2015-03-04 17:24
Audi launched its first all-electric production car – the R8 e-tron – at the Geneva Motor Show, but its EV plans don’t stop there. Engineering boss Dr Ulrich Hackenberg referred to the R8 e-tron as “a technical light tower” and using lessons learned from it will launch a large, family-friendly zero-emissions SUV.
In an official press release for the R8 e-tron Audi stated that “the findings from the R8 e-tron [will] help in creating a vehicle with a [saloon] character.” However when we asked Hackenberg why a saloon had been chosen he seemed puzzled. A colleague later confirmed that the saloon sentence was a mistake in the press release and that the car will be closer to an SUV in shape.
Crucially for the families it will be aimed at, the range will be well-over 300-miles, surpassing the top-spec Tesla Model S, and making it a genuine alternative to petrol and diesel-powered SUVs for the first time.
“It’s a more passenger orientated car, so for more than two passengers. But it will be a car which can be used by families that have some money, it is premium. It will have a big battery capacity and a range of more than 500km (313 miles),” Hackenberg revealed. “We will make a presentation soon.”
Unlike the diesel-electric plug-in hybrid Q7 e-tron, it won’t look like any existing model in the range. “It will have a specific design, so we won’t take and A6 or a Q5 or whatever and integrate the battery electric drivetrain,” said Hackenberg. “The build system has the same architecture as an MLB car, that means we can build it in an MLB plant. MLB means that we can work with steel, with a mixture of materials and also with aluminium.”
With some of the world’s sharpest scientific minds now focused on improving power density in batteries, the pace of development is picking up significantly.
“We started with a 25AH [Ampere-hour] battery, now we have 28AH, we have 37AH samples for the next-generation of PHEVs and in this big EV I have talked about we will also have a battery capacity of 37ah.
“The next-generation has 41AH and then 50AH. We will see this increase by 2018 to around 2020. And we see that in the road map of the cell producers that there will be still higher capacities.”
He gave an example: “If you look to the package of the e-Golf, it’s able to run 180km in the test cycle and that’s with a 25aH battery, if you have a 50AH battery you can increase range to more than 300km, which makes things interesting. If you take a bigger car, like we are doing, then it should be possible to use a 90KWh battery, which is enough to satisfy most demands of a customer.”
As for the name, it’s fairly certain that e-tron – Audi’s designation for all plug-in hybrid and pure-electric cars – will feature, but what goes before it is less clear.
“If I see from the engineering side, a Q is probably not the best solution for an electric car with a large range because it has large surfaces and high aerodynamic resistance,” said Hackenberg. “But if you ask the sales people, everything has to be Q!”
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