K1 Evelio takes electric power into drift racing
Anglo-Spanish venture develops overclocked EV for tail-out competition categoryBeyond buying billion-dollar Hollywood McMansions for Bernie Ecclestone’s daughters, motor racing has two primary purposes. One is provide a proving ground for new automotive technologies. The other is to stimulate consumer excitement. So what better forum is there to overcome consumer scepticism and apathy around EVs than to put them on a track?
Among the latest such efforts is the K1 Evelio All Electric Drift Car (AEDC), a prototype drift racer born to a joint venture formed by Spanish sustainability specialist Quimera’s Responsible Racing garage and UK high-performance EV specialist Evelio Electric Supercars.
There aren’t many racing formats better suited to electric power than drift. Drift is all about short-term whack rather than endurance, so it benefits from loads and loads of instantly available torque without demanding much in the way of range.
Nevertheless, Quimera and Evelio claim the AEDC will make up to 240km on a single charge. And not slowly: it’s good for 0-60mph sprint in 3.2 seconds (meaning 0-100km/h in around 3.4).
In its current 170kW/220Nm form, it’s governed at just 150km/h, but with the powertrain extendable to 250kW, they’re claiming a potential top speed of around 275km/h.
For power, they went with an advanced lithium-iron phosphate battery pack (it’s confusing but yes, that’s lithium-iron, not lithium-ion, although it is in fact a variety of lithium-ion battery using a lithium iron phosphate cathode – that’s the electrode discharging negative ions).
There are two clear advantages driving their choice of battery chemistry. Firstly, it’s unusually fast to recharge – a 30 amp outlet will take it from flat to 80 per cent in just 20 minutes, and fill it in an hour. (Bear in mind that 30A is considerably more potent than the 10A domestic and 15A industrial sockets accessible to the average punter, but it’s not unviable in a specialised racing environment – look at it as an electric equivalent to those quick-fill units you see in petrol racing pits.)
It’s also particularly stable, both in terms of heat/cooling management chemically, making it ideal for a use in cars built from the ground up for mad oversteer.
The makers are holding a competition to design livery for the car. Hopefully the words ‘Responsible Racing’ won’t be too prominent…
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