An Engine Defines a Car—So What Happens in the EV Future?

EZRA DYER
Updated

From the July 2016 issue

An engine defines a car. Corvettes are synonymous with the pushrod V-8. You know a Subaru WRX is approaching before you even see it, because it sounds like a small aircraft about to make a crash landing. It’s hard to imagine a Porsche 911 without a flat-six, or a mid-engined V-8 Ferrari without a flat-plane wail. Would a Dodge Viper without a V-10 sound as sweet? Probably. The Viper sounds like someone kicked a steel trash can down a flight of stairs. But at least it sounds like something, which is more than I can say for electric motors.

Like Robinson, I am flummoxed by the electric-vehicle future. I mean, my job is to describe cars. (And to dress like the Statue of Liberty and stand at intersections to promote tax-preparation services, but that’s just a seasonal gig.) And EVs all drive and sound the same. Internal combustion is a teeming ecosystem populated by strange and wonderful creatures, platypuses and aardvarks and titmice, while electric propulsion is a guy named Fred. Sometimes he takes steroids and gets all jacked up, sometimes he’s out of shape, but he’s always Fred. He’s pleasant enough to hang out with, but after your 534th day with him, you’re gonna long for the excitement of a koala-bear attack. In this example, the koala is a 1.8-liter Mazda MX-3 V-6.

1991 Mazda MX-3 V-6

I’ve helmed a wide array of electric vehicles, and they all hew to a certain theme. I drove a Balqon electric bus in L.A. It was slow, and when I hit the throttle it went “ScreeeHrrmmm.” I drove Toyota’s electric Pikes Peak racer. It was fast, and when I hit the throttle it went “ScreeeHrrmmm.” The Tesla Model S P90D rearranges a driver’s internal organs while going “Screee- Hrrmmm.” I’ve even ridden a 45-mph ­electric recumbent tricycle called the Outrider 422 Alpha. Guess what it sounds like.

Back in the primitive world of chooga-chooga boom-boom engines, it would have been unthinkable that a recumbent bike would ex- hibit the same basic powertrain characteristics as an open-class Pikes Peak racer or a 30-passenger bus. But that’s the reality of electric motors. Oh, you’ve got a new electric car? Let’s see, does it make maximum torque at zero rpm? It does? I just guessed that, somehow. I must be clairvoyant! Let’s go to the horse track. I’ve got a real good feeling about that mare with the equine scoliosis.

Your electric car probably also has a one-speed transmission. Save the Manuals? How about save the gearboxes? Because transmissions are another category of diversity set to be snuffed out by the EV.

I love getting into a manual Camaro and toggling the wheel paddles to activate rev-matched downshifts. I love teeing up a launch-control clutch dump in a PDK Porsche. I love climbing out of a car with a CVT and spending the next hour complaining about CVTs, right until my therapist cuts me off and asks if I’m still eating glue.

Left: 2016 Nissan Leaf. Right: 2016 Tesla Model X.

Transmissions, like internal-combustion engines, lend themselves to a wide variety of approaches that help define a car’s personality. You’ve got your torque converters and your wet clutches and your eight-speeds and your nine-speeds and your other speeds, your manuals and autos and automated manuals. On a manual Mustang, your shift knob could be a cue ball or a skull or a piece of driftwood engraved with the Code of Hammurabi. Ever seen the shifter on a Focus Electric? I can’t think of what it looks like right now, but it’s probably nothing cool like a skull.

At this point you’re probably thinking I’m an EV hater, one of those people who confidently declares: “You know, building a Nissan Leaf causes more pollution than burning 2 million acres of rain forest. I read that somewhere.” On the contrary, I covet an electric car. A Tesla or a Chevy Bolt would answer my needs quite wonderfully. As a precursor to eventual EV ownership, I installed a 7.4-kW photovoltaic solar array on my house. By my math, my rooftop power station produces enough juice to cover about 3000 miles of electric driving per month. And I find it fascinating that we’ve reached this technological turning point where I can go run 11-second quarter-miles in a family car powered by sunlight. (Presuming that the family car has “P90D” in its name.)

So that’s my dilemma. On the one hand, I see the glorious future, where my transportation is quick and silent and requires no tar sands, refineries, or emissions equipment. On the other hand, I daydream of wicked Hellcat burnouts and breathy McLaren boost-dumps and chirping the tires on the 1-2 shift in a manual Honda Accord coupe. All of that goes away when the world goes electric. How do you define your car’s identity when you no longer have cylinder count, engine layout, fuel selection, forced induction, or transmission type? Elon Musk is evidently already thinking about this, or he wouldn’t have put gullwing doors on a minivan.

I don’t have the answer, but I sure hope the car companies do. By now, they know how to make electric cars. I just hope they learn how to make them interesting.