NEWS
Next Audi R8 to go hybrid
German luxury brand commits to plug-in hybrid technology, including for R8 supercarAudi may have cancelled the production version of its all-electric R8 e-tron, but it appears a plug-in hybrid (PHEV) version of the German brand’s flagship sports car is now on the cards.
Speaking at the second Audi ‘future lab’ technology forum in Berlin this week, member of the Audi board for finance, Axel Strotbek, said that unlike the R8 e-tron, an R8 PHEV would make better financial sense for both the company and its customers.
“As you know, after long deliberations, in which I definitely played an instrumental role, for economic feasibility reasons we’ve decided not to bring this car (the R8 e-tron) into large series production because the profitability of projects is something we always test to the ultimate and we are convinced that for large series production it doesn’t meet our requirements,” Strotbek said during a keynote speech on Tuesday.
“Nonetheless, we are convinced – and that’s why we’re showing this car – that existing and future electric and hybrid vehicles will learn a lot from this technology.
“The findings of our engineers have made in this car will be translated into other projects.”
Asked later by motoring.com.au whether a business case for an R8 PHEV would be more feasible, Strotbek said: “Plug-in hybrids have the advantage of a smaller battery package and this will make it feasible for customers because the price will be much lower.
“With hybrid technology, there are advantages of having a small battery package and this will make it feasible for the customers.
“The price will be much lower and as a consequence, there will be a much lower running cost in terms of electricity during the lifetime of the car.”
Audi has produced 10 production-ready prototypes of the R8 e-tron, but cited the high cost of its sizeable battery pack as the main reason for its prohibitive cost.
The R8 e-tron has a driving range of up to 215km and sprints to 100km/h in 4.2 seconds, matching the pace of the V8-powered version, thanks to two electric motors – one for each rear wheel – that develop 280kW and a massive 820Nm of torque.
That’s enough performance for the R8 e-tron to set a new EV lap record of 8:09 at Germany’s famed Nurburgring road circuit in June 2012.
But to compensate for the titanic 577kg lithium-ion battery pack that powers them, Audi embarked on an expensive weight-saving exercise to trim the vehicle’s weight to 1780kg – about 50kg more than the production V8.
Audi says that of its 6000 components, just nine are common with the production R8 and that the aluminium doors are the only shared body panels. At 199kg, the electric supercar’s chassis is 23kg lighter than standard.
Weight reduction measures extend to 1.2kg-lighter fibreglass reinforced composite suspension springs and 2kg-lighter tyres, while carbonfibre reinforced polymer replaces the rear bulkhead, rear windscreen, roof, bonnet and bootlid.
But Strotbek said those technologies would have made the R8 e-tron vastly more expensive than both the R8 V8 and V10.
“It (the price gap) hasn’t been as close as it should have been, that’s why we cancelled it.
“The key was to get it technologically feasible and to get as much spill over into other products as much as we could.”
R8 e-tron chassis chief Dr Karl-Heinz Meitinger said the unexpectedly high cost of the car’s bespoke technologies, which would have to have been dispersed across other Audi models, made the project unfeasible.
“The price of the electric components did not develop as we’d hoped at the beginning of the project,” he said.
“We could not sell it in an economically feasible way... other customers would have had to compensate too much for it.”
Dr Meitinger said high battery costs weren’t the only prohibitive aspect of the pure-electric R8 e-tron.
“It’s not just a price issue. It’s about the driving experience, servicing, infrastructure, acceptance of EV technology...
“The know-how and experience we’ve gathered will be incorporated into other future models.”
It’s understood Audi board member for research and development, Wolfgang Durheimer, also played a key role in the axing of the R8 e-tron project.
After a brief tenure at Bentley as CEO, Durheimer moved into his current role with Audi. Before Bentley Durheimer was the long-time R&D chief at Porsche, which has committed to PHEV technology for its entire model range, including the Panamera, Cayenne, Macan and – eventually – the 918 Spyder, 911 and Boxster/Cayman sports cars.
If Audi does produce a plug-in hybrid R8, it won’t be until the second generation, which is expected to appear in concept guise in 2015.
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Written byMarton Pettendy
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If the price does not contain the notation that it is "Drive Away", the price may not include additional costs, such as stamp duty and other government charges.
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