The all-electric Ford Mustang Mach-E 1400 (for 1400hp) has broken cover in an epic smoke show…is it the coolest electric car ever?
Ever since Ford rolled out the electric Mustang Cobra Jet 1400 the world has been waiting for its next electric shock. And here it is, the Mustang Mach-E 1400 which boasts seven electric motors and love of burning rubber…not fuel.
The Mach-E 1400 was a joint development between Ford and RTR and is based on a Mustang Mach-E GT (these will start rolling out to customers by the end of the year). With the Cobra Jet 1400 already under its belt, Ford and RTR were shooting for an output of 1400 horsepower.
“Now is the perfect time to leverage electric technology, learn from it, and apply it to our portfolio,” said Ron Heiser, chief programme engineer, Mustang Mach-E. “Mustang Mach-E is going to be fun to drive, just like every other Mustang before it, but Mustang Mach-E 1400 is completely insane, thanks to the efforts of Ford Performance and RTR.”
It required 10,000 hours to build the Mach-E 1400 with Ford saying it wanted to bridge the gap between what an electric vehicle can do and what customers tend to believe it can do.
“Getting behind the wheel of this car has completely changed my perspective on what power and torque can be,” said Vaughn Gittin Jr., RTR Vehicles founder. “This experience is like nothing you’ve ever imagined, except for maybe a magnetic roller coaster.”
The design of the thing employed techniques Ford Performance usually employs for its race cars, meaning that aerodynamics have been optimised for their shape and location, with a focus on cooling ducts, front splitter, dive planes and rear wing.
Now for the bit we all want to know about…the seven motors. That’s five more the Mustang Mach-E GT runs. Three are attached to the front differential and four are attached to the rear in pancake style, with a single driveshaft connecting them to the differentials, which have a huge range of adjustability to set the car up for everything from drifting to high-speed track racing.
“The challenge was controlling the extreme levels of power provided by the seven motors,” said Mark Rushbrook, motorsports director, Ford Performance. “Mustang Mach-E 1400 is a showcase of the art of the possible with an electric vehicle.”
The idea of the prototype is to allow Ford Performance to test out different layouts and measure the effect on things like energy consumption and performance. And the layout can be tweaked from rear-wheel, to front-wheel or all-wheel drive. Depending on what the team wants to do with the vehicle, for instance drifting or race track work requires swapping out the front ends. For instance, Drift and track setups have completely different control arms and require steering changes to allow for extreme steering angles in drifting. Power delivery can be split evenly between front and rear, or completely to one or the other. Downforce is targeted at more than 1000 kg at 257km/h.
The 56.8-kilowatt-hour battery (installed) is made up of nickel manganese cobalt pouch cells for ultra-high performance and high discharge rate. The battery system is designed to be cooled during charging using a di-electric coolant, decreasing the time needed between runs.
An electronic brake booster is integrated to allow series regenerative braking combined with ABS and stability control to optimise the braking system. Mustang Mach-E 1400 features Brembo brakes, like the Mustang GT4 race car, and a hydraulic handbrake system designed for drifting that integrates with the powertrain controls to enable the ability to shut off power to the rear motors.
The Mustang Mach-E 1400 will make its public debut at an upcoming NASCAR event.
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