Wednesday 6th July 2016

Martin Leach: PH Meets

From Ford of Europe to NextEV in China, Martin Leach talks about his future for electric cars

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Ahead of the final Battersea Park Formula E race, we headed to an electric karting evening with NextEV. Sadly PH doesn't hold in its staff ranks then next electric motorsport champ, but we did get a few minutes with Martin Leach; formerly President of Ford Europe, he is the co-founder and President of NextEV. We chatted about the role of EVs in road and race cars, plus running out of fuel in a Sierra Cosworth...

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With more hybrid technology creeping into motorsport each year, do you see rules changing to accommodate EVs in sportscar racing and similar disciplines?
"Eventually as the technology improves, I would like to see it. It would be really good because one of the key aspects of an EV that impacts buyers today is range and range anxiety, to the extent that if the technology will enable us to do more long distance racing, that is a good thing."

When people talk about EV, Tesla is the golden boy - how do you think the manufacturer has helped open the market for manufacturers like NextEV?
"Tesla have done a brilliant job; they started a car company and delivered their first car as an outstanding product straight out of the box. I don't count the Roadster as I think it was a bit of an R&D experiment. Their first volume car sold really well and has helped give a lot of people confidence that it is possible to start a car company and I don't know whether we would still be here if Tesla hadn't done what they had done. I think we probably would but our journey may have been a little more difficult."

There has been talk of a NextEV supercar, but when can we realistically expect to see one?
"We said we would launch it before the end of the year and we are half way into the year and we only started last year! To design a super car in that time and to be able to launch it is a significant piece of product development. It is daily work for me right now. So far so good and we are still planning to launch it before the end of the year."

And what's noteworthy in the spec?
"As it is a supercar, range won't be an issue. It will be light and low drag. The two major things that inhibit range are inherently better in a supercar so I don't think there will be any problems with the range. The supercar will be one megawatt. We have validated all the power trains now through over one MW using simulations, circuit simulations and running them on dynamometers. Just last week, we had four-wheel drive dynamometers running to basically validate the whole system before it goes into the first car."

What did you take from your first season in Formula E to influence future strategy?
"Overall lessons in energy management from season one were very critical in season two. We started off nearly 65kg overweight and second from last on the grid. Then in Berlin we qualified fifth and seventh. I have been able to trim nearly 20kg out of the car and been able to improve the performance we get out of the car so that we can qualify in the top ten. The second part of the strategy is stay there for the race hasn't come yet. All the time is now being spent developing our season three car to be fully competitive."

Will the lessons have an impact on the supercar?
"We have wired up all of our various programs to the car. The technology team, the Formula E team and the supercar team are all in active dialogue so that we can do lessons learns and competence transfer. The Formula E team is working on lightweighting which is a critical area for mass production cars. There is nowhere better than motorsport to work on lightweighting using the techniques of motorsport to get the best possible designs then trying to overcome the limitations of scale of production to bring it into mass production."

The main issue consumers have with EVs is the charging time - what can we expect from the NextEV project?
"The problem is that everyone starts with the classic internal combustion engine and then tries to define an EV with that as the basic parameter. Range anxiety is an issue, but I have to tell you that the average travelled distance in Beijing and Shanghai is actually the same number. It is 36.7km per day. If that is your journey there is no need... I mean you could get a couple of Duracell batteries and not have range anxiety.

"I think there is development and education and different infrastructure concepts that will come into play because we start from the user. The user wants to be able to do whatever journey they want to do with their car. If you can arrange that, you have eliminated range anxiety. It isn't a question of "is it 700km?" I remember driving in the middle of France in a Sierra Cosworth with the car on absolute fumes worrying that I am going to be stuck in the middle of the country. There are places in the world where range anxiety exists for internal combustion engine cars as well."

Will a more conventional EV for the masses be joining the line-up in the near future?
"We aren't setting out to be a supercar company, we are setting out to develop and design a car company for our users so that people who will buy our products will know we are capable of doing that. I think that is important, as they know we are capable of winning in Formula E and hopefully they will know we can develop a supercar. We will leave the likes of the supercar business to Ferrari, Lamborghini, Pagani and Bugatti. That isn't what we are trying to do."

Source: Autocar

 

[Evilex]

A Megawatt?

That's 1341hp....

[Mike_C]

I'm confused by this comment:

[quote]I don't count the Roadster as I think it was a bit of an R&D experiment.
[/quote]

And the NextEV are launching to the consumer market with...a Supercar that they don't intend to continue with longterm? Makes no sense to me. Tesla have done the hardwork and proved that a mass market EV can work, so why not just follow their lead and cash in on their coat tails?

[Blanchimont]

Because they're pushing the envelope.
We wouldn't be where we are today if nobody tried anything.

IF they can make a EV Supercar that people will buy and works in the real world, then they'll be onto a winner.

[Mike_C]

Blanchimont said:

Because they're pushing the envelope.
We wouldn't be where we are today if nobody tried anything.

IF they can make a EV Supercar that people will buy and works in the real world, then they'll be onto a winner.

Hardly. Tesla could knock out a carbon-bodied 2-seater on a Model S chassis with a P90D-L drivetrain in a year and you'd have a 'supercar' capable of 0-60 in <2.5s and a +300 mile range due to the lower drag and lighter weight. I don't understand the point of this - to move the game further on we need 400-500 mile range in a usable package!