A Closer Look at the CityEl: State of the Art in European Electric Motoring, Circa 1992

I covered this little guy briefly in the last article, but felt as if there was a bigger story waiting to be told. Out of all the goofy little electric micro cars, quadricycles and trikes I've seen, this is the one I'm most likely to eventually cave in and buy one of as a hobby project.

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While technically a one person vehicle, a rear facing child seat was later sold which users could install for hauling a kiddo around, complete with their own little bubble to watch the world pass by out of.

There were also many different optional upper halves. Some had a hard top, some left out the middle section but included a boat like button-down fabric weather guard, still others were cabriolet styled.

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The CityEl had a lot to offer back in the day and is still well loved by those who owned (or still own) one. It's a cult classic that there exist meetups/clubs dedicated to, where today's owners swap tips about how to upgrade their CityEl, where to buy or how to make replacement parts and so on.

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This is the inside of the CityEl's rear end (giggity). What's the first thing that jumps out at you? Besides the fact that the body is all plastic I mean. It's the batteries, isn't it? Let's zoom the fuck in and take a closer look. ENHANCE!

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This is the 36 volt version as you can probably tell. Those are three Optima yellow top SLA batteries, about the best possible choice if you absolutely must use a lead acid battery. They're far and away better than what the CityEl originally came with:

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Bulkier, uglier, and if yours came with flooded cells, a danger to your life should you ever somehow flip the vehicle over. Not a pretty sight, and far from ideal. That's why the number one most common user upgrade is lithium ion batteries:

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That's more like it! I see a lot of large format Thunder Sky cells in these things, strung together in series. There's few enough cells that they typically don't even bother with a BMS, though there is one attached to the cells in the picture (the thin wires running to reach cell individually).

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Case in point, a more typical setup, no BMS to be seen. If you go this route you save money but have to trust every cell is in roughly identical condition, and may occasionally have to disconnect the cells and individually charge them to ensure the pack stays balanced.

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Some users replace their motor for higher speeds, with the added bonus of making room for neater battery placement. Lithium ion cells offer 5 times the energy density of lead acid on paper, but various real world losses add up such that you don't quite get such a drastic range increase.

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Still, a vehicle which once did thirty miles on a charge can be made to do over 100, and at higher speeds to boot. It's not just the increased energy density that counts here but also the much lighter weight of lithium batteries compared to lead.

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The dash. Not much to look at. The big red button cuts off the battery from the controller, rather than activating an ejection seat as you might hope given how poorly a vehicle made mostly from plastic is likely to fare in a collision. The view from inside while driving looks something like an X-Wing scooting along the ground:

Anyway that's all for this article. It's a charming, weird little machine isn't it? Every day I have to convince myself not to impulse buy one, mostly because of the shipping cost for something that size/weight from Europe and the fact that I haven't the time to take on another project right now. Gotta stay strong.

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^{Stay Cozy!}