RE: Lotus Evora 414E: the tech

[GroundEffect]

Alfanatic said:

zebedee said:

30 litres of fuel and 300 miles - how many mpg is that?

And how much would it cost in electricity to charge the batteries for the first 30 miles?

Or put another way, 270 miles for 30 litres of fuel - how many mpg is that?

40.91 according to this site:

http://www.mpg-calculator.co.uk/

I wonder how many mpg you get if you use it as a sportscar. Probably not many more than a regular Evora S.

[Alfanatic]

GroundEffect said:

I wonder how many mpg you get if you use it as a sportscar. Probably not many more than a regular Evora S.

I dunno, but I was surprised when I saw 40.9, I thought it would be better than that. It's a decent value for 200bhp, but not blowing me away at all.

[Frimley111R]

This type of set up really is the 'near future'. Electric cars are too hampered by tech currently and fuel cell tech doesn't have any infrastructure.

I had a chat to a Lotus engineer at FoS about this set up. Another key point about the engine is that you can mount it horizontally or vertically. There are two 'holes' in the engine and they mill out whichever they need so that they can fit a sump. The holes are identical so it makes not cost difference. Clever thinking.

Also, at a steady motorway cruise the engine can power the batteries and have enough to charge them too meaning you could have a full battery by the time you stopped.

Because the engine only runs at 3000 rpm all the parts can be made much smaller and lighter and the engine optinmised to run at that speed.

There is also a small s/c which can be fitted to the engine.

[kambites]

GroundEffect said:

I wonder how many mpg you get if you use it as a sportscar. Probably not many more than a regular Evora S.

Difficult to say; the gap will almost certainly narrow though.

What proportion of the time is the average sports car driven hard though? 5%?

[herebebeasties]

Alfanatic said:

I dunno, but I was surprised when I saw 40.9, I thought it would be better than that. It's a decent value for 200bhp, but not blowing me away at all.

No, no - it's 414bhp - 207bhp per motor and there are two. 40+ mpg for a 400+ bhp car is pretty good in anyone's book.

[Glosphil]

So if you start with a flat battery being charged by a 48hp engine the maximum power available at the wheels is 48hp minus any conversion and transmission losses?

Or looking at it another way. If you are driving in conditions that require a total of more than 48hp then the batteries must be running down until you will eventually be limited to less than 48hp? Lights, wipers (and a/c?) also take power to run.

Or has Lotus managed to develope a method of generating 207hp x 2 from 48hp. Now that is a real achievement.

[kambites]

herebebeasties said:

Alfanatic said:

I dunno, but I was surprised when I saw 40.9, I thought it would be better than that. It's a decent value for 200bhp, but not blowing me away at all.

No, no - it's 414bhp - 207bhp per motor and there are two. 40+ mpg for a 400+ bhp car is pretty good in anyone's book.

Well the Evora S manages 28 on the test, with a similar power to weight ratio.

[sunsurfer]

That's looking good to me. I wonder if Lotus could bring a similar system to the market as an alternative powertrain for a new Esprit?

There has to be a reason why punters should buy a £190,000 Lotus over a McLaren or Ferrari. An Esprit with an option of a properly sorted hybrid powertrain with serious performance could be that reason.

Edited by sunsurfer on Wednesday 17th October 18:16

[chickensoup]

[quote]Another small British firm involved in the 414E project is Fagor Automation, builders of the generator.
[/quote]
They sound as British as paella

[Alfanatic]

herebebeasties said:

Alfanatic said:

I dunno, but I was surprised when I saw 40.9, I thought it would be better than that. It's a decent value for 200bhp, but not blowing me away at all.

No, no - it's 414bhp - 207bhp per motor and there are two. 40+ mpg for a 400+ bhp car is pretty good in anyone's book.

Ah yes, that's a completely different picture. It's twice as good as I thought!

