World’s Fastest Electric Car is a 1972 Datsun
Out on the dragstrip, one hardly expects the car kicking ass and taking names to be an old ‘72 Datsun 1200. Especially when the losers are driving BMWs, Corvettes and Ferraris. But those guys didn’t get pwned by any ol’ Datsun…this one’s electric!
It seems a bit like a paradox. Drag racing is flame-dipped muscle cars with bikini-clad hood ornaments spread over the hood. Electric cars, not so much.
>> Read up on the 2009 VW Jetta Clean Diesel Cup Season
But John ‘Plasma Boy‘ Wayland’s White Zombie is a game changer.
It goes from 0 to 60 in 3 seconds! In fact, it can take a quarter-mile in 11.46 seconds reaching a top speed of 114 mph - that’s a world record. And it’s street-legal.
The White Zombie is powered by two motors; motors that are usually used to operate forklifts. It’s filled up with over 60 batteries that occupy both the trunk and the back seat. All of this gives the White Zombie about 300 hp, and the ability to beat every combustion engine it comes up against.
It takes about 20 minutes to fully charge the car, and it can get up to 40 miles on a full charge.
So how does a ‘72 Datsun knock down a souped up Corvette? Well, electric vehicles have an abundance of torque and they have it all from a standing stop. So they just explode off the starting line.
I think it’s safe to say that the future of racing is green.
Image: dragtimes.com
[...] via World’s Fastest Electric Car is a 1972 Datsun : Gas 2.0. [...]
I was amused by the narrator’s comment (at the end) that the car doesn’t emit one ounce of air pollution. Well not quite. Didn’t he notice the huge clouds of toxic smoke when the car does a burnout when it approaches the starting line? And besides, the electric engine may not emit air pollution directly, but unless it’s 100% recharged from nuclear power plants, it’s powered by fossil fuels somewhere on the electric generation grid.
Tesla & Wrightspeed don’t beat this car in a quarter mile? Go Datsun.
The car uses electricity which is created by burning fossil fuel which dissipates when transmitted across wires to the track. This may not be as efficient nor environmentally sound as a combusion engine.
Only 40 miles on a single charge? It may waste everyone else off the line, but it’s no good for endurance racing.
The electricity is likely generated from coal plants. This doesn’t make the car any more green than a regular gas guzzler.
Do you really think you could possibly employ filtering as efficient as they use on coal or oil power plants on your average car? That’s what makes electric cars clean. Not that they don’t emit fumes. The energy it consumes *is* cleaner.
@Veritaba
Actually, electric vehicles are greener than typical gas powered cars. In the future you should probably pause for a moment before you spout opinion as fact lest you appear foolish (again).
Wow people, time to read up on how electric vehicles compare to gas engines in terms of emissions:
http://gas2.org/2008/04/08/without-clean-electricity-plug-in-vehicles-arent-so-hot/
uhh, for everyone saying that it still pollutes because the electricity is generated by burning fossil fuels, it does, but electric motors are much more efficient than an ICE can ever hope to be. If you also think about all the things required to get crude out of the ground and refined, etc, etc rather than burning coal (which we already do) or coming from a nuclear plant you see how stupid it is to use gasoline to power car engines.