The maker of the Seal and the Dolphin produces a car that can actually swim
ILLYA VERPRAET
TESTED 13.3.24, GOODWOOD MOTOR CIRCUIT ON SALE NOW (CHINA)
Don’t you hate it when you take a wrong turn on the way to the office and end up in a lake?
Clothes are ruined, the car’s wrecked, and people fishing get cross. Well, the Yangwang U8 is here to help, because it can float for 30 minutes and even motor itself out by spinning the wheels. Allegedly.
A Yangwhatnow? Yangwang is the prestige brand of BYD, and although there are no official plans to sell it in the UK yet, the firm’s executives are strongly considering it, and the fact that they’re showing the U8 to a bunch of UK journalists does say something.
Yangwang isn’t pronounced the way you might expect it to be, by the way. The ‘ang’ bits sound more like the ‘aww’ you might say to a cute kitten. Still, if you ask representatives whether they will actually call it that if it comes to Europe, the reaction varies from “we’re thinking about it” to “probably not”. It means something along the lines of ‘to look up at the stars’, but I don’t think they are particularly attached to the name, given the brand was only launched a year ago in China.
The U8 is not a cute kitten, looking more like a cross between a Land Rover Defender and the Kia EV9’s evil twin. What it is instead is a collection of all the gimmicks your heart could possibly desire.
Aside from being semi-amphibious (the U8 does it in emergencies only and needs to be checked over by a workshop after any swim), it can do tank turns, has active hydraulic suspension and its armrest cubby can be set to temperatures of between 60deg C and -5deg C.
The actual mechanical specification is quite impressive. It’s a ladder-chassis off-roader with a 295bhp electric motor for each wheel and approach, departure and breakover angles that are close to an Ineos Grenadier’s. It’s not a pure EV but a range-extender plug-in hybrid, because with a shape like that, a weight like that (around 3500kg) and four motors drawing power, it would need an enormous battery to have any kind of usable range. Instead, it has a 49kWh battery (similar to that in the BYD Dolphin), with a 2.0-litre turbocharged petrol engine powering a generator. On the Chinese economy cycle, it has a 112-mile electric range and will do somewhere between 20 and 30mpg.
Inside, it’s a cut above normal BYDs. This is the best the company has to offer. So rather than the usual imitation leather, t