[zebedee]

Alfanatic said:

I dunno, but I was surprised when I saw 40.9, I thought it would be better than that. It's a decent value for 200bhp, but not blowing me away at all.

414hp, not 200

[The Wookie]

pimpchez said:

Impressive tech and packaging .But the battery only range is piss poor comapred to a tesla ,well there claimed figures anyway

Put it this way, for an 'average' commute, the 414 is carting around 50-100 odd kilos of engine and generator, the Tesla is carting around 300kg of unused battery pack. On a longer journey the 414 can be filled up in minutes at a petrol station whereas the Tesla takes hours to recharge.

Pure EV's are the end game, but until the batteries can be recharged as quick as a fuel stop or become light enough to allow thousands of miles of range while remaining light enough to be practical, these are potentially an intermediate solution

[Ian974]

On the point of power being available, I presume the engine is running constantly, keeping the batteries topped up, therefore any moment when you aren't using over 50 or whatever bhp, as in constant speed cruising, stopped at traffic lights, slowing down, the battery level will be going up?
I'd imagine you'd only end up low on power if you'd caned it at full power for miles and miles on a motorway or possibly with some seriously heavy track driving.
You'll use up the juice coming out a corner, and make it back up along the straight once you lift off/brake.

[JonnyVTEC]

30 miles seems low for the range, unless they are quoting a typical cruise speed. Ampera is a bigger car, similar weight? Yet manages more EV range on less energy (13.5 kWh).

[anonymous-user]

all that effort for 40mpg and smugness does seem fiscally pointless. A steam engine would make better sense as a generator.

[anonymous-user]

Sure it's a great "technology demonstrator", but here in 2012 no OEM would accept the cripling financial burden that all that complexity brings. A car with only two seats, that has no boot and would cost >£100k? So it does 4sec to 60 and 40mpg, you'd probably sell 7 of them.......


Fast forward to 2020/25, and fuel is now >£2 a litre, performance cars are banned, and put the same drive train in a 4 seater small practical car, but with better batteries, get the cost down by a factor of 5, and maybe, maybe you're on to something!

From small acorns and all that.

[davepoth]

Glosphil said:

So if you start with a flat battery being charged by a 48hp engine the maximum power available at the wheels is 48hp minus any conversion and transmission losses?

Or looking at it another way. If you are driving in conditions that require a total of more than 48hp then the batteries must be running down until you will eventually be limited to less than 48hp? Lights, wipers (and a/c?) also take power to run.

Or has Lotus managed to develope a method of generating 207hp x 2 from 48hp. Now that is a real achievement.

How much time do you spend with your foot buried to the accelerator? It's not all the time, is it? you only use all of the power for very short periods of time.

Lotus will have done the sums - and 48bhp in a slippery body like the Evora is likely plenty to pootle along at 80mph with everything switched on.

[micksims]

I think the 41mpg number depends on whether once the engine kicks in recharges the batteries while keeping the car running. 270 miles on 30 litres of fuel is assuming the engine is running for the rest of the journey.
If the engine recharges the batteries enough during the journey that the engine can spin down then the overall mpg will be much higher.

Vauxhall quote over 300mpg for the Ampera but its not this number all the time the engine is running.

[98elise]

f1ten said:

the batteries are very heavy. this technology is a long way off making it an interesting alternative. i hate to think how many hours and miles those batteries will last before they need to be replaced... 5 years??? and then the cost of new batteries?!

Real world experience has shown that battery life is far better than most would have you believe, with very low failure rates after 10 years (a couple of % at most). Even then refurbs are in the hundreds, not thousands of pounds.

[98elise]

f1ten said:

the batteries are very heavy. this technology is a long way off making it an interesting alternative. i hate to think how many hours and miles those batteries will last before they need to be replaced... 5 years??? and then the cost of new batteries?!

Real world experience has shown that battery life is far better than most would have you believe, with very low failure rates after 10 years (a couple of % at most). Even then refurbs are in the hundreds, not thousands of pounds.