Electrogenic Mini review

That said, there’s more demand for Minis than for Jowetts, so this is about as low-cost and off the shelf as it gets. In fact, the particular car I’m driving here belongs to another company called Smallcarbigcity, which organises tours in London in classic Minis and plans to convert its entire fleet to electric.

So by the time they’re done, there will be some economies of scale, and the conversion had to be as affordable as possible. Still, turning a Mini into an EV starts at £32,000 plus a clean base car. And that’s assuming it needs no other suspension or body work. Good thing Minis aren’t known for rusting, then.

For that money, you get 21kWh of Tesla Model S battery taking the place of the engine and fuel tank. That gives it 80-100 miles of range, but it is possible to add more batteries if you’re willing to sacrifice the rear bench. There’s a CCS charging socket neatly hidden behind the petrol filler cap and it can charge at up to 50kW.

The motor is a Hyper 9 from a company called NetGain, which specialises in motors for EV conversions. It’s capable of putting out 120bhp and 173lb ft, but here it’s pegged back to the same 51bhp of the original petrol engine so it’s easier to homologate as a rental vehicle. If you were to get one privately, Electrogenic would be happy to unlock more power since that takes just a few lines of code. The motor drives through a five-speed gearbox from a Citroën C1 as the original Mini’s engine sump-mounted gearbox can’t be adapted, and custom single-speed reduction gears are needlessly expensive.

To drive, it's remarkably Mini-like. That might be an obvious thing to say about a Mini, but the salient point is that I don’t think it loses anything compared with an original one. This one is entirely standard aside from the obvious. It looks stock, the interior is largely unchanged and the suspension is the same too, as the conversion only adds a handful of kilos. There’s even a non-functional choke cable. Like the inoperative temperature gauge, it could undoubtedly be repurposed for the right idea and price.

You start it by turning the key, which makes the battery light come on to tell you the car’s ready to drive. You don’t need to use the clutch to put it in gear, but doing so does make the action slightly smoother. Letting out the clutch completely before moving off does feel weird, but it’s another thing that sets driving this car apart from modern motoring.

I was recommended to set off in second gear, but as the motor controllers aren’t quite as sophisticated as in a modern EV, the car tends to kangaroo a bit. Setting off in first gets rid of that. Electrogenic can fit a different control module that smooths it out, but it’s about £1500 extra.

You could choose to just put it in third gear and be done with shifting, but going through the gears does make a difference in how sprightly the Mini feels and it really adds to the experience. Downshifting is very peculiar, though, as there is no engine to give auditory feedback about where you are in the rev range and how quickly you can release the clutch.

Don’t think, however, that this is a noiseless modern EV. There is a fair bit of whine coming from the motor, making it oddly reminiscent of a original Mini. As the suspension is standard and the conversion has added a minimal amount of extra mass, the EV Mini drives much like a standard Mini.

The car was on fresh reissue Yokohama classic tyres, and while I wasn’t going to push this small company’s 27-year-old car to the limit, it hung on tenaciously around Bicester Heritage’s test track. The heavy unassisted steering communicates beautifully as the near-inertia-free and stiffly sprung little car darts into corners and hops and bounces over bumps. It’s not sophisticated or refined, but all the more amusing.

It definitely feels quicker than the 51bhp suggests. An extra 20-odd bhp wouldn’t go amiss, but it’s entirely adequate and the full 120bhp sounds like overkill.

At that kind of power output, you might want to consider a brake upgrade of some sort. On this basic car, Electrogenic has left the braking system mostly standard. It’s unassisted, so the pedal needs a firm push if you want to stop in a hurry, but feels just about adequate.