Wanting To Turn Your Scooter To A Hybrid One? Take A Look At This Electric Conversion Kit From A Bengaluru Couple

Despite the automobile industry’s slowdown, the premium scooter segment experienced a 5% growth YoY in the first 5 months. Around 50 lakh units have been sold, resulting in the country’s polluting condition. But what if we could electrify these vehicles to eliminate or lower the emissions. It seems like a startup from Bengaluru has a solution to this.

Rakesh Meladath Karunakaran and Winni Gangadharan, his wife, founded Meladath Auto Components in 2016 to make aftermarket conversion kits which can be used for petrol scooters.

This retrofittable e-kit can turn any regular scooter to an electric-hybrid one, thus eliminating harmful emissions.

39-year-old Kanurakaran used to work at Mahindra and Mahindra. Kanurakaran thinks that the ongoing transition to Evs needs a different take. Dealing with existing IC engine needs more than just using more EVs. This method is not only ineffective, but it can also lead to more traffic jams on the roads.

He said:

So, he came up with another solution, a conversion kit with which scooter can run on both petrol and electric mode separately. According to Karunakara, a hybrid scooter on electric mode can run 40km with just one charge.

The interesting thing about this e-conversion kit is that it doesn’t require any structural changes or fabrication to a scooter. Karunakaran states that it only takes around 30 seconds to apply the kit to a scooter and it is possible to reverse the process without any cutting or welding.

This means that if the owner wants to convert the scooter back to a petrol one, they only need to remove the kit.

All scooters with 12-inch and 10-inch steel wheels can use this electrification kit. The kit runs on a lithium-ion battery. So just like other electric scooters, owners can charge the kit at home without having to go to a charging station.

The kit has a notable advantage over pure electric scooters. It allows users to run the scooter even when the battery runs out. Consider India's lack of EVs charging network, this is a huge plus point.

The conversion kit can also play an important part in reducing emissions. Karunakaran states that the kit can reduce a vehicle’s greenhouse gas emissions to 15%.

The kit hasn’t been commercialized yet as the company is still in discussion with dealerships around India under a registered name “Ezee Hybrid.” The startup’s goal is to use the kits to retrofit as many scooters as possible.

What Meladath wants to do next is a made-in-India pure electric scooter as almost every component will be indigenous.