We miss you so much, Saab. The beloved company’s downfall is well-known, and the company’s optimistic predictions of a comeback under the name National Electric Vehicle Sweden (often shortened to NEVS) have almost completely disappeared. On the other hand, NEVS recently made news when it said it was closing its product development section and showed off Emily, its final design for an electric car. Emily has been here before. In December 2019, Xu Jiayin, the chairman and billionaire founder of the company that owns NEVS, Evergrande Group, gave the NEVS team a sketch and told them to make a plan showing the benefits of in-wheel “or hub-mounted” motors. And they had only eight to ten months to get going. The small group of ex-Saab engineers got to work right away, ready to put ideas they had been thinking about for more than a decade into action. The designers and engineers made a car that looks a lot like a Saab, which is strange, and ahead of its time. The engine was made by Protean Electric, a British company that makes car parts. Emily was made with Protean’s electric-drive systems in mind. These systems combine the motor, electronics, wheel bearings, brakes, and other factors into a hub-mounted base. The tech company made an in-wheel motor system that can fit inside an 18-inch wheel and has 121 horsepower and 1,100 pound-feet of torque. Have you got anything more substantial? The good news is you can get more speed from a giant wheel. Even though the car was fast, Emily aimed to have less power on the road. The regular vehicle could go from 0 to 60 miles per hour in 4.3 seconds and had a total output of 484 horsepower. Emily’s car’s rumoured prototype speed version had 653 horsepower and could go from 0 to 60 mph in 3 seconds. Each hub motor is about 80 pounds, so the whole thing weighs about 320 pounds. In comparison, the front and back conventional drive units of a Tesla Model S each weigh 200 pounds, and the rear unit weighs 290 pounds. This means that the show and traditional drive units weigh 55% more than the hub motor setup, which doesn’t include axles or other equipment. In-wheel motors were looked at by more than just NEVS. Lordstown Motors, a startup that no longer exists, used a hub-motor setup for their Endurance car and got similar benefits. This is also what Rivian did with its R1T and R1S cars. The technology goes back more than a hundred years, to when Ferdinand Porsche was young and even further back. NEVS designers also consider putting three rows of seats in a car. This became possible when an inboard motor and axles were taken out of the way. Aerodynamics was also better because the roof was lower, and the car was lighter and used less energy. Now that we’re talking about energy use, it’s an excellent time to discuss how far Emily can go on a single charge: 621 miles. Reaching 1,000 kilometres is a significant obstacle to getting past. Mercedes-Benz said that its EQXX concept would get an equal amount from a significant automaker last year, even though NEVS had built Emily three years earlier. You might be wondering how NEVS gave its brand-new car so much range. The answer is in the battery’s size and how well it works. Emily can store a total of 175 kWh of energy that can be used. Swedish experts did this. Engineers could do this without changing the length of the vehicle’s wheelbase or its general height. Because of in-wheel motors, inboard electric motors that are usually on the floor may now be able to hold more batteries. A battery pack with 39 kilowatt-hours of power is put in place of the rear drive unit. With a standard floor-mounted bag, Emily’s total capacity increases to 175 kWh, enough energy to drive 621 kilometres on a single charge. There are some problems with making batteries hold more power. The most important thing is weight. Even though we don’t know how much the car or its battery pack weighs, it’s likely, not light. The new 4680-cell battery pack in the Tesla Model Y, made in Texas, can hold about 70 kWh of power. It weighs about 1,200 pounds or 17 pounds per kWh. According to the same calculations, Emily’s bag might have been nearly 3,000 pounds heavy, but this is just a rough guess. Also, heavier cars are less efficient and put more stress on the parts that move. The second bad thing about bigger batteries is that they cost more. The price of each of these cells goes up quickly. According to predictions by the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the price per kWh in 2022 will be around $153, which means Emily’s battery pack could cost more than $26,700. Whether NEVS planned to use a smaller battery pack for the EV needs to be clarified. Even though the company’s future could have been more apparent and active for a long time, the Emily team worked hard because they cared about what they were doing. They made this low, comprehensive, and very sporty electric vehicle (EV) with a solid Scandinavian style to look like a Saab if it was still being made today. The principal designer in charge of Emily’s exterior, Hirash Razaghim, said on Facebook, “We put a lot of heart and effort into the Emily EV, but Evergrande killed our dream.” “Even though the deadline was very short, everyone did their best, and the result was good.” It’s too bad it’s been kept secret for the past two years. With the closing of NEW’s production unit, the Saab dream has died again. The company went into “hibernation” earlier this year by firing 95% of its employees and turning off the lights at its Trollhattan manufacturing centre. Emily might be used to make another car someday, but it’s also possible that it was Saab’s last goodbye from beyond the grave.
