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Ferrari Unveils World's Fastest (and Most Expensive) Hybrid
Hugh Pickens writes writes "Fred Meier reports that Ferrari has unveiled its fastest car ever, a nearly 1000 hp. gas-electric hybrid dubbed LaFerrari that does 0-62 mph in less than 3 seconds, 0-124 in less than 7 seconds, 0-186 mph in 15 seconds. "We chose to call this model LaFerrari," says Ferrari's President, Luca di Montezemolo, "because it is the maximum expression of what defines our company – excellence. ...Aimed at our collectors, this is a truly extraordinary car which encompasses advanced solutions that, in the future, will find their way onto the rest of the range." LaFerrari is the company's first hybrid and has a system that incorporates technology developed for the Scuderia Ferrari Formula One race car's KERS (kinetic energy recovery system) setup. In LaFerrari, the hybrid (HY-KERS) version uses a 6.26-liter, non-turbo, V-12 gas engine rated at 800 hp coupled with a 163 hp. electric motor for a combined rating of 963 hp. A second, separate electric motor drives the power accessories."
I know this site has an international audience, but did anyone really think that this thing ran on some non-specific, presumably flammable "gas"? In the US, "gas" is the most common way to refer to gasoline/petrol. We would call a CNG vehicle a "natural gas" car, and propane or hydrogen would be referred to as just propane or hydrogen.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
..nuff said.
1000 hp of Postage Stamp, disappearing under a dustsheet in some collectors exclusive lockup garage near you soon.
Uhhh...you expect grammar nazis to care about logic? Really? You must be new here.
As for TFA frankly ALL hybrids might as well be toys for the rich because if you remove all the government subsidies? The math just doesn't work. The problem is we haven't had a real breakthrough in battery tech in years and the lithium batteries just don't make economic sense. From the tests I've seen depending on where you live and whether you own a climate controlled garage (because of differences in temps affecting battery life) you are looking at 5-7 years on the battery. Now from what I read the batteries in something like the Leaf or Prius cost around $20,000 to replace yet thanks to government subsidies these cars only cost $24k-$39k depending on feature set so already you have a car that is gonna be practically worthless on the used car market (because the battery costs more than the used car is worth) and any economist will tell you its the used car market that seriously hurts our fossil fuel numbers, currently the USA averages 14MPG and that is because of all the poor folks in used cars on the road.
So while we need to invest in R&D of new battery tech frankly at this point in time hybrids and electrics are just money sinks, all that money sank into subsidizing hybrids is just money pissed down a rathole. If you truly wanted to put the USA on a path of energy independence what you would be better off doing is putting that money into a "people's car/truck" that ran on diesel (so you could later on switch to bio-diesel if the tech becomes viable) with a minimum of 38 MPG for the truck and 45 MPG and a price target of under $30k, THEN you could do a "cash for clunkers" and other subsidies to get the poor out of the older gas guzzlers. If you were to do this with the current national MPG being 14 you could cut our fuel usage by half (figuring in that some will not switch) while having something that would actually make economic sense. With economies of scale you could probably make the vehicles profitable and as the years went by and more and more of the used market was filled by these higher gas mileage vehicles the savings would continue to rise.
But hybrids are just a symptom of a larger disease, the fact that subsidies end up becoming entrenched and continue long after it has been shown not to be economically viable. Just look at ethanol, it causes higher food prices, damages engines, yet we continue to shell out all this money on a tech that has proven to be a dead end because so many in the agra business lobby to keep it. What we need is to spend our money wisely on tech that works economically and hybrids just aren't there yet.
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
Massively overpowered cars don't fishtail and spin anymore
That depends on how much cough syrup Justin Bieber and his pals have been chugging.
Many massively overpowered cars suffer from the mechanical fault of a loose nut behind the steering wheel, where the drivers have more money than driving skills.
Schroedinger's Brexit: The UK is both in and out of the EU at the same time!