A UK Minister Just Broke the Electric Car Land Speed Record

If there are two things in this world that folks just do not respect, it's the US Congress and the obscene amounts of torque that an electric engine can produce. And like its two-wheeled brethren, the Lola B12 69/EV has more than enough torque to spare. Enough, even, to propel a former UK government official to over 200 MPH and into the history books.

The Lola B12 69/EV is built by Drayson Racing Technologies (as in Lord Drayson?he's also the company CEO and former minister for the Labour government) in Kidlington, Oxfordshire. The firm has been in operation since 2007 and focuses on sustainable automotive technology, demonstrating its latest advancements through the firm's race team.

And to demonstrate the potential of electric vehicles, Dayton just went ahead and set a land speed record last week at RAF Elvington in Yorkshire. There, the Lola B12 69/EV hit a top speed of 204.2 MPH, beating the previous 175 MPH record set in 1974 by a General Electric Battery Box car.

To do so, the Drayson team had to modify an existing Le Mans prototype that used a bio-ethanol engine with a 20 kWh (850 HP) electric power plant and modified the recycled carbon fiber chassis to minimize drag and to get it under the 1,000 kg limit to qualify for the FIA (Federation Internationale de l?Automobile) record.

"What it, I hope, shows to people is just what the future potential of electric cars is,? Drayson told the BBC. ?[It] is a pointer to the future ? the technology that we developed for this car will filter down to the cars we use every day.?

While the presence of Google's Eric Schmidt might lead to dreams of driverless car races, Drayson racing will be sticking with human drivers for the time being. In fact Lord Drayson is working to start up a new FIA Formula E competition (open only to electric vehicles) for the 2014 season. Reportedly the races will be 45 minutes long and won't include traditional pit stops. Since you can't very well recharge or swap a battery in a pit stop, racers will instead hop out of the expired car, run 100 meters (which is going to be hilarious), and get into a freshly charged car. Each racer will race three separate cars and get two pits per race. No word yet on whether they'll be allowed to pit for tire changes.

The races are set to start in London in the fall of next year, followed by Rome, Miami, Beijing, Rio de Janeiro (if Brazilian society hasn't collapsed by then) and three other TBD locales. Hopefully they'll be traveling from venue to venue by more conventional means. [Extreme Tech - BBC]

Source: http://gizmodo.com/a-uk-minister-just-broke-the-electric-car-land-speed-re-613121273

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