Here's something you might be interested in.
Ask a Hipster — Advice you didn't know you needed
Big Screen — Movie commentary
Blurt — Music's inside track
Booze News — San Diego spirits
Classical Music — Immortal beauty
Classifieds — Free and easy
Close to Home — What it’s like on the street where you live
Cover Stories — Front-page features
Drinks All Around — Bartenders' drink recipes
Excerpts — Literary and spiritual excerpts
Feast! — Food & drink reviews
Feature Stories — Local news & stories
Fishing Report — What’s getting hooked from ship and shore
From the Archives — Spotlight on the past
Golden Dreams — Talk of the town
The Gonzo Report — Making the musical scene, or at least reporting from it
Letters — Our inbox
Movies@Home — Local movie buffs share favorites
Movie Reviews — Our critics' picks and pans
Musician Interviews — Up close with local artists
Neighborhood News from Stringers — Hyperlocal news
News Ticker — News & politics
Obermeyer — San Diego politics illustrated
Outdoors — Weekly changes in flora and fauna
Overheard in San Diego — Eavesdropping illustrated
Poetry — The old and the new
Reader Travel — Travel section built by travelers
Reading — The hunt for intellectuals
Roam-O-Rama — SoCal's best hiking/biking trails
San Diego Beer — Inside San Diego suds
SD on the QT — Almost factual news
Sheep and Goats — Places of worship
Special Issues — The best of
Street Style — San Diego streets have style
Surf Diego — Real stories from those braving the waves
Theater — On stage in San Diego this week
Tin Fork — Silver spoon alternative
Under the Radar — Matt Potter's undercover work
Unforgettable — Long-ago San Diego
Unreal Estate — San Diego's priciest pads
Your Week — Daily event picks
They look forward to more Tesla crashes
EV West will take your 1962 VW hippie bus and make it electric
EV West has converted this 1962 VW bus into an electric vehicle they call the 'Rust Bus.'
EV West, a custom car shop in San Marcos, is generating worldwide buzz for its high-profile clientele—an ironic twist when you consider the vehicles in the works are silent.
During my recent visit, a 1962 Volkswagen bus pulled up. With its faded red paint and naturally worn parts, it glided quietly into the industrial complex. Anyone familiar with the signature repetitive chirp of an air-cooled VW motor might wonder: Why isn’t this classic double-door panel bus making a peep when the driver, um-mm, hits the accelerator? The answer is simple: it’s been transformed into an electric vehicle by the innovators at EV West. And if you noticed, I didn’t say “hits the gas pedal”—because this vehicle no longer uses gasoline.
The bay of the 1962 Volkswagen bus that used to house an internal combustion engine is now occupied by a much smaller electric motor.
“That bus, which we call ‘Rust Bus,’ has been driven across the United States and back a couple of times for promotional events and charity,” says Michael Bream, CEO and founder of EV West. His 15,000 sq./ft. shop has specialized in converting classic cars into electric vehicles since 2010—one of the first in San Diego County to create a vertically integrated EV business.
Bream, an engineer turned EV (electric vehicle) entrepreneur, and his team design and manufacture many of their EV adapter kit parts in-house. These parts are installed on customers' conversion projects at the North County facility or shipped worldwide. The team’s success is due to extensive R&D, including testing every part within their EV-converted vehicles
“My good buddy, Jack Smith, first took the Rust Bus on the Lincoln Highway in 2022—the first transcontinental highway in the U.S., though it’s no longer continuous,” Bream says. “Then, he drove it to Chicago via Route 66 in 2023 and made the return trip.”
Beneath the bus’s vintage shell is a NetGain HyPer9 144-volt motor, capable of pushing the VW to 100 miles per hour—a far cry from the sluggish pace of its original air-cooled engine. The EV motor is connected to a billet aluminum transmission adapter kit that bolts into the factory transmission. These are just some components of the plug-and-play EV kit for the 1950-1967 VW buses, which they sell for about $22,000. The kit includes a Tesla Model S 22.5-volt battery, providing 90 miles of range (distance traveled on a full charge), and a Thunderstruck 25000 charger. Everything else required to make the EV conversion happen is included, and if the customer needs more range, the EV West team can provide additional batteries.
While some old-school car builders might be intimidated by the EV switchover, the San Marcos EV shop makes it less daunting.
