{"id":24036,"date":"2019-07-26T18:25:39","date_gmt":"2019-07-26T22:25:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/henrypayne.com\/?p=24036"},"modified":"2019-07-26T18:25:39","modified_gmt":"2019-07-26T22:25:39","slug":"jaguar-charges-into-future-with-first-ever-electric-suv-race","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/henrypayne.com\/index.php\/2019\/07\/jaguar-charges-into-future-with-first-ever-electric-suv-race","title":{"rendered":"Jaguar charges into future with first-ever electric-SUV race"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"The<\/p>\n<\/div>

The Jaguar I-Pace eTrophy races took place in Brooklyn in the shadow of the Manhattan skyline. The quiet race cars are a good fit for the inner city.\u00a0(Photo: Henry Payne, The Detroit News)<\/span><\/p>\n

New York<\/em>\u00a0\u2014 The times they are\u00a0a-changin’.<\/p>\n

Earlier this month, the first-ever electric-SUV race \u2014\u00a0the Jaguar I-Pace eTrophy Challenge \u2014\u00a0took place on American soil, bringing together the two hottest trends in autodom: sport utility vehicles and electrification.<\/p>\n

At the same time that car shoppers\u2019 thirst for gas-guzzling SUVs appears unquenchable, governments are also forcing automakers to make battery-powered vehicles. Manufacturers like Jaguar are determined to show the public that the two disparate trends can co-exist. So the eTrophy series was born.<\/p>\n

Jaguar eTrophy follows a rich tradition of single-make series (Porsche IROC, BMW ProCar) meant to market a brand. But this international series comes with a significant technology investment as well.<\/p>\n

Manufacturers are using e-racing to push the limits of battery tech performance that is far behind its gasoline counterpart.<\/p>\n

Featuring 10 4,400-pound crossovers speeding quietly around a fence-lined Brooklyn street course, the eTrophy crowned its first champion on July 14.\u00a0Brazil\u2019s Andres Jimenez\u00a0beat out American Bryan Sellars and Team RLL. Team RLL is owned by Indy 500 star Bobby Rahal, comedian David Letterman\u00a0and businessman Michael Lanigan.<\/p>\n

For Jaguar, the season has proved a victory showing that a two-ton-plus bowling ball on wheels can be flogged around a track for 25 minutes in 90-degree heat and survive. That\u2019s a long way from the 24-hour Le Mans marathons that made famous Jaguar\u2019s gas-powered cars over the years, but it\u2019s a start.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor Jaguar this is a setting you would not normally ascribe to electrified cars especially of the (SUV) variety,\u201d Rahal said trackside. \u201cThis highlights the performance of the I-Pace as compared to a Tesla that clearly doesn\u2019t have the performance the I-Pace does. Jaguar is a sport brand. Tesla is about getting you from point A to point B.\u201d<\/p>\n

Jaguar hopes racing will help it catch up to Tesla\u2019s dominant e-brand. But eTrophy is also indicative of how far electric cars have to go to catch up with their gas-powered peers.<\/p>\n

The eTrophy parallels the open-wheel Formula E race series that showcases the world\u2019s cutting edge of battery technology. For the first time, Formula E in 2019 raced wire-to-wire with a single car after years of switching horses mid-race because the battery could not last 50 minutes.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn a championship that is trying to promote electric technology, that\u2019s a very difficult message to give when range anxiety is one of the biggest concerns of any electric-car user,\u201d said Jaguar Formula E chief engineer Gary Ekerold. \u201cSo there was a real big rush to try and make sure battery technology allowed us to use just one car.\u201d<\/p>\n

McLaren Racing developed a new 52-kW battery that more than doubled the capacity of the last-generation car. But the upgrade came at significant cost and exposed\u00a0the Achilles’ heel of battery power: It nearly doubled the price of a Formula E racer from $500,000 to $900,000.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe cost of the car has gone up partly due to the battery,\u201d said Ekerold. \u201cBecause of the extra weight of the battery, they needed to find other ways of saving weight.”<\/p>\n

He said chassis supplier\u00a0Dallara saved weight with advanced\u00a0Formula One-spec\u2019d composite materials.<\/p>\n

Jaguar hopes the Formula E technology will trickle down to production cars like the I-Pace. Tech transfer is a key reason manufacturers go racing, whether it\u2019s a Honda Civic in IMSA\u2019s Michelin Pilot series or Corvette at the 24 Hours of Daytona.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe challenge in any tech transfer from the racing environment to production is cost,\u201d says Ekerold. \u201cThe cost of the battery in our Formula E cars in a production environment is not realistic. Therefore any hardware tech has to be re-engineered to get cost out of it. So most significant learnings they transfer between racing and is concept and know-how on how to achieve something.\u201d<\/p>\n

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