back to article Veteran F1 designer readies 'affordable' sportster

Early in 2008, former McLaren and Jordan F1 designer Jim Dowle announced that his company, JJAD, would make a bespoke two-door sports car called the P1. It has now been announced that it will be an electric sports car, so consider our ears officially pricked up. JJAD P1-E Jim Dowle's P1-E: 0-60 in 2.9s Called the P1-E, the …

COMMENTS

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  1. Lionel Baden
    Thumb Down

    if its electric

    Why did the dumbass Designer/artist put a exhaust on it ???

    and why did nobody notice

  2. Arnold Lieberman
    Alert

    If it is electrically powered

    Why does it have what appear to be two elongated exhaust pipes under the rear bumper?

  3. amanfromMars Silver badge
    Paris Hilton

    Lovely Jubbly

    Lovely Jubbly

    By amanfromMars

    Posted Monday 26th January 2009 16:31 GMT

    Where's the dotted line?

    Wow .... Short and Sweet and Standard IC Key. Real Sticky.

  4. Andy

    in case ....

    they dump the batteries and go hydrogen fuel cell... ?

  5. Drew
    Thumb Down

    Front end overbite :(

    ...looks like the pumpkin my kids cut out for Halloween last year.

  6. Ian Davies
    Stop

    Re. dumb-ass comments about exhausts

    The car originally announced in 2008 was actually the Project 001, a car that will be powered by a regular 4-cylinder combustion engine, hence the exhausts. This is about the P1-E, the electric version, although the Reg doesn't stray far enough from regurgitating the press release to include this important difference.

    It shouldn't have been too much of struggle to work out that the visuals were from the original.

  7. Anonymous Coward
    Stop

    Mousey?

    The side shot kinda reminds me of those gray mice Dell ships with their boring dull gray boxes...

  8. Tony
    Flame

    Exhausts...

    Do electric motors get hot...?

  9. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    rehash

    Exhaust pipes might be some sort of heat gas system still useful for electric battery sytems. However, more likely is that this is a rehash of a car http://www.themotorreport.com.au/3815/ex-mclaren-designer-to-build-mid-engined-exige-challenger/ (same photo, note) he was building last year which was petrol powered and 35k

  10. Mike Flugennock
    Thumb Up

    Whee-hah. Suh-weet.

    All other issues aside, that's got to be the slickest _looking_ goddamn' thing I've seen so far. Still, am I the only one here who sees a vague resemblance to the cars in 'THX 1138' (ie. the only decent picture Lucas ever made)?

    So where's the interior shots? Is the instrument panel more of a plain, elegant form following function, or is it 'Tokyo By Night' (as some German engineers nicknamed the Nissan 300ZX instruments when it came out).

    Re: tail exhaust pipes, I think that might just be due to tradition more than anything. It probably didn't "look right" without them. Or, perhaps they could actually be oil-slick dispensers for the James Bond Limited Edition.

  11. Geoff May

    What do electric cars dream of?

    Inquiring minds and all ...

    Mine's the one with the solar-powered battery charger

  12. The BigYin
    Thumb Down

    Eh?

    Affordable my Aunt Tilda! Get that price down to £10k and then we'll talk.

    Other than that - ugly than an ugly thing from planet ugly that has been soundly beaten with a very heavy ugly stick.

  13. Bad Beaver

    Exhausts

    - look nice

    - could also be handy when it comes to implementing some fake engine sound contraption

  14. Paul Dewey

    To all exhaust posters......

    Surely the following statement indicates it will have lecky and petrol ?

    "We decided it was time to create an affordable electric sports car that combined the advantages of conventionally-engined machines with those of electric ones

  15. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Did anyone think that...

    ...the exhausts might be left on purely for show? This won't be the first time a vehicle has a component that looks like it should be there and yet serves no purpose...

  16. P. Lee
    Thumb Up

    Its about time...

    ... that someone produced a cheap electric car.

    OK, it isn't cheap, but £/mph-wise its good value.

    I really want one... but without air-conditioning it would be no use here in Oz. :(

    I fear electric cars with aircon are a no-go.

  17. Anonymous Coward
    Thumb Down

    Fugly

    Most cars don't turn out looking like the concept vehicle that spawned them. I do hope that trend continues in this case.

  18. Greg

    @Geoff

    Running over electric sheep?

  19. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Paper.

    It's just a piece of frigging paper.

    Here's my super mega car:-

    _/o--o/-

    It'll do 0-60 in 0.5 secs and over 2000mph travelling well over 3000miles if you just talk to it nicely.

    At a mind bogglingly good price tag of only 23pence.

    >Time... that someone produced a cheap electric car.

    G-Whiz? Looks like a POS drives like a POS because it's got real electric bits in and it's cheap.

