanksgiving. They graciously set aside a large area for our electric cars. Today we were able to show off many cars including Tesla Model S, Nissan Leaf, and Chevy Volt. The stars of the show were, again, the BMW i8 and the Tesla Model X.

The BMW i8 has a distinctive look that’s hard to miss. Later in the day many people were amazed by Tesla Model X parking itself with no driver inside.

Most people were surprised at how practical electric cars are. Those that were aware of electric cars were still surprised at how affordable they can be. On the one side, the Nissan Leaf with 84 miles of range can now be purchased for under $10k pre-owned. On the other end, the luxurious high-performance Tesla Model X and BMW i8. And in the middle, the Chevy Volt and pre-owned  Model S offering a balance between price and performance.

Check out the full photo gallery from the event.

We were invited to participate with our personal electric vehicles again this year at the Satellite Beach Founders Day parade and event.  In the parade we had a few EVs including our newest member’s BMW i8.  Needless to say, that car got the most oohs and ahhs as it drove by the spectators.  Before,  during, and after the parade we had our table set up at the David R Schechter Center and several electric cars on display for everyone to see and compare and ask all the questions they wanted.  Everyone that spoke to us and had their questions answered thanked us for the quick “EV Education”.  Many people commented that they didn’t know there were electric cars like the Chevy Volt and Ford Fusion Energi that have a gasoline generator under the hood that automatically starts after the battery runs out.  Of course the biggest attraction was the Tesla Model X with its falcon wing doors open.  Almost everyone agreed that it should be able to fly.  Keep checking our upcoming events page to see where we’ll be set up next and bring your electric vehicle questions!

Here’s a link to the full album:  https://goo.gl/photos/qw8EDyraUAv7Z2YN6