Wind riders, this time ride the wind.
Who is the most perfect "Bond car"?
Born on the track, the British sports car brand Lotus, must be listed in the name. In 1977, in the 007 series of movies "Underwater City", James Bond piloted a Lotus Esprit, and after pressing a button, the sports car rushed into the sea, transformed into a submarine, and could launch missiles underwater.
"It's amazing," Tesla CEO Elon Musk commented. The car was also auctioned and collected by Musk in 2013 for nearly $1 million, providing part of the inspiration for Tesla's electric pickup Truck, the Cyber Truck.
Esprit, who was bought by Musk, source: Lotus official
Outside of the movie, Lotus, along with Porsche and Ferrari, is called "the world's top three sports car brands".
Since 1958, Lotus has won seven F1 Manufacturers' Championships, six F1 Drivers' Championships, 81 Formula 1 Races and many other events. Behind the victory is Lotus's ultimate pursuit of aerodynamics and lightweighting, a sports car brand that is truly for the driver.
Nowadays, the new energy outlet has struck, and Lotus has ridden the wind with the "wind control technique". With the launch of the first pure electric supercar Evija, the first pure electric SUV will be released on March 29, and Lotus will usher in a new era.
"The King of Aerodynamics"
"Acceleration allows you to run faster on the straights, and weight loss allows you to run faster anywhere." Lotus founder Colin Chapman once said so. Therefore, while all F1 teams chased the Ferrari and desperately improved the engine power, Chapman, who had served in the Air Force, borrowed aircraft knowledge and cultivated his own unique skills with lightweight and aerodynamic concepts.
In 1954, Chapman, with the help of his good friend Frank Costin, began building the Lotus Mark 8. In the limited test environment at that time, the two people had a hard time testing better aerodynamic performance.
They glued fuzz on the shell of the prototype car, and determined the direction of air flow by observing the direction of the fluff. In order to observe the fluff swing at a speed of 160 km/h, Frank even went into battle himself, having people tie themselves to the front hood. Of course, this later became one of the first wind tunnel experiments in the history of automobiles.
Source: Lotus official
The efforts of the two were not in vain.
The Mark 8 weighs only 520 kg and has an engine of only 85 horsepower, but its top speed exceeds 200 km/h. At the British Grand Prix at Silverstone, Chapman drove the Mark 8 to beat the Porsche 550 Spyder. (From Autohome's "Type 132 Awakening belongs to Lotus's era is coming.") The path of the king of lotus car aerodynamics also began.
However, an increase in speed does not mean that all troubles can be ended. When the sports car is driving fast enough to fly, the vehicle needs to increase downforce to improve stability.
Chapman began to do research again. In the past, racing cars only provided grip through the chassis and tires, but Chapman innovated to add wind wings as a new source of grip.
In 1968, the Lotus Type 49 was introduced. In this car, the wind wing is an aerodynamic device arranged in front and rear specifically to increase the downforce and thus increase the grip of the vehicle. The advent of the Type 49 also heralded F1's official entry into the aerodynamic "wing" era.
In the decade that followed, Lotus not only increased downforce through wind wings, but also became a pioneer in the use of the "ground effect". The ground effect refers to the formation of a negative pressure zone in the interior of the side box of the racing car by guiding the bottom stream of the car, coupled with the side skirt design that is close to the road surface, forming a "venturi effect", obtaining great air downforce and firmly sucking the car on the ground.
In 1978, lotus type 79, the "integrator of the ground effect", dominated the F1 arena with 8 victories.
From the wedge-shaped front, to the wind-setting wing and the F1 ground effect, Lotus has left a large fortune for human automobile civilization. Even Enzo Ferrari, an "old rival" who had been dismissive of Lotus, later had to admit that Colin Chapman was "brilliant in cutting-edge insights."
To this day, we can still see these technologies. Many sports cars are equipped with different tail fins; the "Venturi effect" is also a must for sports cars.
As the "king of aerodynamics", Lotus not only builds his own cars, but also helps others build good cars. In the list of Lotus technical support, there is no shortage of Aston Martin, Toyota, Peugeot, Jaguar figures, chapman called Chapman the "Jobs" of the sports car world does not seem to be an exaggeration.
Electrification of "fast lane changes"
The era of fuel vehicles has witnessed the glory of Lotus, but the glory of the past has not stopped its footsteps. When the wave of electrification hit, Lotus, the 74-year-old "car old cannon", was also struggling to transform.
As early as 2017, Feng Qingfeng, CEO of Lotus Group, pointed out the direction of electrification. Two years later, Lotus kicked off the electrification transition with its first pure electric supercar, the Evija. In July 2021, Lotus said a solemn farewell to the fuel era with the Sports Car Emira.
A month later, Lotus announced its electrification product plan for the next five years, that is, from 2022, it will launch 4 pure electric vehicle products to embrace the era of electrification. Specifically, in 2022, Lotus will launch an E-Class SUV code-named Type 132; in 2023, an E-Class four-door coupe code-named Type 133; and in 2025, a D-Class "New Species of Pure Electric Intelligence" code-named Type 134. In 2026, Lotus will also launch a pure electric sports car.
