- The check automotive is called after three record-setting Renault prototypes from the final century
- Renault claims the largely carbon-fiber prototype weighs lower than 2,204 kilos
- Many of the weight is from an 87-kwh capability battery pack
Renault on Thursday unveiled an idea automotive designed not simply to look fairly on auto present stands, however to check new methods of enhancing electric-vehicle effectivity.
The Renault Filante Document 2025 is a single-seat EV that will probably be utilized in effectivity and vary document makes an attempt later this yr, Renault mentioned in a press launch. First, it will likely be displayed on the Retromobile basic automotive present in Paris, which runs Feb. 5-9, alongside vehicles that impressed it.
Renault has a protracted historical past of record-setting prototypes. The Filante Document 2025 takes its identify from three of them: the Ètoile Filante (French for “taking pictures star”) that set pace information at Utah’s Bonneville Salt Flats within the Nineteen Fifties, and the 40 CV des Data and Nervasport des Data that set varied pace and endurance information within the Nineteen Twenties and Thirties, respectively.
Renault Filante Document 2025
The open-wheel bodywork, spherical headlights, and cab-rearward proportions are retro homages to these historic document vehicles, notably the 40 CV des Data. That is thematically in line with Renault’s present road-car technique which, as demonstrated with the Renault 5 E-Tech hatchback, does not shrink back from retro styling.
The design continues to be wind-tunnel confirmed, Renault claims. The elongated form helps higher management airflow across the physique, and the wheels and suspension elements have full fairings like these of a land-speed document streamliner. The motive force sits in a reclined place just like that of a Components 1 race automotive, with the steering wheel hooked up to the cockpit cover for simpler ingress and egress.
Physique panels are held along with seen screws, a alternative impressed by plane building that helps save weight, in line with Renault. The panels themselves are carbon fiber, whereas the chassis is comprised of a mixture of aluminum, carbon fiber, and metal. Topology optimization—the usage of software program fashions to find out the minimal quantity of fabric wanted in a given space—helped additional cut back weight all the way down to what Renault claims is lower than 2,204 kilos.
Renault Filante Document 2025
The battery pack accounts for 1,322 kilos of that complete. It has the identical 87-kwh capability because the pack within the Renault Scénic E-Tech crossover, however with cell-to-pack tech the automaker claims reduces weight and permits for extra versatile packaging (the pack is positioned ahead within the chassis, underneath the motive force’s toes). Equally, steer-by-wire and brake-by-wire techniques helped designers take advantage of the restricted area within the Filante Document 2025’s cockpit.
Renault did not present a lot element on the powertrain, however mentioned the Filante Document 2025 will roll on specially-designed Michelin tires with a slim design to assist cut back aerodynamic drag and rolling resistance.
As a one-off prototype designed to flee the weight-and-efficiency spiral of present EVs aiming for information, the Filante Document 2025 is analogous in intent to the Mercedes-Benz Imaginative and prescient EQXX idea, which in 2022 managed 746 miles on a single cost on a highway journey from Stuttgart, Germany, to the Silverstone racetrack within the U.Ok.—with sufficient cost leftover for a number of victory laps. However the place the EQXX not less than vaguely resembled a highway automotive, with 4 doorways and a traditional inside, the Filante Document 2025 appears tailor-made for racetracks.
