As an incurable fan of oddball and/or unusual vehicles, I’m embarrassed that I haven’t heard of the 1976 Jeep DJ-5E Electruck. I know, right? This cool right-hand drive Jeep is listed on eBay with an unmet opening bid of $5,200. It’s located in Grove City, Ohio and after getting new batteries you should be able to drive it home, 29 miles at a time.
Wait, there’s only a 29-mile range on this thing? No wonder they didn’t become popular. The USPS did a “route profile analysis” on these Jeep EVs and it was favorable for being able to do their route within the given range of the batteries. They were able to go around 35 mph for 29 miles and they still had 20% of the battery power still left. They weren’t intended for every route, of course, but for those routes that fell within that range they provided an interesting alternative.
This particular example is one of 352 that were made for use where heavy air pollution was an issue. If any of you remember the 1970s, yeah, it wasn’t good. We usually hear the “But you’re just burning coal to create the power” arguments every time that an EV is shown. That would be a valid argument if it were true today, but of course there are other clean energy alternatives today. With 3,500 miles, this thing has been driven more than I would have expected.
The seller “bought this in 2011 and just “put it back” with my other collection of postal jeeps. It is now coming up for sale as I need room. It is showroom perfect, just drop in some new batteries.” It appears to have been fully restored but not in the exact post office style. I have no clue what a person would use this one for especially with it not being in the classic post office paint scheme. I guess, really it can be used for anything that any other small, slow EV with a short range can be used for; bopping around the neighborhood.
The batteries look good but they will need to be changed out. They say that this thing is “showroom perfect, just drop in some new batteries.” One thing that the seller mentions that I’m not quite sure what it means is if “you deliver plastic bags this is the most economical and practical vehicle you will find.” Plastic bags? Have any of you heard of the DJ-5E Electruck?
Plastic bags= newspapers in the country. They are wrapped in a plastic bag and tossed on the driveway
And then tossed in the trash can without reading, as that news is already a day old.
Yeah Dan, my SIL, neice, and I run a paper route with The Ledger out of
Lakeland Fl. When I was running a route before my wife passed away,
I noticed that some carriers were using the gas powered version of this
truck to deliver their papers and making huge profits doing it. That right
hand steering must’ve took some getting used to, but they could hold
over 400 Sunday papers without squatting on the rear axles. As for this
truck, it would be a very unique vehicle to run errands or going to car
shows. I can almost guarantee that you won’t see another like it.
The cost of those batteries alone will kill ya. Where I live they run $100+ each, so roughly a grand for a new set.
Then you gotta charge em every day. Whew!
It might be used in a park or campground setting, if you have a permanent trailer set up. It should be quiet, and having been kicked out of a park or two for excessive noise, I know what I’m talking about!
Good idea as well as a way to one up fellow retirees who only have a golf cart.
Glen has a good idea about how to use this. I am sure you could get some high tech batteries and greatly extend the range but would it be worth the cost? A very limited use vehicle but it is interesting.
Hybrid cars have been around for awhile now, there must be some batteries in a scrap yard somewhere. I don’t know if they are interchangeable between different car manufacturers, but I’m sure someone could figure it out.
Somehow the museum found a buyer for this Electric Escort. (Ford sold Escorts to the Electric Car folks as rollers who added the electric bits and batteries.) Someone found a use for an electric car.
Here’s another little known mail truck…Studebaker Zip Van
Thank god I will be dead before electric cars completely replace fossil fuel vehicles, there’s nothing like the sound of a good combustion engine sound through dual flowmasters.
I don’t see any point in owning this little rig. A range of 29 miles? Right-hand drive? $5,200? Strike three. You’d be better off with a golf cart; cheaper, left-side steering wheel and probably more range.
We had an Otis (yes, the elevator company) USPS van here for a while. It was in terrible shape, and we moved it along to an electric vehicle collector in Germany. We wish him luck!
Ford also had a total electric Ranger pick up in the 90s, we had two at my job with OCFS in New York . They were quick, range depended on ambient temp. The warmer the better . Had to laugh electric PS , power brakes and it was equipped with air and a heater , but it had manuel windows . sticker was in the 50k range . Ford recalled all of them and destroyed them !
None left?
What a waste of time restoring this and not converting it back to a gas or small Diesel engine the way it sits right now it’s completely useless. You couldn’t give this thing to me in fact you’d have to pay me to take it.
Wonder if these had regenerative braking? Any kind of resistance heating? Wonder how long it takes to recharge the batteries? These days you figure about 5 miles per hour with 110 charging.
No offense, but that is a really ignorant thing to say.
I would LOVE to own a vehicle like this. Sure its range isn’t the best, but the point is that it is so unique, and very rare. It is a piece of history. Like all of the cars on this site, it is being featured here for a reason.
Of course this kind of stuff isn’t for everyone. But anyone who can’t at least appreciate the “weird” automobiles like this Jeep for what it is shouldn’t be considered an automotive enthusiast.
And if the seller was offering to pay someone to take this mail Jeep away, I would be the first in line… and still offer him/her some money.
Sorry to ramble, but this is an important topic to me.
Amen! I agree that any real vehicle enthusiast should at least be able to appreciate every vehicle, even, gasp.. battery-powered ones! You don’t have to like them, but appreciate that someone is thinking outside the same box we’ve been in for the last 120 years. The sky isn’t falling, we aren’t losing gas-powered vehicles anytime soon, maybe not even in any of our lifetimes. Good grief, it’s always such a crisis when one is shown. Thanks for being a voice of reason, M.C.S., and others who aren’t 100% against showing anything but gas-burners here.
Thank you very much, Scotty!
Glad to see that I am among kindred spirits.
With that short distance of “drivability” you could always use it to go check/get your mail from your mailbox at the end of the driveway as long as you dont have a private box at the post office in town that would then be too far away to make the round trip for even the smallest of towns!!!!!