Available AWD/4WD

First time poster, long time reader… I am still a couple years from getting into this. Right now I am pretty happy on a human powered bike…

Anyway, I tried searching these forums for all/4 wheel drive EVs, but the search string doesn’t allow 3 characters… hard to search for.

So, a couple posts interested me. One is that Zap-X which looks way better than I thought was technologically feasible at this point, a bit out of my price range too! But that’s another discussion. Other posts refer to full sized EV’s also trucks…

As someone who is often in Snow, dirt roads to hiking trails, I would like to convert an EV that might have available 4WD, and has a bit higher clearance. Car bodies could include Toyota All track wagons, Subarus, small SUV’s. I carry around fragile musical instruments too, so it would be nice to have them inside, not a truck. So a minor question is: What body should I use?

The main thing I wanted to discuss was how to do available 4WD. It looks like individual motors, 1 per wheel might do the trick.
Is an option to go between front wheel drive for easy stuff and 4WD for snow and dirt feasible? Would that option save energy? Would the rear motors after being turned off for 2WD create drag? I’m sure there are many unforeseen issues, but I mainly want to know about the possibility of available 4WD.

Thanks
JP

simply having the motor there takes up range because of the added weight… however there is a new system me and some others are working on to fix this.