MALIBU, California – Essentially the most amazing thing in regards to the $2.1 million Rimac Nevera is how easy it’s to just get in and drive.
The Nevera is an electrical hypercar from Croatia. It sits low — very low — to the bottom, and at first glance it looks like the straightforward act of stepping into it may very well be complicated. However the doors, which lift up and out kind of like a Lamborghini’s, cut into the roof simply enough to be sure that I do not bump my head as I drop myself into the driving force’s seat.
Getting underway does take a bit little bit of learning. Gears are shifted with a giant knob to the left of the steering wheel, the ability seat’s adjustments are hidden in a touchscreen, and switches for the turn signals and headlights are mounted directly on the steering wheel. But once you’ve that down, it’s easy to operate.
The entire automotive is like that — easy to operate — its 1,914 horsepower notwithstanding.
Considered one of the primary things I noticed as we got underway is that it’s easy to see out of the Nevera. That is not a given with cars like this. For instance, in Ferraris and Lamborghinis and other low-slung highway rockets, it’s often a challenge to see what’s behind you. But while the Nevera is certainly low slung, there’s simply enough of a rear window to make it easy to drive in highway traffic. Good side mirrors actually help with that.
There’s also simply enough mechanical noise to remind you that you just’re in a hypercar. There will not be an engine, but there are 4 electric motors and so they make mellifluous mechanical sounds because the automotive moves down the road. Not so loud that I could not converse with my passenger, Rimac’s Ryan Lanteigne, in an inexpensive talking voice. It’s just loud enough to remind us that we’re driving in something special.
And the Nevera may be very special indeed — correctly for its just over $2 million asking price. You will see why within the video.
The Rimac story
Rimac — pronounced REE-mahtz, roughly — is Croatia’s first and only automaker. Its 35-year-old founder, Mate (MAH-ta) Rimac, began tinkering with electric vehicles after he blew the engine in an old BMW he raced as an adolescent. After rebuilding it with an electrical drivetrain — and winning some races, besides — he founded Rimac Automobili in 2009, hoping to at some point construct an electrical supercar in his home country.
Although Rimac the corporate’s first years were a struggle, Mate’s timing turned out to be excellent on reflection, with automakers all over the world moving to electrify their fleets.
Rimac’s early prototypes were impressive enough to attract significant investments from Hyundai and Porsche, and it raised one other 500 million euros (or about $534 million) last 12 months. Those served as the inspiration of what’s now a thriving business consulting to traditional automakers eager to construct high-performance EVs. Aston Martin and Swedish supercar maker Koenigsegg are amongst Rimac’s clients, together with a variety of others that the corporate says it could possibly’t yet disclose.
The Nevera is known as for the fierce summer storms that roll into Croatia from the Adriatic Sea. (Rimac employees like to say that neveras — the storms — are “extremely powerful and charged by lightning,” similar to their automotive.)
The Nevera (the automotive) serves each as a rolling display of Rimac’s EV expertise and because the supercar that Mate Rimac has long dreamed of constructing. It is a four-motor design — one for every wheel — with a 120 kilowatt-hour battery pack, enough for about 300 miles of range under normal driving conditions.
4 motors and a cravat
But there’s nothing normal in regards to the Nevera’s power output. Those 4 motors give it a complete of 1,914 horsepower, and a pair of,360 newton-meters of torque — enough for a top speed of 258 miles per hour. Zero to 60 miles per hour takes just 1.74 seconds, according to Rimac.
I didn’t confirm that point with any great accuracy, but I can attest that such an influence thrust is plausible. As friendly because it is to drive in traffic, the Nevera is nearly unbelievably quick when fully uncorked. Nevertheless it never feels uncontrollable, and that is a big engineering achievement.
Much more impressive, albeit more subtle, is the best way those 4 motors work together. The automotive’s systems adjust each motor’s power output 100 times a second to ensure optimum handling moment to moment. Or, put one other way, the Nevera blasts through and out of tight corners without hesitation. That is a trick that other supercars can only emulate with braking.
It’s a fair more impressive trick given the automotive’s weight, around 5,100 kilos. But as hard because it is likely to be to imagine, that weight is so well packaged, with the batteries mounted low and shut to the Nevera’s center, that it’s hardly noticeable. (After all, the tremendous power on tap helps.)
It is a good-looking automotive, too, low and radical but not excessive. Civilized. It’s well-made, with flawless carbon fiber on the surface and comfy leather throughout the inside. Croatia doesn’t have a practice of automotive making, however the Nevera does reflect some national pride: As well as to the automotive’s name, the intakes on its sides are styled to resemble a cravat, the ancestor of the fashionable necktie — a Croatian invention dating to the sixteenth century.
The Nevera starts at 2 million euros, or simply over $2.1 million. If that is in your price range, speak up soon. Rimac says it plans to construct just 150 of them.