  20. Roger Heathcote
    Stop

    I hope these things...

    ...make a bit of noise! 130MPH without a roaring engine to alert people sounds extremely dangerous to pedestrians and cyclists alike. No doubt the Clarkesons of the word will relish the bloodbath but pity the rest of us in London who'll have to dodge with the city boys who end up driving these things. Maybe we should bring back the 4mph / fella with a flag rule?

  21. Pete James

    Another dreamer

    It's disappointing to read such a load of old guff. The original concept - which was being bandied about 12 months ago I think - was about 200Kg lighter and the projected price was lower by about £20,000 as well.

    Styling was done by - Alejandro Loya Iturralde. Even for a very so-so stylist this is not something to be proud of; a one-trick pony with the clumsy, Bugatti homage, massing of the bodywork around the rear wheels (a common theme in his uninspired work) and a lumpy, contrived effort all round. Seeing as Dowle has decided to - conveniently - embrace the electric idea he could also take the opportunity to ditch the now completely irrelevant styling and come up with something better. And a lot more original.

    Dowle worked under the legendary Gordon Murray. Sadly it would appear he didn't appear to actually learn anything.

  22. TeeCee Gold badge
    Boffin

    @P. Lee

    No worries. Airco pump with built in 'leccy motor works just fine. As used in the Prius and other such where the IC engine doesn't run all the time and also in installations where fitting a pump into the engine bay and driving it off the engine is impractical (many mid-engined vehicles).

    Likewise, power steering combined motor/pump units were quite common in mid / rear engine configurations. These have been generally superseded by "pure" electrically assisted racks in recent years though.

  23. Steven Jones

    Justg another one for the virtual toybox

    Clearly all you need to get something published on this site is a guy with some drafting skills to produce a pretty image of a sexy car, put together some half-credible technical data on some piece of automotive vapourware and you get a write-up where you can almost see the saliva dripping off the text.

    Only if the claims are so unbeleivable as to be a gross embarrasment to the laws of physics is there any attempt at any real analysis.

  24. Scott Mckenzie

    £50 says...

    ... it looks nothing like that when produced.

  25. Robin
    Happy

    @Roger Heathcote re. noise

    Yes, otherwise the Top Gear of the future would be somewhat less shouty.

    Clarkson: "Just listen to that r... errr ... I mean...."

    p.s. Where do you go cycling where cars are driving at 130mph?

  26. david
    Stop

    what I want to know is

    How has the wight been kept so low if Lotus partnered Tesla cant do it with 389 bhp and 230 mile range. This seems to perform miricles in comparison... on paper at least.

  27. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    @P. Lee

    "OK, it isn't cheap, but £/mph-wise its good value"

    £55,000 for 130mph good value? Eh? There are plenty of cars on the market that will do 130mph for one hell of a lot less than fifty-five grand. It's a step in the right direction for sure, but it isn't good value. Better value than a Tesla, yes, but then there is very little on the road today that isn't better value than a Tesla.

    And as for the whole emissions issue. The green electricity brigade have bandied about a figure of 860g of CO2 per unit of sparks, apply that to a full charge at claimed ranged for the Tesla and you get about 250g of CO2 per mile. Not particularly low emissions is it? Will this one be better.

  28. David Foster
    Coat

    130mph

    Is that it?

  29. Arclight

    They aren't exhausts

    They're USB ports for recharging it.

  30. The elephant in the room
    Thumb Up

    Looks fantastic but...

    ...doubt it will be as cheap as 55k if it ever gets made; which is still a lot more money than a Mazda MX5, which I'd take as the benchmark of an "affordable sportster" .

  31. TeeCee Gold badge
    Joke

    @Arclight.

    Magic! All I need now is a PC that has a power supply capable of chucking out a few thousand amps on the 5V rail and I'm in business.

  32. Danny
    Paris Hilton

    hmm

    More vapourware to laugh at when it doesnt come out. Or comes out with a quadrupled price tag, lower specs and worthless drive.

  33. ArfinGreebly
    Go

    Tron Car?

    I've seen that car somewhere . . . oh, yeah, Tron.

    On the lighter side, if you spent the dosh on a reasonable (gasp!) gas-drinker rig, the remainder from £55k would pay for somewhere between 60k and 100k miles worth of petrol.

    I'm reminded of people who spend £10k upgrading the windows in their homes to "save money" on heating and cooling. Las time I worked the maths, the "savings" takes about ten years to realize.

    "Here, buy this car! Over the life of the car, you'll almost save enough on petrol to have afforded it!"

  34. Iain

    @Pete James

    Funny you should mention Gordon Murray. The T25 is sounding an awful lot more important in the real world than this thing. Looks like an old (i.e. REAL) Mini, apparently handles that well, too.

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