Automotive News says that Toyota has made an electric sports car model with a clutch and manual gear. Toyota Chairman Akio Toyoda shared the information after he tested the prototype and said he could hear engine sounds inside the car. Lexus, the luxury arm of Toyota, has already tried out a simulated manual. The companies hope that it will make EVs more attractive. All high-performance cars of the future will be electric. This could happen as soon as a few years from now. At the moment, there are no electric cars (EVs) on the market that have a “shift-for-yourself” choice. This isn’t very pleasant for fans who like the extra control that manual transmissions offer. Akio Toyoda, the head of Toyota, recently told Automotive News that the company is working on an electric sports car that could change that. Toyoda told the media that he drove a prototype made by Toyota’s racing company, Gazoo Racing, during last weekend’s 24 Hours of Le Mans. He said, “You have a manual transmission with a clutch, and you can hear engine noise inside the car.” The only thing an electric car doesn’t have is the smell of gas, which is almost impossible to notice. Toyota hasn’t officially shown off its new electric sports car, but it has shown off a model called the Sports EV. Lexus is working on an electric version of its LFA supercar and has already tried a manual transmission that feels like a traditional stick shift. This could add excitement to an electric vehicle. The Lexus UX300e is another example. The carmaker changed it by adding a clutch and what looks like manual gear. Toyoda has run into the same problem with the sample. From what he said about the engine sounds inside the car, it needs to be clarified if they come from the electric motors or a sound meant to sound like an internal combustion engine, like what we heard in Porsche’s 718 Cayman GT4 ePerformance race car. It will be exciting to see whether Toyota can create a fully functional fake manual transmission for an electric vehicle.