Compared with the hesitation of sports car peers in the era of fuel vehicles, Lotus's courage to transform is more admirable.
Even though Porsche has launched the Taycan, a pure electric vehicle, Porsche admitted in March 2020 that "Porsche will never stop the internal combustion engine, and the soul of the brand , the Porsche 911 will always offer the internal combustion engine option". Ferrari has also said that its brand will not launch any electric models before 2025.
In fact, Lotus has long accumulated technology on the road to electrification.
Tesla is regarded as the "pioneer" of electric vehicles. But what is less known is that Tesla's first electric car, the Roadster, was created by Tesla Martin Eberhard, who persuaded Lotus Automotive Engineering Director Roger Becker to build on Lotus Elise.
Tesla was licensed for key technologies for the Elise chassis, on the basis of which the Roadster chassis was designed, so the two were highly similar in suspension and occupant protection systems, and Tesla also received numerous patents from Lotus. As a result, the original Roadster could also see the shadow of the Lotus model. In 2012, Roadster was discontinued due to the termination of its partnership with Lotus.
Not only that, the aerodynamic "internal power" previously cultivated has also laid the foundation for lotus's development in the era of electrification, which has become Lotus's unique advantage.
Air resistance is the biggest enemy for pure electric vehicles. Public data show that for every 10% reduction in the wind resistance coefficient, for new energy vehicles, the mileage can be increased by about 3%. And Lotus, who has carved aerodynamics into his genes, has no baggage in this regard.
Lotus's first pure electric supercar, Evija, has long played with wind resistance with aerodynamics. The design concept, known as "porosity", directs high-energy airflow to the rear of the Evija, allowing wind to pass through the body rather than pushing the air in front of it, further reducing the wind resistance.
Evija Source: Lotus Official
This makes the Evija's maximum power up to 2000 horsepower, which can break through 100 in 3 seconds, but the body weight is only 1680 kg, which is lighter than the same performance of the fuel sports car, and won the title of "the world's largest mass production car, the lightest pure electric supercar".
The Type 132, which will be launched on March 29, has made a new breakthrough on the basis of the following porous design, which uses an 800V high-voltage system, which can achieve extremely fast charging, and the acceleration of 100 kilometers is also within 3 seconds.
After embracing the era of electrification, Lotus, the "king of aerodynamics", did not have to bother to consider the impact of engine displacement on vehicle performance.
"New Weapons"
After entering the era of automobile 3.0, an intelligent driving revolution is emerging. The blind pursuit of large displacement has become a thing of the past, and consumers hope to get more driving pleasure in addition to speed.
Based on this, intelligence has become Lotus's "new weapon". Lotus sees "track-level intelligent driving" as the firm technical direction for the next 10 years.
Achieving this goal is not easy. "This is a completely different technology path from any other brand," said Li Bo, vice president of Lotus Technology and head of the intelligent driving business line, "and it needs to combine better software algorithms, higher computing power platforms, and stronger sensing systems with cloud support and driver engagement." ”
But Lotus remained confident. According to Feng Qingfeng, Lotus adopts the technical route of lidar + ultra-high-definition camera + 4D millimeter wave radar full-field perception fusion, and ensures the safety of drivers through active redundancy in software and hardware performance. "You may think it's expensive, but I think the redundancy is worth it, because safety is the most important thing."
Not only that, lotus intelligent driving systems will continue to learn the driver's handling preferences and styles, personalized analysis and service for each driver, and achieve true personalization in data processing and calibration. "Not only did we choose materials that are different from other car companies, but we used intelligence to customize the needs of each person's travel scene." Feng Qingfeng said frankly.
In the era of electrification, Lotus independently created an EPA edge evolutionary architecture for itself.
It can apply track-level electric drive intelligent driving to daily driving scenarios according to the development needs of Lotus's ultra-high-end pure electric intelligent vehicles, and the wheelbase can be adapted according to the model between 2889-3100mm, and retain the flexibility of expansion space, which can support the development of C+ class, D class, E class and higher level models.
With the historical accumulation of "aerodynamics" and the blessing of the new weapon of "track-level intelligent driving", Lotus Type132 seems to have new ambitions, with the significant increase in the market penetration of global luxury brand new energy vehicles.
Compared with the new car manufacturers who have suffered from production capacity at every turn, since Lotus was acquired, Geely has provided real money and silver support and empowerment for Lotus's full run.
Under the leadership of Geely Holdings, Lotus "bonded" with Wuhan in 2018. Lotus intelligent factory is located in Hannan District, Wuhan City, covers an area of 1526 acres, with a total investment of more than 9 billion yuan, in 2020 to start a comprehensive construction, planned to be completed and put into operation in 2022, with an annual production capacity of 150,000 vehicles production capacity.
Image source: Lotus official
"This is an opportunity given to Lotus by the times," Feng said. The 74-year-old "aerodynamic guru" is riding the wind and injecting new colors into the era of electric vehicles.