An Electric Car Unlike Any Other

Rick Woodbury and son Bryan have a plan to dominate the global automotive market with a revolutionary electric vehicle the width of a motorcycle that has more torque than a Bugatti Veyron 16.4 and which they say can outperform many sports cars. With one complete car made and sold so far — to George Clooney, no less — they need about $50 million to jump-start large-scale production at their start-up firm, Commuter Cars Corp.

+ enlarge image  |  view slideshow > The $108,000 Tango T600 uses two electric motors powered by roughly 1,000 pounds of batteries to generate a total of 1,000 pound-feet of torque. Its range maxes out at 80 miles.

"The plan is to put 150 million of these cars on the road within 15 to 20 years,” said Woodbury with infectious enthusiasm. “I’m not saying this will happen overnight; I’m saying it will happen gradually."

Spokane, Wash.-based Commuters Cars, which Woodbury runs with his son, already builds and sells the Tango T600 — actually, father and son build the car themselves pretty much by hand. It costs $108,000 and doesn’t meet federal crash regulations, though it does comply with race-car safety regulations designed to protect drivers in crashes of up to 200 mph.

The T600 is sold as a partially assembled kit in order to skirt federal safety regulations, which would require millions in research and development costs (not to mention several vehicles to crash test) in order to comply with. It ships 95 percent complete; Woodbury arranges sale and delivery of the remaining 5 percent and will even fly wherever needed to bolt it together — though it's not too difficult for the mechanically inclined to do themselves using the included manual, he said.

In a nod to its appeal to affluent consumers, the Tango T600 is featured on the cover of the 2006 holiday preview catalog for Hammacher Schlemmer, a New York City-based chain of stores that sells high-end home and office products, electronics and gadgets. The car is listed in the catalog, and on the company site, for $108,000 and can be purchased by calling 800/227-3528.

Our car is 39 inches wide, making it the narrowest car in the world, yet it has stability akin to a Porsche 911,” said Woodbury, who raced 911s for car dealership Beverly Hills Porsche Audi, where he once worked. The slender T600 doesn't look stable, but the weight of up to 25 batteries used to power two electric motors sitting four inches off the ground all but cement the tires to the road. It has a maximum range of 80 miles and can be fully charged from a standard home plug outlet in three hours.