“We handle all the design work and fabricate the parts,” Bream explains. “The whole idea is to lower the barrier to entry so more people can take on these conversions.”
During the VW customizing boom in the '90s—we’d run to VW Parts and Accessories in National City, buy the needed parts, and network with other VW enthusiasts who’d randomly pull up to the shop. The parking lot and street were packed with buses and bugs. Then we’d head to the junkyards, hoping to find a VW we could strip and repurpose for our project vehicles.
A selection of cars in stages of conversion on EV West's backlot.
Bream continues the auto shop and junkyard camaraderie ritual—but with a different scope in 2025. Amid our interview, a priest pulled up. “His name is Father James Friar,” Bream says. “He originally came to us five years ago and converted a classic Mini Cooper himself.” The EV West team walked Father James through the EV build process until completion. “He did a fantastic job,” Bream adds, “and took it to some races and autocross events.”
Now that Father James has experience with the EV transformation using the same smaller NetGain HyPer9 144-volt motor as in the VW mentioned earlier, he is now confident in upping his EV game, converting his new project, an 80s BMW, which he's packing with a Tesla motor.
After Father James left, Bream walked me to a well-built 1953 Baja bug with an oval-shaped rear window. “My dad and I did this as a father-and-son project when I was 50 years old and my dad was 80,” he says. “And we completed our first father-son EV car project.”
These classic bugs can fetch over $40,000 if restored right—with their original gas-guzzling, noisy motors. So if Bream ever wants to revert the VW to its original 25-horsepower, 1.1-liter, air-cooled, four-cylinder boxer engine — that’s not a problem. His conversion kits "are 100 percent reversible," he says. "Ideally, you should be able to remove the EV setup, reinstall a gas engine and stock suspension, and take it to a car show where even a hardcore concours judge wouldn’t suspect it was ever EV converted.
EV West makes conversion kits for classic Porsches, some of which will likely appear at the La Jolla Concours d'Elegance car show on April 25-27. Bream and his team developed EV conversion kits for vintage Porsche models 911, 912, 914, and 356, ranging from $8,734 to $34,000. The higher-end kit incorporates the Tesla Model S engine and accompanying parts.
In the 1990s and 2000s, Bream owned and ran Gravity Skateboards, a popular San Diego longboard company. He always gravitated toward speed and tinkering with transportation mobiles to make them more efficient and safer. In 2009, Bream and his race buddies converted an old Porsche 912 and a Ford Ranger the following year to EVs. “When we first started, nobody thought EVs would be big,” he says. “I was super into racing, and my friends and I were racing BMWs.” Then, he opened EV West in 2010 while still running his successful skateboard company.
In 2011, Bream bought a BMW M3 for $3,500 in Arizona and began building an EV race car to handle an uphill climb with treacherous curves.
In 2012, Bream and his team completed the M3 and competed in the world-renowned Pike’s Peak International Hill Climb in Colorado. The EV West crew won in their class and held the mountain record with an 11:58.929 for a street-converted car. “That’s when the world started to take notice of us,” Bream says, “Top Gear ran an article on us.” Then they posted a YouTube video of the winning run, which racked up thousands of views, showcasing what an EV-powered BMW could do. The secret? The massive amount of instantaneous torque that it’s electric power motor makes.
When the team returned to San Marcos—the EV builders' lives changed.
“I told the general manager of the skateboard company and gave my two-week notice,” Bream recalls. “They took over my day-to-day responsibilities and shared them with other employees. I left and focused all my efforts on my electric car company.”
Today, EVs are cooler than ever. Charging stations are scattered across San Diego County, and the Cybertruck is turning heads with its futuristic design. Meanwhile, at the Barona drag strip, some of the fastest-built hot rods are getting smoked by the Tesla Plaid—the quickest accelerating production car on the market, outrunning even Lamborghinis and Ferraris in quarter-mile races.
Next door to EV West’s facility, Bream and his team are preparing the next generation of EV enthusiasts, as well as traditional internal combustion engine mechanics, to expand their expertise into EV repairs and conversions through the EVLC’s Three-Day EV Conversion Workshop.
