Gordon Murray is the man behind possibly the greatest car ever, the McLaren F1. Since then, he’s continued designing cars that currently culminate with the T50 and T33 supercars made by his own company GMA.
In between, he developed one vehicle called the Light Car Company Rocket. Designed to focus entirely on saving weight and being fast, the little car had a 1,000 cc Yamaha engine and weighed just 850 pounds.
All of that experience makes him perhaps the perfect man to do what seems impossible these days; build a lightweight electric vehicle for the masses. Now, the United Kingdom has provided him with exactly £11,493,235 reasons to do it.
That funding is part of an £88 million innovation fund from the Advanced Propulsion Centre UK with 46 projects selected as recipients. Gordon Murray Group (GMG) submitted an application focused on developing a monocoque architecture with the name M-LightEn. That appears to be a combination of the words monocoque, lightweight, and energy as all three are mentioned in the grant.
Specifically, the APC says the money will go toward “Developing a production-ready, ultra-lightweight, low CO2, monocoque architecture and solutions for a portfolio of class-leading future vehicles.” No doubt, dropping the overall weight of a vehicle significantly almost always has a substantially positive effect on performance (both the fun kind and the fuel efficiency kind). [Ed Note: At least, in stop-and-go driving conditions. Aerodynamics dominate the efficiency equation at higher speeds. -DT].
Right now, the lightest EV on sale is the lowly Fiat 500e, with a claimed curb weight of just under 3,000 pounds. The MINI Cooper SE evidently weighs around 3,100 pounds. [Ed Note: A 2019 BMW i3 BEV, which is significantly larger and has a larger battery than either of those cars, weighs just under 3000 pounds. -DT]. That doesn’t sound too bad but those two do well to go 100 miles between charges. The Nissan Leaf tips the scales at around 3,600 pounds (one rider’s weight within that of an E39 BMW 5-Series) and it has just over 200 miles of range.
As EV manufactures strive to achieve higher range estimates, they mostly go with one main strategy: A bigger battery, which, of course, adds a lot of weight, which tends to require up-sizing certain components, which adds weight, which reduces range, which yields more battery size — it’s a vicious cycle. In the case of the GMC Hummer EV, it only manages to have a range of a little over 300 miles while needing a battery that weighs (by itself mind you) 2,923 pounds.
Again, if anyone can build a lightweight EV, it’s Gordon Murray, so it’s really interesting to consider what he might cook up here. According to Autocar, whatever it is, GMA might end up using it on more than just EVs, too.
GMG business director Jean-Philippe Launberg told the publication that the goal with M-LightEn is “to make cars significantly more energy-efficient to build and run, contributing to the UK’s decarbonisation. Furthermore, the extra lightweighting we will unlock through M-Lighten directly enhances the already legendary dynamics of our cars. It’s driving perfection taken to the next level.”
Murray has already designed a few light city cars including one from several years ago called the Motiv. It was basically an urban people mover with a range of around 60 miles and a top speed of just 40 mph.
In 2021, Gordon Murray Electronics came to life with the purpose of designing “the world’s lightest, most efficient and advanced EVs [electric vehicles].” Since then it’s been folded into the Gordon Murray Group, but the mission doesn’t appear to have changed. During that announcement, the team made clear that it was still working on a lightweight EV. Surely, this new influx of cash can aid in bringing that vehicle or one like it closer to production.
GMG isn’t the only big name in transportation getting funding from the UK government, either. Jaguar Land Rover received £6,341,420 to develop a UK supply chain that will produce high-volume lightweight, composite technologies for the auto industry.
Ford received £8,439,514 for a project it’s calling E-Steel which focuses on e-sheet stamping and lamination. According to S&P Global:
Electrical steel, or silicon steel, is an iron-silicon alloy that possesses superior magnetic properties to other types of steel alloys making it optimized for a variety of electrical machines ranging from power and distribution transformers to electric motors.
UK-based Magtec is working on next-gen electric drivelines for electric trucks destined to work for the Royal Mail. Triumph Motorcycles is getting funding to develop a second-gen electric motorcycle platform, and Intelligent Energy is going to work on a 200 kW+ fuel cell system for heavy-duty trucks.
All of this appears to be an all-hands-on-deck approach to electrifying more than just a few cars here and there. At the end of the day, though, what I’m most excited to see is what Gordon Murray comes up with. If it’s half as brilliant as his best creations, we could see a car that makes the most of even a small, relatively clean-to-manufacture battery. And that’s what hte world needs.
The world needs another Mini. Not the Minis that Mini makes nowadays, but a new equivalent of the classic Mini, which was both cheap, small, and efficient enough for everyone to afford and drive, and also stylish and fun enough that wealthy celebrities and racing drivers bought them as fashion accessories and cheap race cars.
Now, if anyone can make a near-Mini-sized modern EV that’s actually fun to drive and charming as well, it’s probably Gordon Murray Automotive.
How many Minions can this hold?
Asking for a friend.
Good to see uk government throwing some seed money at future tech. They’ve lost so much of their indiginous auto manufacturing sector, maybe the offspring of these initiatives will spin off into companies and local industry.
This is all well and good, and I love the idea of a lightweight and aerodynamic EV.
However, I’m a weirdo who comments on a somewhat niche car website.
The “normal” people don’t buy small lightweight cars because it’s seen as being cheap. They go out and buy the ginormous SUVs despite the costs so that they can project a certain image of status.
I want this car to take off, but it won’t because people – on the whole -are impractical and only care about perceived wealth.
Counterpoint: Toyota has sold at least six million(I can’t find an up to date number) Prii, and it definitely wasn’t to project an image of wealth. A lot of it may have been to project an image of “greenness”, a lot of it was based on the idea that it would be very cheap to run.
