Porsche gets serious with electric cars
The Porsche Taycan, as the new battery electric model has been baptized, has one motor each for the front and rear axle, resulting in a permanent all-wheel drive. The vehicle which some observers already call a “Tesla killer” will be ready to order in about a year, the company says. For the time being, Porsche has begun to manufacture several hundred pre-series versions for testing and engineering purposes.
Combined, the two motors have a performance of at least 440 kilowatts or 600 hp which bring the vehicle to a maximum speed of 250 kmph (some 155 mph). For optimal behavior in curves, the car has demand-controlled torque vectoring on all wheels.
What seems more important (given the range angst of many potential buyers) is the driving range of 500 kilometers or more, based on the battery capacity of 100 kilowatt-hours in the basic version.
Therefore, the batteries are a pivotal aspect of the vehicle. At are supplied at the cell level by manufacturer LG and then integrated with battery management and thermal management systems to form large energy storage units. This integration and optimization work is done by Porsche itself at a special facility. The company’s engineers tweaked the battery systems to be capable of multiple (many) accelerations without degradation in terms of performance and without overheating. The system voltage of 800V is designed to enable fast charging – Porsche claims that within 15 minutes the batteries can be charged to a range of 400 km or 80% of their total capacity.
The user interface of the vehicle reflects its high-tech ambition. Operation is weidely based on features like gesture control and holograms. A camera monitors the driver’s viewing direction and posture and aligns the instrument display with the driver’s field of vision. And (of course), the Taycan has no exterior mirrors – instead it is equipped with two rear-looking cameras which depict whatever they see in small displays in the right and left corner of the cockpit.
Also the production process looks futuristic: Instead of the usual assembly-line oriented production, Porsche relies on workgroups when assembling the vehicle; the components are fed to these workgroups by autonomously moving vehicles and then transported onward. The sports car maker boasts of a CO2 neutral production; the company’s goal is establishing a factory with zero impact in terms of climate and ambient.
The Taycan will only be Porsche’s first electric series model. By 2025, the company hopes that 50 percent of its production output will be electric.
Related articles:
Porsche to invest more than six billion euro in electromobility by 2022
Audi, Porsche jointly develop electric sports car architecture
BMW rolls out its first serial electrical vehicle
If you enjoyed this article, you will like the following ones: don't miss them by subscribing to :
