How Jack’s Garage & Circular EV are building the Future of Bolt-On EV Kits

When Joseph Salama stands beside Aziza, his Pearlescent Gold 1978 Volkswagen Type 2 bus, he’s revealing a blueprint for the future of classic motoring. Aziza is more than a beloved family camper with 18 years of road trips under her belt with Joseph; she’s proof that electrification can be reversible, affordable, and scalable, all without butchering heritage. And in true Joseph fashion, she’s also been tested the hard way—nearly 10,000 miles since conversion, including almost 2,000 grueling rally miles across Europe. Aziza isn’t a show queen; she’s a working development vehicle, and a rolling business card for Jack’s Garage and its latest partnership with Fellten.

From Tripoli to Ladbroke Grove

Joseph’s love affair with Volkswagens began before he could walk. At six months old, his father packed the family into a VW camper van and emigrated from Southend-on-Sea to Tripoli, Libya, almost 3,000 miles away. That formative journey left its mark. By the 1990s, Joseph was already steeped in VW culture, and when Jack’s Garage, a modest workshop under the railway arches at Ladbroke Grove in London, came up for sale, he jumped at the chance. He took ownership in 2007, inheriting a team of mechanics and a reputation for keeping London’s classic Volkswagens alive, especially his favorite air-cooled Beetles, buses, and Karmann Ghias.

Jack’s Garage became the kind of place enthusiasts whispered about as they booked their beloved Volkswagens in for work months in advance. Known for six-hundred-point pre-purchase inspections and famous for sourcing rare panels from all over the world when the aftermarket fell short, customers came not just from across London but from as far as Scotland, Ireland, France, and Spain. Joseph built a business on obsessive attention to detail and, as he likes to put it, “how it came out of the factory,” insisting on stock repairs instead of aftermarket “improvements.”

But longevity was tested. In 2017, the Grenfell Tower fire tragedy unfolded just streets away from the garage. Deliveries halted, customers stayed away, and at one point Joseph had to pay staff wages by skipping his own. The team shrank from 14 to 7, and the future looked bleak, yet the crisis sparked reinvention. By 2020, Jack’s Garage was leaning into a new obsession: electrification.

Bitten by the Electric Bug

Joseph’s first foray into EVs came in 2018 through meeting Richard Morgan, aka Moggy, the founder of Electric Classic Cars, at his Wales HQ, and Chris Hazell from Fellten, then Zero EV, in Bristol, UK. This was fundamentally to gain an accurate foundational understanding of this embryonic niche from the primary trailblazers firsthand. On a shoestring budget, Joseph purchased a Beetle conversion unit with second-life Tesla batteries from Moggy, essentially a motor, battery modules, and several boxes of wires. After this first conversion, Joseph concluded that this offering was simply not good enough for the principal to bloom. Also, there could be no acceptable warranty he could provide his clients with for these second-life batteries (which constituted more than 50% of the build cost). The search resumed in earnest for Joseph. A better solution for Aziza and his clients must be found!

After an arduous hunt, in early 2020 Joseph signed a partnership deal with eClassics Stuttgart as their sole UK partner. eClassics Stuttgart was the only official Volkswagen-approved electrification specialist. Its EV solutions carried a global VW warranty, using all-new Volkswagen OEM components from the VW factory in East Brunswick, direct from the motherland, so to speak.

 

Their “Bumblebee,” a classic yellow Beetle cabriolet, was one of ten prototypes (pre-Volkswagen official partnership), powered by a mighty little Bosch electric motor and a customized rebuilt original Beetle gearbox. These ten prototypes were the launchpad for a key investor and Dr. Herbert Diess (then the Volkswagen Group’s visionary CEO) to begin this historic new chapter for the iconic love brand. This was a dream come true for millions of enthusiasts the world over. This unique partnership with Volkswagen Group Components was sealed with the manufacturing of one Copper Gold T1 split-screen bus and three white classic Beetle cabriolets. They drove so well that Dr. Diess kept one of them. The other two spent time at Jack’s Garage in North Kensington as demonstrators. They were a revelation, redefining these motoring legends: smooth, refined, perfectly balanced, and very, very fast! But it was also a relatively fragile start, albeit unbeknownst to all involved. COVID shattered global supply chains, slowly killing the project.

By the end of the summer of 2022, it was the end of a dream. However, the seed had been planted. If electrification could be done well, without damaging heritage metal, Joseph believed it could still transform the entire air-cooled VW scene for generations to come. What he needed was a system designed with reversibility, safety, and scalability in mind. All priceless lessons, hard-learned from his relationship and experiences with eClassics GmbH and Volkswagen Group Components.

Enter Fellten

Fellten’s UBP55E 55 kWh universal battery pack is the kind of engineering backbone small garages dream of. Tested to 21G crash loads, modular by design, and CCS fast-charge ready at up to 76 kW, it takes the Wild West out of classic conversions. Pair it with a Zonic 70 motor, producing 70 kW (95 hp), and you’ve got the bones of a conversion that feels OEM without pretending to be.

It was Joseph’s valuable relationship with Chris Hazell and Alex Dawood, founders of Fellten (then Zero EV), that led him to the conclusion; “Why waste precious time and resources reinventing the wheel? Fellten’s universal battery pack was a perfect tier-one quality solution for the next chapter of our journey.”

