Tesla’s latest competition in the glamour electric vehicle stakes doesn’t come from some hyper-cool start-up, faceless Chinese conglomerate, or even vacuum cleaner salesman James Dyson.
Rather, it comes from a Russian armament company. Scratch that: probably the most famous Russian armament company and inventor of the AK-47 automatic rifle, Kalashnikov.
Cue quips about their CV-1 prototype being bulletproof, etc.
It’s no joke, regardless of how improbable a corporate about-turn it may seem. Like Spalding sports goods announcing a new line of baby formula.
Kalashnikov unveiled the CV-1 at that epicentre of early-adopter, sustainable tech showcases, Russia’s Army 2018 International Military Technical Forum at the Kubinka Tank Museum, Moscow.
From the front, the Kalashnikov CV-1 looks like some sort of retro-futuristic 1970s Buck Rogers take on a prototype Ford Cortina MkII station wagon. From the back, it’s 1975 Renault 16 all the way, with a touch of Farina-era BMC. Suffice to say, the CV-1 looks like a total throwback.
Product specifics are rather scant, but Kalashnikov says the concept is based on the boxy Soviet-era IZH-21252 “Kombi”.
The company claims the EV is good for a 350km electric range, replenishable from a charging port at the rear.
The 220kW electric motor enables the car to shoot (sorry) from zero to 100km/h in six seconds.
More Trabant than Tesla, the CV-1 was on show at the military expo with no other information available about Kalashnikov’s hopes for a sideline in electric vehicles.
Mid-engine is the new black
The mid-engined Chevrolet Corvette has possibly had the automotive world’s longest gestation period. It won’t be available until 2020, but spy photos and excitable headlines have been saturating (mainly US) automotive media news feeds since 1987. Okay, maybe not. But it feels like that long.
The mid-engined thing might however, be catching ...
This week saw the British motoring press announcing that when Jaguar Land Rover replaces the F-Type coupe and cabrio, the Coventry carmaker will “embrace hybrid technology and go mid-engined”.
Not that this will happen any time soon. The F-Type is, frankly, still far too much fun – and too new – to replace. It has only been with us for five years. Its predecessor, the XK, was around for 18 years (and looked ancient after about six), so the F-Type has a fair distance left to run yet.
We know this because any mid-engined Jag – which may or may not end up being called the J-Type – wouldn’t appear until 2022, according to the British press.
If the move to mid-engined architecture were to happen, it would be the second time in the marque’s lengthy history that a model has been laid out as such. The first was the rather rare XJ220 supercar of the 1990s.
Oh, and no General Motors, Jaguar isn’t that interested in the mid-engined Corvette as a target; it is allegedly using the Honda NSX to benchmark against (with that hybrid-engine tech in mind).
At the rate the Chevrolet is going through its final development phase, the Jaguar J-Type might beat it to sale anyway ...
Mazda (modified) for fun
So, you’re a factory test driver for exclusive low-volume hypercars. You’ve got the weekend off and you’re keen to spend some time having fun on a challenging race track. What do you drive?
If you’re Koenigsegg’s in-house wheelman, Robert Serwanski, the answer – rather improbably – is an 11-year-old Mazda MX-5.
Okay, there’s probably a bit of context required here. Aside from helming the world’s most expensive sports cars around test tracks in the name of edge-of-dynamic-envelope exploration, Serwanski also likes to race in privateer championships.
Most recently he was a competitor in the Swedish Mazda MX-5 Cup. Bitten by the budget-friendly roadster bug, he has taken his 2007 NC-era MX-5 to the Nurburgring in search of slow-speed lap glory.
Well, maybe not slow speed at all. We should point out that Serwanski’s MX-5 is far from stock. He says his diminutive track star is equipped with 245/40/17 track tyres, an opened-up intake and exhaust, remapped ECU, coil-overs with higher rate springs, an after-market front anti-roll bar (the rear bar has been removed), six-piston front brakes, a front lip and rear spoiler, a carbon-fibre hard-top, lightweight clutch and flywheel and a larger radiator.
And interestingly, Serwanski has also pulled out the roadster’s standard six-speed manual gearbox and replaced it with a close-ratio five-speeder instead.
The engine’s rev limit has been raised to 8000rpm to eliminate unnecessary shifts.
Serwanski recently set a new PB lap at Nurburgring: 7min 37 sec. It’s on YouTube.