Audi R8 e-tron: Electrifying Ubercar

By now, you must have changed your head image about electric cars probably. They don't necessarily have to be tiny and inefficient as our familiar Reva. Thanks to the R & D of some auto companies on electro-mobility, they now have expanded our imaginations on electric cars. Especially companies like Tesla and Mercedes Benz, the concept of an all-electric supercar no longer seems as unlikely as it once did.

Of course Audi has joined that league very recently, but its R8 e-tron and the technology involved offer us a glimpse of future and hint us how flexible and emotional electro-mobility can be. 


The car is considered to be a 'technology highlight' by the company, which favours further research in the field and future series of production cars can benefit from it. Which means, the R8 e-tron is not going to reach production line anytime soon. Audi has opted to engage the car for further research in electric mobility. Only 13 units have been built and each costs a reputed 1.3 million dollars!

The R8 e-tron has a 280 kw powerhouse with a maximum torque of about 820 Nm. The car boasts an impressive driving range of 215 kms, yet would limit the R8 to shorter drives. Now I understand why Tony Stark's alter-ego uses the e-tron for his daily drive!

3 Modes: Audi's drive select system present in e-tron too!

In spite of a parallel R & D to the regular R8, the e-tron remarkably has very little R8 in it. Only the doors are same. Everything else in the e-tron are hand made out of light weight carbon fibre. The interiors too have been completely redesigned. Light weight and less aero drag has been the top priority in designing this R8. The glass cover on the rear to display the R8's engine is replaced with a carbon-fibre panel hiding the enormous battery. The e-tron's unique alloys wheels feature self-closing carbon flaps to improve aerodynamics. Steel springs are replaced with lighter glass-fiber reinforced plastic (GFRP) units (resistant to corrosion, snapping and the effects of road grime and corrosive cleaning products) and the rear wheel hubs are now titanium.

The 'T' Shaped battery pack is heavy

Unique to the R8 e-tron is the ingenious design of the battery pack. Inside the car, the area what's usually the transmission hub is the lithium-ion battery, shaped like 'T'. The front part has two cell levels and the rear part behind the seats has four cell levels. All together weighs 577 kgs - deftly illustrates the problem with current electric car technology. Batteries are big. There are multple circuit boards and ECUs looking after them and thus a high-tech heat management system is in place. Two electric motors of 140 KW each on the either side propel each of the rear wheels independently. This unique configuration allows a kind of torque vectoring while cornering. The rear brakes are brake-by-wire, interesting innovation isn't it?

The braking energy recuperation on the rear wheels is a top feature in the energy management. The car on the whole weighs 1780 kgs. The body panels and side structures are barely 200 kgs - 23 kgs lighter than the normal R8. The e-tron sprints to the 100 kmph mark is just 4.2 seconds. No regular R8 is as silent, and indeed squeaky-clean and green, as the e-tron.

Every aspect of this high-performance sports cars demonstrates the sheer breadth of what is technically feasible. An electric R8 at any point would still be hugely more expensive than a gasoline one. And the e-tron has a long way to go in terms of customer expectations of supercars, performance and driving range while comparing normal R8. Nevertheless, the R8 e-tron will remain a model used to research the technology to be used in future cars.

Image Courtesy: www.motorauthority.com, www.themotorreport.com.au, www.fourtitude.com