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Mate Rimac young Croatian inventor created the fastest electric car in the world
The Rimac Concept One is a full electric vehicle and supercar made by a company called Rimac Automobili from Croatia
Proud Mate Rimac, young Croatian enterpreneur, with his sensational supercar - Concept One vehicle.
Nenad Bach and his son Ivo by the Rimac car.
History of the Rimac Automobili Concept One
The Rimac Concept One is a full electric vehicle and supercar made by a company called Rimac Automobili from Croatia. Our local reporter Sašo Malbaša visited the factory for a tour and talked to the person behind the powerful and silent sports car, Mate Rimac – owner of Rimac Automobili.
Let’s start by going back to the time Mate Rimac was graduating from high school. For his final exam he got the task to invent something unique. Other kids in the same year were ťinventingŤ amplifiers, but Mate went a step further and made a glove that could retrofit a computer keyboard. After winning the national award on the inventor’s championship, Mate was sent to Tokyo where he won another prize. He made a side mirror which helped solving the dead angle problem. It was patented and he partially sold the rights to a company in the car industry.
Four years ago, Mate started drifting, and bought a 323i E30 BMW which is known in the world of drifting as a fantastic car to learn your skills. The car had a normal engine at that point, but not for long. Mate took the car for a ride and burned the engine.
So no engine, no car and no drifting. So why not make it electric? He went online, found the instructions and started ordering parts. A team of friends helped him out and they eventually put together what was his first electric car. Along the way Mate realized that the project itself wasn’t so complicated. So he started the development of his own parts and software for the car based on technology that had been implemented into the BMW.
After dismantling the 323i and putting it back together at least five times, he started chasing another dream, a dream alive since his childhood. He chased his dream to become a supercar manufacturer and one of the fastest in the world. The idea was put on paper and Mate visioned his very own supercar; the concept_one.
While completing and constantly improving the BMW, he gained the knowledge to start patenting the concept_one. The renamed BMW e-M3 acted as his basis to fall back on. The final package developed about 600hp on the motor and 550hp on the wheels. The car did 0-100km/h in 3.3sec producing around 900Nm of torque providing a constant push because of the electric motors. It reached a top speed of 280km/h while maintaining a range of about 180-200km. Mate was one of the very few who completed this year’s e-miglia race.
Now that the BMW was done, the next step felt logical. From an idea to a sketch, from a sketch to a car. Mate got friendly with his drawing table and his laptop and started writing a patent for the car. Every single detail was documented, before he even had any investors. After sketching was finshed and the details were worked out, Mate tried to find some investors for his project. Eventually he did and started to manage a team of professionals to help him build the concept_one.
The concept became reality at the 2011 IAA Motor Show. The outside lines are quite strong resembling the historical Ford GT40 sports car from the States. The rear end has a sci-fi theme, where the front resembles Ferrari-styling. The wheels on the car are custom-made specially for the electric car. They include Rimac signs in the middle and Rimac signs on the edge of the rims. The huge brake calipers and disks will cope with the immense braking power. The car has the ability to use brake energy regeneration, which is nothing more than recharging the battery while braking.
The Concepe One is fitted with a camera system featuring seven onboard cameras. The car doesn’t have a back window and cameras instead of mirrors. The production model will have mirrors, because of car safety regulations. The air conditioning, the gauge and the multimedia appliances in the car are digital and specially designed by Rimac Automobili. The interior offers a combination between a soft leather and Alcantara. All the buttons on the dashboard are handmade and specially designed for the concept. The car is built in Croatia. 90 percent of the production process is done in the factory of Rimac Automobili near Zagreb.
Safety? Mate is promising a lot of safety technology inside the car. Since the car has four independent motors on each wheel the car accelerates really quick and can manage its stability control a lot faster and with advanced options. The axles at the front and the back are not connected, which makes it possible to manage every single wheel at the same time.
The car’s power train produces 1,088hp and 3,800Nm of torque. 0-100km/h is done in 2.8 seconds and a top speed of 305km/h is possible. Some of you may wonder why only 305km/h. There is a simple answer, because it’s electronically limited. We also asked Mate and he was quite clear. “It can go 500km/h, but we can’t guarantee the passenger’s safety.”
The car’s range is about 600km. At Rimac Automobili they are developing a technology, which will improve this figure. 600km is a normal driving range, but in race mode the car should be capable of doing at least seven to nine laps on the Nurburgring Nordschleife. This is a total range of only 140 to 180km in race mode.
The price tag of this electric supercar is an astonishing € 750,000. It will be limited to only 88 pieces, and takes about € 5 to refill.
Sveta Nedelja (near Zagreb), October 12th, 2012. – Rimac Automobili is proudly announcing that the Rimac e-M3 has broken several world acceleration records. The records are broken in Category A, Group VIII (electric vehicle), Class 3 (above 1000 kg) according to FIA categorization.
The e-M3 was Rimac Automobili’s first test mule - the car that started all. The founder and CEO Mate Rimac started to convert this car when he was only 19 years old: “I owned an old BMW E30 (MY 1984) which I used for drift and circuit races. At one of these races, the gas engine blew up. Then I decided to try building an EV. After one year or so the car was able to drive but I was not satisfied with the result. It was heavy, not very powerful and the range was very limited. I started to gather a team of experts to develop our own components since I believed that the electric propulsion can give much more compared to what was available on the market. At that time, I already had a very clear vision of my ultimate goal. Today, hard work is making my dream come true.”
Now the “green monster” develops 600 horsepower, 900 Nm of torque, reaches 100 km/h from standstill in 3.3 sec and a top speed of 280 km/h. Five development evolutions have pushed the e-M3 to become the officially fastest accelerating electric vehicle according to strict FIA rules.
The record braking attempt took place on a 2 km long military runway near Zagreb on April the 17th, 2011. Nonetheless, the records couldn’t be published until now. Mr. Rimac explains: “We had to wait over a year for FIA’s official approval to publish the records. But while we were waiting the spirit of inventiveness took us even further, so we made something even faster. Our pre-production car, the Concept_One, can beat the e-M3; by far.”
Such a prolific output is surprising from a company that young, with little previous automotive experience. But still, Rimac Automobili has brought a sparkle in the world of e-mobility and is now breaking prejudice about boring and slow electric vehicles. As a company riddled with innovation at the cutting-edge of electric vehicle technology, Rimac Automobili will bring to all who remain dubious one more surprise – before the end of this year, Rimac Automobili will deliver its first ground-braking vehicle to a customer. Records:
Formated for CROWN by Darko Žubrinić Distributed by www.Croatia.org . This message is intended for Croatian Associations/Institutions and their Friends in Croatia and in the World. The opinions/articles expressed on this list do not reflect personal opinions of the moderator. If the reader of this message is not the intended recipient, please delete or destroy all copies of this communication and please, let us know!
