My current "it would be so cool but it will never happen" fantasy project
idea:
- An Ultima
GTR body and kit - about $23,000.
- Two UQM PowerPhase
200 electric motors, each capable of 200 kw (268 bhp) and 900Nm of
torque, one per rear wheel - I don't know what they cost, probably in excess
of $10,000 total.
- The controllers that UQM sell are probably just as good, but if in
doubt, two Soliton
One controllers, one per motor - a steal at only $6,000.
- 134 Kokam
SLPB 80460330H batteries, capable of delivering 500-800A, charging at
500A, and storing 100Ah of power. Weighing in at just over 360kg, the
whole pack stores 42.8 kilowatt-hours of power. Unknown price, but based
on rough guesses from other quoted Kokam prices - probably about
$50,000.
- A cooling system for the motors and the controllers. Probably another
$2,000. Refrigerated might make sense here.
- All the other bits and pieces that make the car liveable - seats, harness,
air conditioning, etc. These are considered "optional extras" by Ultima, but
at a rough guess it's probably more than $6,000.
Using direct drive should be sufficient - at a tyre circumference of say
1.8 metres, at 5,500RPM the car will be going about 594Km/hr (unless I've
done something grossly wrong with the units of those calculations). But
getting a gearbox to reduce the ratio on those motors, say by a factor of
two, puts the top speed at a more reasonable 297Km/hr and puts more of the
motors peak efficiency within our standard rev range. Still, trying to find
a gearbox that can deal with 900Nm of torque is a problem.
As a comparison, the Ultima GTR that has set
several world
records used a seven liter V8 producing 720bhp (528Kw). I'm delivering
200KW (268bhp) per wheel in a curve that flattens out at around 3500 RPM. A
similar
car has a torque of around 811 lb/ft - 1100Nm; I can deliver 900Nm per
wheel up to around 1250RPM. It's too late and I've spent too much time
browsing random stuff on the internet to work out how to convert that into
an acceleration time for a 1000kg car on wheels with a radius of about 307mm.
It's probably fairly big. So an electric conversion doesn't make it into a
GTR-killer, but it's still pretty compatible.
So overall the UltimaWatt project would cost over $100,000. Anybody
interested in sponsoring this project ☺?
