MALIBU, California – Essentially the most wonderful factor concerning the $2.1 million Rimac Nevera is how simple it’s to only get in and drive.
The Nevera is an electrical hypercar from Croatia. It sits low — very low — to the bottom, and at first look it seems to be like the easy act of stepping into it might be difficult. However the doorways, which elevate up and out type of like a Lamborghini’s, lower into the roof simply sufficient to make sure that I do not bump my head as I drop myself into the motive force’s seat.
Getting underway does take slightly little bit of studying. Gears are shifted with an enormous knob to the left of the steering wheel, the ability seat’s changes are hidden in a touchscreen, and switches for the flip alerts and headlights are mounted straight on the steering wheel. However as soon as you’ve got obtained that down, it is easy to function.
The entire automotive is like that — easy to function — its 1,914 horsepower however.
One of many first issues I observed as we obtained underway is that it is easy to see out of the Nevera. That is not a given with automobiles like this. For instance, in Ferraris and Lamborghinis and different low-slung freeway rockets, it is usually a problem to see what’s behind you. However whereas the Nevera is unquestionably low slung, there’s simply sufficient of a rear window to make it simple to drive in freeway visitors. Good aspect mirrors definitely assist with that.
There’s additionally simply sufficient mechanical noise to remind you that you simply’re in a hypercar. There will not be an engine, however there are 4 electrical motors and so they make mellifluous mechanical sounds because the automotive strikes down the street. Not so loud that I could not converse with my passenger, Rimac’s Ryan Lanteigne, in an affordable speaking voice. It’s simply loud sufficient to remind us that we’re driving in one thing particular.
And the Nevera may be very particular certainly — accurately for its simply over $2 million asking value. You will see why within the video.
The Rimac story
Rimac — pronounced REE-mahtz, roughly — is Croatia’s first and solely automaker. Its 35-year-old founder, Mate (MAH-ta) Rimac, began tinkering with electrical autos after he blew the engine in an previous BMW he raced as a youngster. After rebuilding it with an electrical drivetrain — and profitable some races, apart from — he based Rimac Automobili in 2009, hoping to at some point construct an electrical supercar in his house nation.
Though Rimac the corporate’s first years have been a battle, Mate’s timing turned out to be glorious on reflection, with automakers world wide shifting to impress their fleets.
Rimac’s early prototypes have been spectacular sufficient to draw important investments from Hyundai and Porsche, and it raised one other 500 million euros (or about $534 million) final yr. These served as the muse of what’s now a thriving enterprise consulting to conventional automakers keen to construct high-performance EVs. Aston Martin and Swedish supercar maker Koenigsegg are amongst Rimac’s purchasers, together with quite a few others that the corporate says it could actually’t but disclose.
The Nevera is known as for the fierce summer time storms that roll into Croatia from the Adriatic Sea. (Rimac staff prefer to say that neveras — the storms — are “extraordinarily highly effective and charged by lightning,” similar to their automotive.)
The Nevera (the automotive) serves each as a rolling show of Rimac’s EV experience and because the supercar that Mate Rimac has lengthy dreamed of constructing. It is a four-motor design — one for every wheel — with a 120 kilowatt-hour battery pack, sufficient for about 300 miles of vary underneath regular driving circumstances.
4 motors and a cravat
However there’s nothing regular concerning the Nevera’s energy output. These 4 motors give it a complete of 1,914 horsepower, and a pair of,360 newton-meters of torque — sufficient for a prime pace of 258 miles per hour. Zero to 60 miles per hour takes simply 1.74 seconds, in response to Rimac.
I did not confirm that point with any nice accuracy, however I can attest that such an influence thrust is believable. As pleasant as it’s to drive in visitors, the Nevera is sort of unbelievably fast when absolutely uncorked. But it surely by no means feels uncontrollable, and that is a major engineering achievement.
Much more spectacular, albeit extra delicate, is the way in which these 4 motors work collectively. The automotive’s methods modify every motor’s energy output 100 instances a second to make sure optimum dealing with second to second. Or, put one other method, the Nevera blasts via and out of tight corners with out hesitation. That is a trick that different supercars can solely emulate with braking.
It is an much more spectacular trick given the automotive’s weight, round 5,100 kilos. However as arduous because it may be to consider, that weight is so properly packaged, with the batteries mounted low and near the Nevera’s heart, that it is hardly noticeable. (In fact, the super energy on faucet helps.)
It is a handsome automotive, too, low and radical however not excessive. Civilized. It is well-made, with flawless carbon fiber on the skin and comfy leather-based all through the inside. Croatia would not have a convention of automotive making, however the Nevera does mirror some nationwide satisfaction: Along with the automotive’s identify, the intakes on its sides are styled to resemble a cravat, the ancestor of the fashionable necktie — a Croatian invention relationship to the sixteenth century.
The Nevera begins at 2 million euros, or simply over $2.1 million. If that is in your value vary, converse up quickly. Rimac says it plans to construct simply 150 of them.