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"The best driver's car in the world," on road and track - * UK
* England - McLaren P1 heats up the Arctic Circle
(Video from YouTube, by McLarenAutomotiveTV -"The McLaren P1™: tested to extremes": With only a few months remaining until the first deliveries will be made to just 375 customers, the development programme for the McLaren P1™ continues to accelerate as it nears its end. This extensive work is being carried out to ensure that the McLaren P1™ delivers on the target of being 'the best driver's car in the world on road and track'...or a frozen lake, for that matter)
Woking,Surrey,EN,UK -Gizmag, by C.C. Weiss -May 1, 2013: -- You don't create one of the utmost masterpieces of the high-performance supercar market without countless hours of testing. Much of that testing is dirty, sweaty and anything but sexy, but a few select aspects are riveting enough to make for edge-of-your-seat video – aspects like the McLaren P1 drifting through snow-powdered ice in northern Sweden... The specific reason behind McLaren's traveling across the North Sea was "durability and development testing" under extreme conditions, something that sounds much more compelling when set to the soundtrack of a motor-assisted 727-bhp V8 engine and screeching Pirellis. McLaren brought the car inside the borders of the area we know as the Arctic Circle for the testing... McLaren showed a P1 design study at the Paris Motor Show last September and provided details about the 903-bhp hybrid powertrain and other mechanicals prior to the 2013 Geneva Motor Show... Moving forward, McLaren is certain to cite the 217 mph (349 km/h) top speed, sub-3-second 0-62 mph (0-100 km/h) and sub-7-second 0-124 mph (0-200 km/h) in trying to convince 375 buyers that US$1.15 million is a small price to pay for this particular piece of motoring history...
* Belgium - Ford's eWheelDrive has designs on the urban car of the future
(Image: Cutaway view of the eWheelDrive hub motor)Lommel,Belgium -Gizmag, by David Szondy -May 1, 2013: -- It's predicted that by the year 2050 there will be 9.3 billion people on Earth and 6.4 billion of them will be living in cities. There could also be four times as many cars on the roads as today, leading to an incredible degree of urban congestion and gridlock. That’s the impetus behind Ford and technology partner Schaeffler’s eWheelDrive electric research car, that moves the motor to the wheel hubs... The eWheelDrive is under development by Ford and project leader Schaeffler, a German automotive component manufacturer and supplier. The aim of the project is to investigate the potential for smaller, more agile cars better suited to crowded urban environments... The eWheelDrive doesn't look very revolutionary. It’s based on that most conventional of cars, the Ford Fiesta, but the real secret isn’t under the bonnet because there’s nothing there except the battery. Instead, the engine has given way to two electric motors mounted in the hubs of the rear wheels along with the braking and cooling systems...
This setup also isn’t entirely new, but what is new is the fact that the eWheelDrive is not intended to make it more sporty or just greener, but as a way of developing car technologies for increasingly crowded city streets. The design frees up space under the bonnet that is normally occupied by a conventional engine or a central electric motor, opening the door for smaller, more agile cars ...* Germany - Compact laser system scans road surfaces at 100 km/h
(Photo: Cars and lasers, together again) Munich,Germany -Gizmag, by James Holloway -May 1, 2013: -- Researchers at the Fraunhofer Institute for Physical Measurement Techniques have come up with a car-mounted laser scanner the size of a shoe box, that can survey the contours of road surfaces at speeds of up to 100 km/h (62 mph). The system detects potholes and other road damage in need of repair. According to the Institute, the Pavement Profile Scanner (or PPS) has surveyed 15,000 km of road since mid-2012, in which time it has proven cheaper, faster and more accurate than existing systems which require hefty attachments to the carrier vehicle. An octagonal mirror housing scatters the laser light across the width of the road. With a 70º acquisition angle, the system can scan roads up to 4 m (13 ft) wide. By recording the time it takes for the laser to return to the scanner from the road surface, the distance at any point can be calculated; to an accuracy between 0.15 and 0.3 mm in the case of PPS. The only other information needed is the vehicle's position and orientation as a reference for each datapoint. It's LIDAR, basically...
Labels: cars technonews
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