Hasta La Gadget!

The Porsche 356 Speedster and Porche 550 Spyder are some of the most iconic sports cars of all time, minimalist design and racing pedigree making their mark — and of course James Dean losing his life in a Spyder certainly helped it to gain some notoriety. Restored models go for hundreds of thousands of dollars, but the one you’re looking at above goes for much less. It’s a replica made by California company Euromasters, and it’s all-electric. Specs on that plus the Spyder replica are identical, including 120hp motors, top speed of over 100mph, a range of over 200 miles, and 0 – 60 in a very brisk 5.6 seconds — almost four seconds faster than an original road-going 356. The Speedster was unveiled at the LA Auto Show late last year and both it and the Spyder are now up for order. $49,900 if you want the Speedster, another $5,000 if you want the James Dean Edition Spyder. Just be careful if you get one: we doubt these Little Bastards are much safer in a crash than the originals.

Euromasters electric classic Porsche replicas let you be a rebel without a gas tank originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 06 Feb 2011 15:07:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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If you’re still waiting on your Nissan Leaf pre-order slip to bear fruit, you’re not alone. But, know that you might be able to finally go and rent one of the things — if you live in Japan (or have the appropriate international drivers license and willingness to travel). Nissan just delivered 190 of the hotly-desired hatches to rental companies across its home country and, while Hertz is planning to offer the things up around these parts, we don’t see any available for reservations yet. There are some lovely mid-sized alternatives available, though, if you don’t mind white paint, Velour interiors, and gas-powered engines.

Nissan delivers 190 Leaf EVs to rental companies in Japan, pre-orderers still get none originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 04 Feb 2011 15:07:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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We’re no strangers to Zigbee around these parts, using the various Alliance-certified devices to monitor our power usage and let our refrigerators talk to our washing machines. Soon our cars might be able to get in on that little conversation with the Zigbee Alliance and SAE International starting to work together. SAE develops standards and certifications in the automotive industry (amongst many others) and it embracing Zigbee Smart Energy means that we should see many more auto manufacturers adopting this tech to enable their cars to talk to the grid straight through their plugs. They’ll be able to do things like provide charging status updates and to pull down utility pricing information, ensuring your ride charges when rates are lowest. Many current and most upcoming electric cars can do this sort of thing, but they rely on wireless data connectivity to do so. Zigbee would eliminate that. No word on which manufacturers will jump on first, but given the pull the SAE has we think many will.

Continue reading SAE and Zigbee team up to make plug-in cars charge smarter

SAE and Zigbee team up to make plug-in cars charge smarter originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 03 Feb 2011 16:23:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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A new player has entered the electric motorcycle game, joining the likes of Brammo’s Empulse but doing it with rather more… unconventional styling. It’s the Agility Global Saietta, an all-electric sports bike that will come in two flavors: the 50 mile range Saietta S and the 100 mile Saietta R. The former of the two will be quicker than the first, getting to 60 in under four seconds, whereas R riders will have to wait another tick of the stopwatch due to extra battery weight. Naturally that extra range and speed will cost you: £9,975 for the S and £13,975 for the R, figures that equate to roughly $16,200 and $22,650. Hefty sums, both, but nobody said being on the cutting edge of the humpbacked sport bike trend was going to be cheap. We weren’t given any specific horsepower or weight figures, but we’re told the power to weight ratio is 675hp per ton. You can make your own guesses about weight to try and get a firm power figure, but it certainly should be peppy enough.

At this point we don’t know much about the bikes themselves beyond what you can see in the photos, which show a trellis frame cradling a sizeable battery pack. The swingarm is a combination of machined parts and pipes, rear suspension elevated to make room for the electric motor sitting just above the pivot point. Front suspension also shows an unconventional design, offset steering linkage and a single damper eschewing the traditional fork design found on your average (non-BMW) motorcycle. These images are, of course, just renders, but the bike has just made its word debut at the MCN London Motorcycle Show and we’ll be bringing you some actual pictures as soon as we get them. As to when those who order the bikes will get theirs, we’re told shipments begin in April.

Update: We have some pictures from the Saietta launch at MCN. Real, honest to gosh photos, these.

Update 2: We’re told it’s actually the lighter S that’s quicker to 60, not the R, despite what the PR says below.

Continue reading Agility Saietta unveiled, the decidedly unconventional electric sports bike

Agility Saietta unveiled, the decidedly unconventional electric sports bike originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 03 Feb 2011 05:45:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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The Chevy Volt and Nissan Leaf are alike in a lot of ways: both rely on electric motors for their locomotion, both have earned Car of the Year awards (Volt in North America, Leaf in Europe), and both have had stunningly low sales in their first couple of months on sale. January’s numbers have just come out and the Volt leads the way with 321 vehicles sold or leased, while Nissan scores an even weaker 87 purchases. That compares to figures of 326 and 19, respectively, for the month of December. Before we all start writing off the EV as DOA (again), let’s remember that both companies have massive back-orders for their electrified people carriers, leading us to believe that the most likely cause for this slow trickle of deliveries is a limited supply rather than dwindling demand. Production volumes of the Volt and Leaf are expected to ramp up as we go forward, so panic’s inadvisable — unless we come around to January 2012 and are still looking at fewer sales than the Joojoo managed.

408 Chevrolet Volts and Nissan Leafs sold in US during January, limited supply probably to blame originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 02 Feb 2011 08:10:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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