That’s nice, but it was also so expensive that hardly anyone bought them. I guess the i3 is evidence that it’s technically possible to build lighter EVs, but that the tradeoffs aren’t worth it to the general public.
Yeah, a full carbon tub is a non starter for any mass market car
Going back further, GM had the T25 and T27 (25 being gasoline, 27 being electric) that, IIRC, had also had the entire manufacturing rethought to go with it. It had F1-like seating for 3 and a forward hinging section acting as a door.
He also designed a utilitarian truck, the Ox, for developing countries. It was flat-pack to minimise shipping costs and could be assembled quickly once it reached its destination
https://www.carsguide.com.au/car-news/gordon-murray-designs-worlds-first-flat-pack-truck-global-vehicle-trust-ox-45835
Like the T25 and T27 it seems to have disappeared without trace. A shame, because it’s really clever.
BYD seagull supposedly is in the 2600-2700 lb range depending on battery size, so that might be the one to beat.
I think in the old Sunraycer/EV1 days I read about how battery technology needed to improve and how if you add more batteries you need to add more power and it becomes this snowball effect, and that’s why the EV1 was aluminum and thermoplastic. Similar to how David mentioned his i3’s carbon fiber body.
As lithium started being used that kind of got put by the wayside as you could have range and power, weight be damned. Even the Chevy Bolt was over 3500 lbs, about 700 lbs more than the Sonic it’s based on. It’s body panels are aluminum but it’s still steel underneath, and the EUV has steel panels.
I’m wondering what a modern EV1 would do with the better batteries, 400 miles of range on a 60Kwh pack?
Makes you wonder why VW didn’t do an update of the XL1 as an EV.
Nowhere for a reasonably packaged battery to go, I think.
The funny thing about EVs is that due to aerodynamics being such a focus in the design department, they have tons of room to gain in efficiency from rolling resistance losses, which is purely a function of the tires (that topic gets messy), weight and actually speed. A lower rolling resistance tire compound can make a profound, even double digit mileage difference in the range of an EV, even with like-for-like widths.
Now I’d have to dig back through notes from college to find the exact formulas and notes on percentage values, but part of the issue so many EVs are running in to from legacy automakers is chasing range by just piling on battery capacity until the desired range number gets hit, especially with luxury products where price is less critical. If I get bored this weekend I may add a comment after with some findings.
As was alluded to, the Hummer EV, and every other GM EV Truck, are absolute pathetic jokes of engineering when it comes to efficiency. Yes they were GM’s technological moonshot, as many people I spoke to on the project would tell me. What was clear was that the Hummer EV was purely used for technology advancement, to create EV platform tech that can be applied better to the rest of Ultium platform cars going forward. Development timelines were shorter than usual, goals were higher, and objectives gave no damns about efficient design. As a project and vehicle, it is truly the functional opposite to everything Gordon Murray Automotive does.
The world looking in at the Hummer EV is solidly in the view of of America being America: “make it big”. Yet, functionally, much of what GM learnt on the Hummer EVs could have been easily applied to a Bolt, or Volt.
But where are the headlines if you don’t make the Canyonero?
IIRC, the Michelin Primacy (sp?) tires were developed for Prius. Ironically, they were also speced for the ToyoBru. They gave the sporty car an early breakaway the kinda limited how fast the driver would crash when he ran out of talent and luck at the same time.
This makes me wonder how interesting it would be to have tire-based racing series, where the rules are basically a free for all but you all have to use the same low rolling resistance economy tires.
There are going to be two ways to do this. Seeing that we don’t have the first and most preferential way – higher energy density power storage – we have to do it the other way. I think this will produce some interesting engineering and manufacturing, It will also produce short lived (if at all) and ugly little cars that don’t appeal to actual buyers. In order to hit mass appeal (and make a dent in emissions) you need to give people a reason to be excited to switch. If GM can make an affordable car that is light enough and efficient enough that you can use less batteries for comparable range to ICE AND make it as useful and pretty as its conventional counterparts…then we may see something.
It doesn’t need to be pretty to be successful. Hell, I’ve got a Kia Soul, a car that the first time I saw one as a rental I thought “that’s the ugliest car I’ve ever seen.”. But it turns out to be very well executed for usability and price, and they’re fairly popular. (Yeah, there’s the ignition lock issue, but it was almost a decade before anybody noticed.)
I hope this actually leads to an actual production vehicle. Gordon Murray is a true genius, but the issue in recent years seems to be convincing manufacturers to take on his non-supercar projects.
Supercars are the only place where his signature blend of function and form coalesce into something desirable. His city cars are designed with the exact same blend, but because the function is so skewed towards efficiency, the form that follows is…unappealing.
Well, people are willing to make compromises for speed and performance because those cars aren’t meant to be livable every day. Making compromises on the livability of a car meant to be used near daily for “normal” purposes makes the whole entire car a huge compromise.
Heck, the McLaren F1 seems like it has fewer compromises when it comes to daily-driveability than some of his city car designs.
Part of the genius of Gordon Murray is understanding what people want. In reality, these city car concepts are not even remotely close to what actual consumers want, but are exactly what investors and judges/panels for these sorts of contests are looking for. The niche of vaporware city car EV pod nonsense is more established than it has any right to be. I think of them as the automotive equivalent of NFTs, where there’s alleged demand and usefulness and value in them, “we just need more investment to get them there we promise!”
Murray is able to put his spin on them in a way that is easy to call interesting and fresh, it gets his company exposure and investment that lets him work on what he actually cares about. With any luck, this EV monocoque chassis is the project he wants to build, and we’ll get the benefit of a lightweight and efficient EV with the GM touch on it.
Of course they don’t sell, they don’t make them. How can you buy one if they don’t make it?