UNDER THE SKIN
UNTIL NOW, FUEL CELL EVs have primarily been about sustainability – unlike battery EVs, of which there are plenty of ultra-rapid examples. It will be a while yet before mainstream hydrogen cars appear in significant numbers, but UK engineering firm WAE Technologies is ahead of the game with its 575bhp EVRh.
Revealed at the Cenex Low Carbon Vehicle show recently, the EVRh is a high-performance car architecture designed to show off FCEVs’ capabilities.
Fuel cells are good at delivering a steady flow of electrical power but not so good at delivering the sudden bursts of power needed for acceleration. For that reason, FCEVs have a buffer battery to power their motors, which is kept topped up by the fuel cell stack. The EVRh is a parallel hybrid, so both the battery and the fuel cell stack can feed power directly to the motors via a controller.
WAE calls the power unit an ‘FCEV battery pack’ as a nod to its integrated design. The best way to think of it is as a hydrogen-electric engine, only without any moving parts. The power unit and hydrogen tanks are mounted centrally in the car to give it a low centre of gravity and even front-to-rear weight distribution.
The EVRh is a lightweight composite structure with a rigid central tub, capable of supporting track-only or road-going roadster, Targa and fixed-roof coupé bodies; and a rear-wheel-drive or four-wheel-drive layout, with a choice of motor configurations.
The liquid-cooled ‘power unit’ can supply a maximum 430kW (577bhp) of energy to the motors, with the fuel cell providing 120kW of charge power.
The whole package weighs less than 1900kg and can accelerate to 62mph in less than 2.5sec. WAE estimates the car is capable of turning in a Nürburgring lap time of under
