The Electric Stars 156
speech where Elon talked about SpaceX.^214
At age 14, Jeffrey Brian Straubel, known to all as
JB, discovered a discarded electric golf cart. He decided
to rebuild it. To find the parts needed, he convinced his
mother to drive as far as 50 miles [80 km] in search for
batteries, tires, and electric motors. “He was passionate
about it,” his mother said. “He wrote to the manufacturers
for information. He worked on it every day, all day long,
all evening long, until he got it to run. JB was born to be
an engineer. He was always passionate about anything that
had wheels and required engineering.” To motivate himself,
he watch the movieOctober Sky. “I watch it every year
or so,” he said. “It’s inspirational. I always come out of it
wanting to work harder.”213,215
Straubel has always enjoyed the sound of silence. He
can drive for hours without listening to music. This might
be the reason to why he became fascinated by machines
powered by electricity. “Electric vehicles don’t make much
noise,” Straubel said. “When they do, something is not
right.” Among other projects, he worked with unmanned
electric airplanes, he converted a Porsche 944 to electric
drive, and he constructed an electric bicycle nicknamedthe
Red Bike. He was also a fan of the EV1 and you can see
him, or his unknown twin, driving it in the documentary
Who killed the electric car?“I was talking to anyone and
everyone to promote the idea that electric vehicles had
turned a corner,” Straubel said. “I told them that with new
battery technology, they could go much, much farther than
anyone thought was possible.”213,215