December can be a lucrative month for YouTubers, which means that’s when you’ll typically see them post some of their best videos. But it also means some will inevitably fall through the cracks. Especially if you, yourself, take time off close to Christmas to spend time with the people who say they love you. Heck, even an allegedly professional car blogger can miss a few of the really good ones, which is why I’m about to make you watch a two-week-old video that I just found. Maybe I’ll do better in 2026, but let’s be honest — probably not.
The video in question comes from a channel called This Old Jalopy, which absolutely deserves far more than the 36,000 subscribers it currently has. So, if you like what you see, you know what to do. Anyway, why are we here? Because about two years ago, Danny Mantyla, the guy behind This Old Jalopy, decided to EV-swap an old 1962 Mercury Comet on a budget. He certainly isn’t the first guy to EV-swap an old classic, but the videos are still entertaining and well-done.Â
And while he documented the process of making that EV swap happen over multiple videos, now that it’s (sort of) done, he squished all 12 of those videos together into a single 45-minute overview of the entire project. Even if you have a pretty good idea of what it would take to turn a classic car into a Leaf-powered EV, it’s still fun to watch the whole thing come together, especially knowing he was working with about a $6,000 budget.Â
Like a Leaf but much cooler
Granted, while it does appear that Mantyla built this car in the garage attached to his house, it also looks like a pretty well-stocked garage. So, if some random person wanted to do the same thing, they’d probably have to spend a good bit of money upfront just buying the necessary tools. Plus, you’re probably going to have to throw some time and/or money at learning how to weld and do electrical work. You know, so you don’t kill yourself to death while building or driving the thing. If you already have all those things, though, in a couple years, you could also build your own electric classic on a budget.
As far as the build itself goes, instead of hooking the Leaf’s motor up to the transmission, Mantyla tore out the entire powertrain and instead opted to mount the motor in the rear. Since the Leaf isn’t what anyone would call “quick” or “powerful,” the idea was to reduce weight and minimize drivetrain losses, since you don’t actually need a transmission in an EV. Making that work, of course, required a little fabrication, but there’s nothing wrong with a little DIY (as long as you already know what you’re doing). After that, it was axle-building time, followed by a little CV shaft-shortening, before the real fun could begin with all the electrical work.Â
Will the troubleshooting phase potentially turn you off to this whole idea? Potentially. But hey, that’s just something you have to deal with when you’re trying to shove the powertrain from a crashed Leaf into a 60-year-old car. After all that, though, it’s still great to see it finally start and drive. Could it still use some clearcoat, a hood, turn signals, headlights, windshield wipers, seatbelts, and a speedometer? Sure. But don’t pretend this thing isn’t still awesome as-is.
