« IMF advisor: 'In The Absence Of A Credible Plan We Will Have A Global Financial Meltdown In Two To Three Weeks' | Drone Computers infected with virus »
PrintOctober 8, 2011
An electric car that will blow your doors off
While Detroit bumbles along sorta kinda exploring the idea of electric cars, check this out.
This is easily one of the sexiest cars I've ever seen. It's looks can stand toe to to with the fabled Ferrari Daytona 365 GTB4, the Maserati Gran Turismo or the awe inspiring Audi R8.
With a 260hp internal combustion engine mated to 981 lb/ft electric motors rated at total torque from 0 mph, we're talking about a launch experience that'll drain the blood from your eyeballs.
I shudder when I reflect on the Nissan Leaf next to this. A people's cube vs. pure pheromonal rush. And yes, it's comparing organic apples to store bought apples. And comparing generic beer to the good stuff price wise. The Fisker Karma is a hybrid, while the Leaf is 100% electric. But the Karma does generate it's own electric needs from it's configuration, for at least 250 miles.
Then there's the newly announced Tesla S. http://www.teslamotors.com/models (yes, I know they're PR afflicted by their federal government association) But that is wow design.
The future sure looks bright this way, like Spring Break at Fort Lauderdale instead of the Political Science mixer look the radical Left wants us to embrace. Instead of granny dresses and Birkenstocks I'll happily take bikinis and sun and sand like the Karma suggests is possible in the way it's curves sensuously flow.
Now, now, I know Conservatives want electricity in their houses and gasoline in their cars. I get it. I'm a guy who loves the throaty thunder of GM's 572 c.i. Big Block. (look at the goosebumps on my arm!) But, I'm a Conservative who chooses choice over sameness, who chooses diversity over One Way. I'm all for competition where the best man is the last one standing. If you can bring it, let's see it. Performance is king.
So, I put it to you that electrics are gonna blow the doors off internal combustion. With this caveat, the electrics will dominate when Engineering and Science start dating men and women with that indomitable need to master a market segment. You know, the profit motive? Storage, compression and concentration of electrical power will absolutely, for doggone sure come that will allow 400, 500, 600 mile range at out-run the police speeds. And jamming that much power into this newfangled storage in as little time as a current fillup will absolutely be achieved. Yes, it will. Or, all American history is a lie.
Put it this way, if you'd told my Grandaddy a multi-trillion dollar industry was imminent by compressing sand into wafers then passing a weak electrical current through it carrying no more than the information of Zero and One, he'd had my head examined. But here we are. Everything about computers is beyond the ken of our forebears just three generations back. Breakthroughs and massive change are always hovering over us like clouds of glory. It's going to happen again. Electric personal transportation is coming. Who does it is yet to be seen. But it's coming and I welcome the competition. Because I relish performance above all else, and performance is maybe the one thing that doesn't lie.
So, how good will electric cars be? I've no idea. I never thought a car could make me nearly black out, but the 2011 Corvette ZR under full acceleration and cranked into a hard corner almost did. A full Gee. Holy smokes. How about the house pulling 765 lb/ft of torque out of a Cummins Dodge? Used to be that was Caterpillar territory. Or the Cadillac CTS-V which, stock mind you, holds the record for fastest sedan lap at the Nurburgring. So we can safely assume advances will happen, because where money beckons entrepreneurs will blossom.
Put an electric motor at each wheel and you have total torque for all wheel drive. With, say, 900 lb/ft and a rough equivalent of 150 horses per motor there's no way a street legal car can keep up. Let me repeat, no way. Off the line it would be like a launch off a carrier. Or, as Hunter Thompson said, you are the snake (an obscure reference. Google it)
But there's one thing electric cars don't have. Sex. Appeal.
Honestly, an electric motor winding up is not blowing a girl's dress off. A tuned exhaust mated to a Ford 5.0L V8 in a Mustang will certainly loosen a button or two. Historically speaking.
Electric cars need an audio chip mated to an exterior sound system that reproduces the sounds we know and love so when we step on the throttle of an electric we get the thrill we know and love. It's only common sense. For all you after market tuners out there who read American Thinker, that right there is an entrepreneurial gimme. 40 - 50 sampled exhaust tonal ranges run through an iPod compatible App married to an aftermarket sound system like Bose does to helicopters. Crank out sound like the delicious spine tingling V12 Ferrari song one day and the next select the big bore howl of a fuel injected Hemi. Oh, the possibilities.
Let's get busy.