Joseph’s genius wasn’t in simply bolting this into his Aziza; it was in designing the supporting frame, electronics, and interfaces so that any ’70s VW bus could receive the same second-life treatment in just three days or less—no welding, no cutting, no drilling. Everything is reversible. As Joseph puts it, “You can put it back to fossil…not that anyone ever would.”

The result is a plug-and-play kit that delivers nearly 200 miles of real-world range, multiple driving modes (Sport, Normal, Eco, and Eco+), proper regenerative braking, and even OEM-style touches like Apple CarPlay and a heated windshield! Optional upgrades include electric power steering and camper comforts, but the foundation remains the same: a bolt-on EV heart for one of the world’s most beloved vehicles—the love bus.

International Proving Ground

Of course, a system is only as good as its shakedown. Aziza has been Joseph’s test mule, companion, and evangelist. Together they’ve crossed Europe from London, Amsterdam, Germany, and Belgium all the way to the beaches of Dunkirk, France. They’ve won rallies, multiple awards, and proven without doubt that a converted bus can rapid-charge from any CCS or AC charger across Europe and the UK without drama.

Inside, Aziza remains a Spartan camper on purpose: a rock-and-roll bed, some storage, and a sound system. Under the parcel shelf lies the battery box in the rear engine bay, and forward of it are the inverter, motor carrier, and Zonic 70 motor, with direct drive to the wheels—all neatly packaged where the original gearbox and old flat-four once thrashed. Aziza is quieter than most converted classics and more refined too. Joseph admits he feels like a trucker behind the wheel of the giant steering wheel but grins when he flicks into Sport mode and watches the power bar surge. In his words: “Aim for the stars, and we’ll reach Jupiter in no time.”

Beyond One Bus

What separates Jack’s Garage from traditional conversion specialists is ambition. Joseph isn’t building one-off dream machines; he’s laying the foundations for global scalability. The kits will be sold B2B to workshops worldwide, who can then offer them to customers alongside their own restoration services, as well as client-specific upgrades. This is a growth strategy Joseph developed together with the geniuses put in place by the visionary Dr. Diess from Volkswagen Group Components back in 2020. Essentially, practically any ICE or fossil workshop in California, São Paulo, Barcelona, Tokyo, or Cape Town could install a Jack’s Garage kit in a customer bus in days. The shop would then also have the ability to upsell restoration services, pop-tops, camper interiors, or top-end sound systems, as well as any bespoke corporate designs on top to build epic ‘Kombis.’

Battery swap options have also been engineered into the design, even if today’s charging infrastructure makes them less relevant. For fleets, rentals, or second-life battery reuse, the option exists, reducing costs and boosting sustainability. In time, Joseph even hints at hybrid add-ons for more modern vans like T4s and T5s, as well as post-consumer aluminum alloy (100% recycled aluminum) motor carrier frames, making all of these units significantly lighter and stronger.

To keep standards high, Joseph co-founded Circular EV, a consortium aimed at professionalizing the retrofit sector, setting industry standards, and focusing on bolt-on, fully reversible second-life solutions for all iconic motoring legends, as well as commercial fleets. Fellten, also based in the UK but already distributed globally, with its track record of OEM engineering and manufacturing, is a cornerstone partner. More top-end, premium partners are joining us, who can add real value to this vision in making this global tsunami within our niche truly spectacular.

Circular Duty

Joseph doesn’t shy away from philosophy. For him, this isn’t just about one bus or one kit. It’s about responsibility. “It’s our generation’s duty to decarbonize the global automotive industry,” he says, pointing at London’s endless delivery vans. Converting fleets makes more sense than replacing them with expensive new EVs that carry an entirely new and quite significant embedded carbon footprint, especially when those vans already carry custom interiors for specific applications or trades such as ambulances. It’s why this really matters. This is not just for fun but for proof to the public that retrofitted classics and fleets are safe, reliable, and, in Joseph’s favorite phrase, “as close to bulletproof as bulletproof can be.” Today, with Fellten’s UBP55E under its wing and Aziza as proof of concept, Jack’s Garage is staring at a bright future. Joseph closes most conversations about Aziza with borrowed words that sound entirely his own: “We owe it to the generations that follow us, our children and our children’s children, to be outlandish in our ambition and stubborn in our optimism.”

Jack’s Garage VW Bus Kit (Aziza prototype)

Base vehicle: 1978 VW Type 2 twin sliding-door camper
Battery system: Fellten UBP55E (55 kWh, CCS rapid charge at 76 kW, tested to 21G)
Motor: Zonic 70 (70 kW/95 hp)
Range: ~200 miles (real-world, mixed driving)
Install time: ~3 days, fully reversible (bolt-on, no cutting/welding)
Drive modes: Sport / Normal / Eco / Eco+ with adjustable regen braking
Extras: CarPlay integration, heated windscreen, optional electric power steering (light steer), camper equipment upgrades
Test mileage: 10,000 miles (including 2,000+ rally miles across Europe)

Jack’s Garage at a Glance:

Founded: 1993 (Joseph has owned since 2007)
Location: Ladbroke Grove, North Kensington, London, W10, UK
jacksgarage.co.uk and circularev.net