As Tesla’s popularity soars, more crashes mean a growing supply of salvaged parts hitting the secondary market. This allows EV West to produce more Tesla conversion kits for vintage car builders worldwide—including two local skateboarding legends. As this article goes live, Tony Hawk’s 1962 Corvette and Mike McGill’s 1953 truck are both receiving Tesla powertrains.
Tony Hawk's 1962 Corvette is receiving EV West's full EV conversion.
“Mike’s truck is coming along but isn’t running yet,” Bream shares. “Tony’s car is running—we’re just finalizing the instrumentation.”
Bream sums it up: "I'm a car guy, and so is my team. Our mission is to save classic cars. In this electrification push, too many great vehicles get left behind. Instead of building new cars and using more resources, we give old ones a second life. We even repurpose parts from crashed cars—like the Tesla battery pack from a car the insurance company said wasn't worth fixing. Reusing these parts reduces environmental impact while keeping the spirit of classic cars alive. That's what we're all about."
Here's something you might be interested in.
They look forward to more Tesla crashes
EV West will take your 1962 VW hippie bus and make it electric
They look forward to more Tesla crashes
EV West will take your 1962 VW hippie bus and make it electric
EV West has converted this 1962 VW bus into an electric vehicle they call the 'Rust Bus.'
EV West, a custom car shop in San Marcos, is generating worldwide buzz for its high-profile clientele—an ironic twist when you consider the vehicles in the works are silent.
During my recent visit, a 1962 Volkswagen bus pulled up. With its faded red paint and naturally worn parts, it glided quietly into the industrial complex. Anyone familiar with the signature repetitive chirp of an air-cooled VW motor might wonder: Why isn’t this classic double-door panel bus making a peep when the driver, um-mm, hits the accelerator? The answer is simple: it’s been transformed into an electric vehicle by the innovators at EV West. And if you noticed, I didn’t say “hits the gas pedal”—because this vehicle no longer uses gasoline.
The bay of the 1962 Volkswagen bus that used to house an internal combustion engine is now occupied by a much smaller electric motor.
“That bus, which we call ‘Rust Bus,’ has been driven across the United States and back a couple of times for promotional events and charity,” says Michael Bream, CEO and founder of EV West. His 15,000 sq./ft. shop has specialized in converting classic cars into electric vehicles since 2010—one of the first in San Diego County to create a vertically integrated EV business.
Bream, an engineer turned EV (electric vehicle) entrepreneur, and his team design and manufacture many of their EV adapter kit parts in-house. These parts are installed on customers' conversion projects at the North County facility or shipped worldwide. The team’s success is due to extensive R&D, including testing every part within their EV-converted vehicles
“My good buddy, Jack Smith, first took the Rust Bus on the Lincoln Highway in 2022—the first transcontinental highway in the U.S., though it’s no longer continuous,” Bream says. “Then, he drove it to Chicago via Route 66 in 2023 and made the return trip.”
Beneath the bus’s vintage shell is a NetGain HyPer9 144-volt motor, capable of pushing the VW to 100 miles per hour—a far cry from the sluggish pace of its original air-cooled engine. The EV motor is connected to a billet aluminum transmission adapter kit that bolts into the factory transmission. These are just some components of the plug-and-play EV kit for the 1950-1967 VW buses, which they sell for about $22,000. The kit includes a Tesla Model S 22.5-volt battery, providing 90 miles of range (distance traveled on a full charge), and a Thunderstruck 25000 charger. Everything else required to make the EV conversion happen is included, and if the customer needs more range, the EV West team can provide additional batteries.
While some old-school car builders might be intimidated by the EV switchover, the San Marcos EV shop makes it less daunting.
“We handle all the design work and fabricate the parts,” Bream explains. “The whole idea is to lower the barrier to entry so more people can take on these conversions.”
During the VW customizing boom in the '90s—we’d run to VW Parts and Accessories in National City, buy the needed parts, and network with other VW enthusiasts who’d randomly pull up to the shop. The parking lot and street were packed with buses and bugs. Then we’d head to the junkyards, hoping to find a VW we could strip and repurpose for our project vehicles.
A selection of cars in stages of conversion on EV West's backlot.
Bream continues the auto shop and junkyard camaraderie ritual—but with a different scope in 2025. Amid our interview, a priest pulled up. “His name is Father James Friar,” Bream says. “He originally came to us five years ago and converted a classic Mini Cooper himself.” The EV West team walked Father James through the EV build process until completion. “He did a fantastic job,” Bream adds, “and took it to some races and autocross events.”
