Electric cars

[ORD]

Imagine that Porsche were to offer the following:

(1) A 2-seater sports car with an electric motor (with a tiny petrol engine to work only as a range extender by charging the batteries).
(2) The car performs the same as a Cayman S.
(3) The car costs about £70k (plus Porsche option piss-taking).
(4) Plug in re-charging in your garage and an unassisted 100m range.

Who would be interested? No engine note. No induction noise. Would that kill the idea for you?

[mrdemon]

it would be great, the torque of having 4 brushless motors on each wheel would feel amazing.

my Petrol bill is about 5k PA so welcome some help in that area.

as long as the steering was ok and the car was not all driving for you, bring it on.

[ORD]

I wonder whether it would feel a bit sterile after a while because of the instant torque - no building the torque and power to a crescendo. But maybe the sheer brutality of the jerk when you press the not-actually-loud pedal would make up for it!


One thing that occurs to me about these electric motors is that they can presumably be designed to give a huge amount of accel at legal speeds, which is what everyone says matters most. But it would be sad to feel it all start to drop off when still in only double figures. One thing that I like (although get little objective benefit from) is that in a burst of speed to overtake, the car starts to move into its real operating zone just as you think "Oh crap. Better ease off". It's nice to have a car that needs holding back rather than pushing along.

[griffter]

It would have character, but not of the kind I seek in a fun car. Engine noise and characteristics, to both exploit and drive around are essential.

[noneedtolift]

It's been done here in Germany - in fact the old boxter is a well liked sports-car for conversion to electric drive.