With wins in virtually every type of motor racing you can imagine – Indycar, Formula 1, rowboats, etc. – Lola is an undisputed motorsports legend. Earlier this week, the Lola legend got a little bit greener, with the announcement that UK-based Drayson Racing would be bring an all-electric racer to taze shock zap amp-up the LeMans Prototype class in 2012.
Officially (and unimaginatively) called the B12/69EV, the Drayson-Lola “showcases advances such as inductive charging, composite battery power, moveable aerodynamics and electrical regenerative damping, making it one of the most innovative cleantech motorsport project in the world,” according to project head Lord Drayson, who is the UK’s former Minister of Science and Innovation and current Managing Partner at Drayson Racing, as well as President of the Motorsport Industry Association and (possibly, I didn’t fact-check this) being an actual Lord (Oh, lawdy!).
We can see some of those technological innovations laid out in the diagram, below …
… indeed, with movable aerodynamics, wireless quick-charging, Lola’s renowned chassis innovations, regenerative KERS-style braking, and more than 850 hp available from the Drayson-Lola’s electric motors, the new B12/69EV “aims to be the fastest electric-powered racecar to lap a circuit.”
We shall see soon enough, yes?
You can see a few more photo, below, and check out the original Drayson press release here.
Source: Drayson Racing, via Motorpasion F1.
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About Jo Borras
New reality coming crashing down on an American way of life, as nuclear generated power from Thorium feeds electric bullet trains capable of over 320 Kph in China, and sililar train adventures surface in Europe. Ever rising Oil prices, as the vast Pan Eurasian Alliances in the East bid high with strong, reliable unmanipulated Yuan backed by over 6000 Million workers against the faltring U.S. fiat faith based “Funny money” defended now by fear and threats, not confidence and good faith. We watch tthe fading of an Empire as it gradually shrinks even as the Pan Eurasian Alliances dwarf it cast long shadows over it, and steal its place on the world’s marketplace with cheaper, better products, even the American motor-car now vanquished by Asian designs.
Racing cars in circles for endurance testing no longer valid in a world of hgh speed nuclear elelctric rail, even the jet airplane to soon escape cost effective regions and fall away.
Daisy chained nuclear elelctric bullet trains , with fes transfers can provide very inexpensive, very comfortable, very convenient, cross continent travel, nuclear elelctric ships can travers the seas in great style, and for very low fares, as the oil fueled jet planes find fuel to costly try bio-fuels find them in short supply. The 21 Century beli=ongs to safer cheaper Thorium based nuclear eletricty – not fossil fuels, not Solar, Wind, Wave, Hydro, Tidal, Geothermal, they are all an aside, in the overwhelming simplicity to come form China from Bill Gates usung spent fuel, using Thorium a an energy source for an electric world. See America’s “dirty little fission Secret” www,theoildrum.com/node/4971 when a wrong choice was made by war mongers in power Humanity will correct this error, and China leads the way.
Electric cars are in preparation for this world wide evolution. Similary electric bullet train development, and far reaching battery research. These cars the engineering insights gained here will pave the way to a nuclear-electric future as oil becomes scarce, as oil is priced beyond the average wage earner’s abilities to pay.
Uncle B, I am so tired of your lunatic rantings. You don’t know a damn thing about China and you continuously rant about some non-existent utopia which doesn’t even exist.
We’re on here talking about a cool new EV racing series and some new technology advancing and you have to rant about America and China??? Really? Do you truly have mental problems?
Take your moronic ass over there and see how they actually live for a while, then come back and we might bother to debate with your dumbass.
Until then, go fuck yourself.
Agreed. I’m deleting any more Uncle B comments I run across and explaining (once again) that Ritalin does not let you choose WHAT to focus on.
Thanks Jo. Geez, I don’t normally like to see anything filtered, but this is almost like listening to a racist when he gets going. Just irrational, mean spirited stuff, totally off the subject we’re discussing.
I tend to be a bit self-critical of ourselves as Americans and hope we can do better than some of the wasteful, polluting, stupid things we do today. I’ll be glad to debate even those things and how we can do better…when that is the subject of the article.
Now, back to EV Racing!
Amen, brother Dave!
I went to the Petite Le Mans this past fall and it was wonderful to see these beasts in person. I’m a big EV guy, but WOW, those Peugeot 908s and the Audi R18s looked like alien predators in person. And they totally surprised me at how they sounded going down the straights. It was stunning how quiet they were down the straights compared to the GT class and even the LMPC cars.
My girlfriend was with me and told her that as cool as that was, I couldn’t wait till the day I could hear what it was like when an 908 type super car came rolling down the straight as an EV!
I was dreaming of 800hp, 4 motors for torque vectoring and all wheel drive/regen braking. I thought it would be 5 years before I could see something like that, at least! And they even throw in advancements like structural batteries!
Suddenly I turn around and see this and it is so cool! And so encouraging.
Think of the advances in high power battery advancements they will drive. The rapid recharging for the batteries. And yes, even cost advancements. They may be racing, but they have budgets too. And above all, weight is EVERYTHING in racing so they’ll push the energy density very hard. Suddenly, battery companies have a new market to help pay for their research and development new technology even before they get the volumes up and the price down for average consumers.
This is great stuff guys..
Bill Gates in China see: http://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/story/2011/12/07/technology-bill-gates-china-nuclear-reactor.html
Not sure what Bill Gates has to do with the Drayson Lola, but I’ll Approve this to see where you’re headed.
They’re not going to race this, sadly — LMP1 rules still allow only petrol and diesel engines, with or without hybrid electric drivetrains.
Per Drayson’s own Q&A, this car is intended to showcase pure EV technology and optimized around single-lap qualifying times (though they envision that you *can* run it in a race — with induction charging pads to replenish the batteries in the pits). But there is no homologation for EV cars yet so there’s no point optimizing for it yet.
http://www.draysonracingtechnologies.com/news_article.html?Q-A—Lola-Drayson-B12-69EV-all-electric-LMP-car-9
Bring on FIA’s Formula E in 2013 though — that’d be the first time we’ll see top-level 4-wheels electric racing! (for two-wheeler we already have the electric Isle of Man race).