Now that Father James has experience with the EV transformation using the same smaller NetGain HyPer9 144-volt motor as in the VW mentioned earlier, he is now confident in upping his EV game, converting his new project, an 80s BMW, which he's packing with a Tesla motor.
After Father James left, Bream walked me to a well-built 1953 Baja bug with an oval-shaped rear window. “My dad and I did this as a father-and-son project when I was 50 years old and my dad was 80,” he says. “And we completed our first father-son EV car project.”
These classic bugs can fetch over $40,000 if restored right—with their original gas-guzzling, noisy motors. So if Bream ever wants to revert the VW to its original 25-horsepower, 1.1-liter, air-cooled, four-cylinder boxer engine — that’s not a problem. His conversion kits "are 100 percent reversible," he says. "Ideally, you should be able to remove the EV setup, reinstall a gas engine and stock suspension, and take it to a car show where even a hardcore concours judge wouldn’t suspect it was ever EV converted.
EV West makes conversion kits for classic Porsches, some of which will likely appear at the La Jolla Concours d'Elegance car show on April 25-27. Bream and his team developed EV conversion kits for vintage Porsche models 911, 912, 914, and 356, ranging from $8,734 to $34,000. The higher-end kit incorporates the Tesla Model S engine and accompanying parts.
In the 1990s and 2000s, Bream owned and ran Gravity Skateboards, a popular San Diego longboard company. He always gravitated toward speed and tinkering with transportation mobiles to make them more efficient and safer. In 2009, Bream and his race buddies converted an old Porsche 912 and a Ford Ranger the following year to EVs. “When we first started, nobody thought EVs would be big,” he says. “I was super into racing, and my friends and I were racing BMWs.” Then, he opened EV West in 2010 while still running his successful skateboard company.
In 2011, Bream bought a BMW M3 for $3,500 in Arizona and began building an EV race car to handle an uphill climb with treacherous curves.
In 2012, Bream and his team completed the M3 and competed in the world-renowned Pike’s Peak International Hill Climb in Colorado. The EV West crew won in their class and held the mountain record with an 11:58.929 for a street-converted car. “That’s when the world started to take notice of us,” Bream says, “Top Gear ran an article on us.” Then they posted a YouTube video of the winning run, which racked up thousands of views, showcasing what an EV-powered BMW could do. The secret? The massive amount of instantaneous torque that it’s electric power motor makes.
When the team returned to San Marcos—the EV builders' lives changed.
“I told the general manager of the skateboard company and gave my two-week notice,” Bream recalls. “They took over my day-to-day responsibilities and shared them with other employees. I left and focused all my efforts on my electric car company.”
Today, EVs are cooler than ever. Charging stations are scattered across San Diego County, and the Cybertruck is turning heads with its futuristic design. Meanwhile, at the Barona drag strip, some of the fastest-built hot rods are getting smoked by the Tesla Plaid—the quickest accelerating production car on the market, outrunning even Lamborghinis and Ferraris in quarter-mile races.
Next door to EV West’s facility, Bream and his team are preparing the next generation of EV enthusiasts, as well as traditional internal combustion engine mechanics, to expand their expertise into EV repairs and conversions through the EVLC’s Three-Day EV Conversion Workshop.
As Tesla’s popularity soars, more crashes mean a growing supply of salvaged parts hitting the secondary market. This allows EV West to produce more Tesla conversion kits for vintage car builders worldwide—including two local skateboarding legends. As this article goes live, Tony Hawk’s 1962 Corvette and Mike McGill’s 1953 truck are both receiving Tesla powertrains.
Tony Hawk's 1962 Corvette is receiving EV West's full EV conversion.
“Mike’s truck is coming along but isn’t running yet,” Bream shares. “Tony’s car is running—we’re just finalizing the instrumentation.”
Bream sums it up: "I'm a car guy, and so is my team. Our mission is to save classic cars. In this electrification push, too many great vehicles get left behind. Instead of building new cars and using more resources, we give old ones a second life. We even repurpose parts from crashed cars—like the Tesla battery pack from a car the insurance company said wasn't worth fixing. Reusing these parts reduces environmental impact while keeping the spirit of classic cars alive. That's what we're all about."
Comments