Watch this tiny electric race car set a new world record for acceleration: 0-60 in 1.5 seconds

Shawn Knight

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Students from ETH Zurich and Hochschule Luzern, two universities in Sweden, have developed and successfully demonstrated the world’s fastest accelerating electric vehicle.

A video from Academic Motorsports Club Zurich (AMZ) captures the historic albeit anti-climactic moment. Fortunately, the production team did a nice job of building up to the actual run in which the vehicle accelerated from 0 to 60 miles per hour in just 1.513 seconds.

The electric car, dubbed Grimsel, set the record while covering less than 100 feet of track at the Dübendorf air base near Zurich. The previous record of 1.779 seconds was set by a team from the University of Stuttgart last year.

You don’t have to be a car enthusiast to realize that’s ridiculously fast but if you need some convincing, the first few minutes of the entertaining clip should help put it into perspective.

The time is more than half a second faster than the world’s fastest accelerating production car, the hybrid-electric 2014 Porsche 918 Spyder, and nearly a full second faster to 60 than the renowned Bugatti Veyron (and the upcoming Bugatti Chiron). For reference, Tesla’s blistering fast Model S with Ludicrous speed upgrade takes 2.6 seconds to do the same.

Some might be calling foul here as this isn’t a true production car. What’s more, the one-off race car is also incredibly small – hardly bigger than a go-kart. Even still, that’s incredibly fast for anything to reach 60 mph. Job well done!

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"...from ETH Zurich and Hochschule Luzern, two universities in Sweden..."

Whoever wrote this article clearly isn't from Europe. Those universities are both located in Switzerland.

Source: I actually live in Switzerland and study at the ETH in Zurich.
 
I hate video click bait like this. 3 flipping minutes, just to get to the end of the video, "click here to see the results"
BS just for hits.
 
All these Fastest In the World BS articles, what a waste of time...

The last time I saw a real fast car:


which could do 1-100km/h in 1 second flat, back in 2009.

Ty my knowledge, it was beaten later, by some car that could do it in 0.8 second.
 
If we're talking production cars, it doesn't fit in the category. And if you're talking about specialty cars, Top Fuel Dragsters hit over 329 MPH in 3.728 seconds... Estimated to have hit 60 ~ 0.3, 100MPH ~ 0.8 seconds, etc. They jump to 200 MPH in a blink and have to push to get the last bit out.

Electric cars have theoretically infinite torque (what makes you go fast faster or tow) at idle and lose it the faster they go and tons of horsepower (what makes you hit the high speeds faster) when under way. Generally great for drag racing. One company tried to build one but they couldn't keep the axles from snapping under the load (and that's saying a ton considering what these 9kHP rigs today put them through). But the initial jerk of power is just too much and too difficult at the time to reign in (or the motor isn't strong enough to be competitive).

In comparison, modern F1 Racecars do 0-60 in ~ 1.6 seconds. So ya, the title, fastest ever world record, bogus. Fastest specialty vehicle in it's class, maybe but it's still not overly impressive considering.
 
If we're talking production cars, it doesn't fit in the category. And if you're talking about specialty cars, Top Fuel Dragsters hit over 329 MPH in 3.728 seconds... Estimated to have hit 60 ~ 0.3, 100MPH ~ 0.8 seconds, etc. They jump to 200 MPH in a blink and have to push to get the last bit out.

Electric cars have theoretically infinite torque (what makes you go fast faster or tow) at idle and lose it the faster they go and tons of horsepower (what makes you hit the high speeds faster) when under way. Generally great for drag racing. One company tried to build one but they couldn't keep the axles from snapping under the load (and that's saying a ton considering what these 9kHP rigs today put them through). But the initial jerk of power is just too much and too difficult at the time to reign in (or the motor isn't strong enough to be competitive).

In comparison, modern F1 Racecars do 0-60 in ~ 1.6 seconds. So ya, the title, fastest ever world record, bogus. Fastest specialty vehicle in it's class, maybe but it's still not overly impressive considering.
+1. Society's continuous obsession with the most, fastest, best, ad nauseum, is as bad as society's faulty impression that expensive == the best in whatever category.
 
All these Fastest In the World BS articles, what a waste of time...

The last time I saw a real fast car:


which could do 1-100km/h in 1 second flat, back in 2009.

Ty my knowledge, it was beaten later, by some car that could do it in 0.8 second.

Fastest electric car maybe? I don't know but maybe it's fastest in some category.
 
Video is boring and the actual record video linked at the end is much more interesting. The car itself looks fun and would like to try drive one my self.
 
MotoGp motorcycles out accelerate Formula 1 cars and hit higher speeds on the straights, they definitely lose the advantage in the corners tho...big time
 
The article says "the vehicle accelerated from 0 to 60 miles per hour in just 1.513 seconds", but in the video, the commentator says that it "went from 0 to 100 kilometers per hour in 1.513 seconds". 100 kph is approximately 62 mph, so it must have taken even less time to get to 60 mph.

I am wondering if the young blond woman shown in the video was the driver during the record run. She would be lighter than the men, which would be a big help in achieving a lower time.
 
All these Fastest In the World BS articles, what a waste of time...

The last time I saw a real fast car:


which could do 1-100km/h in 1 second flat, back in 2009.

Ty my knowledge, it was beaten later, by some car that could do it in 0.8 second.

Which part of the TITLE did you miss?

Nobody said you had to watchthe damn thing!!
 
"Students from ETH Zurich and Hochschule Luzern, two universities in Sweden, have developed and successfully demonstrated the world’s fastest accelerating electric vehicle."

Which parts of the FIRST PARAGRAPH did the other readers miss?

It says " world’s fastest accelerating electric vehicle."

NOT production car.
NOT gasoline-powered car.
NOT even a "car" for Christ sakes.

It says an "Electric Vehicle." That means anything a person can drive that has one or more wheels powered by electricity.

That's it.

Get over yourselves.
 
Nah, watch this instead:

It's 14 minutes long, but it feels like less than half of the electric car video.

SPOILER ALERT: 74 MPH in 21 Feet 3/10 second

@DrRJP I freely concede that this and the little electric toy compete in different categories. I also concede the electric car likely has much longer service intervals.

Top Fuel Dragster though, is just a whole lot more awesome. In fact, it's exponentially more awesome!

CAUTION:
This next video contains scenes of graphic air pollution. It should not be watched by persons with respiratory conditions, those with any environmental concerns whatsoever, or persons with extreme empathy toward dinosaurs who very obviously died in vain, so many millions of years ago, thereby making this spectacle of gross excess possible

.

Some pertinent facts, which I was unable to check with respect to accuracy:

These 2 trucks, output the same amount of smog as does China, in one day of industrial production.

The drivers are showboating by toggling the afterburners on and off.

The little toy electric car which was the topic of this thread, could absolutely put a hole shot on either one of them. :D
 
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