Top Gear lads build the Hammerhead Eagle i-Thrust, an ER-EV to answer the Chevy Volt
Many electric vehicle fans out there are constantly complaining about how long it is taking automakers to bring plug-in vehicles to market. We've had commenters here on this site claiming that they should be able to bring EVs to the street in six months. Apparently even six months is too long for the crew at Top Gear.
For those unfamiliar with the format of the show, most episodes involve the producers giving a challenge of some kind to hosts Jeremy Clarkson, James May and Richard Hammond. The most recent episode, aired this week on the BBC in the UK, included just such a challenge. The boys were tasked to build their own answer to the extended range EV Chevy Volt.
In a mere 18 hours they transformed a TVR Chimaera (interesting choice since a chimaera is a mythological creature composed of parts of a number of animals) into the Hammerhead Eagle i-Thrust pictured above. Once the i-Thrust was completed, it was turned over to AutoCar magazine for an independent road test. As you might guess based on the photo, the results were not surprising and they are a testament to perhaps taking a little more time and car in development of a car. You can grab a copy of AutoCar's full road test as a PDF here and watch a video of the test here.
[Source: AutoCar]
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Zeph 11:44AM (11/23/2009)
Clarkson and Cº making another hit piece on electric cars? Should we be surprised?
The irony is that, while trying to pass these cars off as laughable and a bad choice, they are actually showing people how practical and elegantly simple they are.
They also made a snide comment direct to the i-miev.
Top Gear has clearly got an anti electric corporate agenda, but the fact that they have to keep at it so much shows clearly that the electric car revolution is starting to take off. The more they bash it the stronger the case for electrics becomes, because by now most of the public have realised that they are a bunch of biased clowns trying to manipulated public perception.
With a little more work, now that parts are becoming available, thousands of people will be able to make their own electric conversions. If the industry doesn't do it for us we will do it for ourselves.
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paulwesterberg 5:44PM (11/23/2009)
Yea they couldn't bother to just replace the drive-train from a donor vehicle with some batteries and a motor they had to make it look like a monstrosity. If you told someone to go build an ICE car using only parts from the lumberyard you would end up with something just as hideous.
They could have converted a lotus chassis but then their efforts to make it suck would be even more obvious compared to tesla, envi, lotus, etc.
evftw 8:49PM (11/23/2009)
And you expected something different?
Top Gear - Abitious but rubbish - Total garbage car. Barely runs. Poorly executed but hilarious.
Here's what the cars would look like on other shows.
Overhaulin - Lots of shots of her ass and a muscle car repainted with a 1MW motor and a kicking stereo.
Mythbusters - Really geeky, probably works well. Made from a Taurus...
etc, etc...
Cougs 9:07AM (11/24/2009)
Zeph:
Corporate agenda? They are on the BBC which is a public station...and the current Labour Party that runs the government is very much in support of "green" initiatives.
Also, its a TV show...lighten up :-). If I took umbrage at every joke about Irish people being drunk I'd never be able to have a drink. TopGear doesn't pretend to be PC and the world is better off for it.
Zeph 10:38AM (11/24/2009)
Coughs: You probably still believe the UK is a democracy too...
The agenda, long term, is to make people pay more than they have to for whatever they are allowed to own. For now there is a concentrated effort to keep the lid on electrics up to a point where they can be sold as corporate forces want to sell them, which for now seems to mean hybrids and battery lease schemes (scams). Just watch hybrids being pushed as the second coming and independent electric car start ups being bulldozed.
The only green initiative big government is in support of is green CO2 based taxation. Everything else is windowdressing, they are parasites and not deciders, and our current economic and political processes are way to centralized for our own good.
Cougs 5:15PM (11/24/2009)
Zeph:
I like your spirit but this is just a difference of ideals. For them, there isn't a compromise worth making between speed and the environment. TopGear is anti-government (even if they are owned by them) and they are anti-corporatism (they level the biggest criticsm of automobiles at those that are produce by large corporations that have no sense of spirit or individuality). That being said, if Ferrari comes out with an all electric supercar that does 0-60 in 3.5 seconds and corners near 1.0 g and doesn't fall apart like a Mini E, they will probably tell you they love it and that the seats are rubbish or that their isn't a transmission per-se but otherwise it is great. That is just the way the show works - no hidden agendas, just entertainment.
Zeph 5:26PM (11/24/2009)
I disagree... they do have an agenda. They nailed the Tesla, which by any yardstick is a superior sportscar to anything upto and including it's price bracket, because it has blistering performance and decent range for pennies on the mile... The tesla hit piece was totally contrived, almost as much as the last electric car hit piece.
They defend automotive individuality as long as it's in a price bracket where only a few people can afford it.
They pose as populists but their manipulations favor elitists, imo. They have not mentioned the lightning GT, that I can remember, in any of their shows for example, which is a uk based electric startup that seems to be developing another superior product.
They only move for the petroleum industry and the current establishment, and they are becoming pretty transparent about it.
And I'll tell you why: A person with an electric car and solar panels has energy independence for as long as the batteries last. And the powers that be are shaky about an electric economy because they know there are simple and easy ways to generate and store electricity. They also know you can get electricity out of a vacuum. Tesla has done this (the man, not the company). I have noticed a recent trend, which is to get the worst students and focus them on electricity courses in high school. This to me tells me that the establishment will only tolerate an electric economy based on ignorance.
People all over the world are waking up to just what is possible, and to just how much we are being lied to. Hint: it's almost everything.
I don't want to demonise Top Gear. They are just infotainment. I am just trying to show people that they are thinking with tainted memes.
Cheers.
Phlub 6:08AM (11/25/2009)
I agree with everything Zeph has said. This show week on week irritates me more and more and it's because of their stance on anything "green". As was said they could have just stuck the TVR body back on the car, but they had to make a mockery of it by designing a car like a child would. The fact that Clarkson said that May's idea of a generator was revolutionary just shows how out of touch they really are, because if they were serious journalists they would know that the Volt works on a similar principle(from my understanding).
I know the program is meant to be a joke, and I know who the target audience is, but they can often have a serious moral to their articles when it's about driving Ferrari's, Astons and Lambos through east European countryside, but when it comes to anything "green" the only thing they can do is make a mockery.
Do you think they were driving through Oxford to have a dig at the Mini E? There's a good example, they were in Oxford driving an electric car, that's a good opportunity to mention what Mini are doing, the links are there and I honestly thought they would.
Oh4Sh0 11:53AM (11/23/2009)
Is that a photo of the Chrysler Sebring?
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andrichrose 1:33PM (11/23/2009)
No it cant be , the panel fit looks better than the Chrysler !
maestro_mario 7:58AM (11/24/2009)
No, I was so sure that it was the 2012 Honda Element concept vehicule... :-)
jonwil2002 6:25PM (11/23/2009)
Woah, its actually possible to make a car that's UGLIER than a PT Cruiser...
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gorr 8:52PM (11/23/2009)
At least they fitted a medium sized gasoline or diesel or kerosene electric generator battery recharger and performance enhancer.
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Chris M 9:29PM (11/23/2009)
Well, there you go, Gorr! Just what you ordered!
Are you ready to buy? (grin)