Article | Joey

On November 23rd, 2020, Porsche accomplished an unprecedented continuous drifting challenge in electric vehicle history with the pure-electric vehicle Taycan at the Porsche Center in Hockenheimring, Germany.

In that venue, Taycan with a length of 4.96 meters and rear-wheel drive drifted 42.2 kilometers (210 laps) at an average speed of 46 km/h within 55 minutes, and finally ran out of electric power. From that moment, a new Guinness World Record was officially born.

If in the era of gasoline cars, Porsche’s attempts and challenges with performance as brand labels had almost nothing to do with Chinese automakers and Chinese consumers.

After all, Chinese automakers at that time were still limited by the development and manufacturing levels of the three major components and still regarded fuel economy, ease of use, and high reliability as their top priorities for developing new car models. However, this goal may need to be adjusted now.

Just last night, IM Motors played a pre-recorded video of the launch online. In the video, in addition to the official launch of their long-awaited L7 model, IM Motors completed a drifting challenge like Taycan.

At the Tianma Mountain racetrack in Shanghai, IM L7 achieved 258 laps of drifting within 66 minutes, successfully drifted a distance of 43.646 kilometers, and broke the record for “the longest distance of electric vehicles drifting on wet roads.”

Many people may think that such surpassing significance only exists in the marketing level and as proof of Guinness World Records. After all, almost no one would buy a car to play drifting in either the era of gasoline cars or electric cars.

But in my opinion, such changes mean that Chinese car brands are beginning to dare to challenge old car brands. In the past, if Chinese automakers challenged European and American car brands, the challenges tended to lean towards the dispute between pure-electric and internal combustion engine forms of energy or focused on the more advanced intelligent driving assistance and human-computer interaction levels.

But, as IM L7 has done, daring to confront European and American old car brands directly in the field of electric vehicles, and even gaining the advantage, was almost nonexistent in the past.

If we used to describe the rise of China’s auto industry as taking the winding road to overtake, now, as IM’s co-CEO Liu Tao says, it’s “overtaking on the straightaway.”

The System Relies on Straight-Line Overtaking

The question we’re discussing now is: where does IM’s confidence in “overtaking on the straightaway” come from?

In fact, the performance of the L7 has been established since it was in the R&D phase, but at that time, the performance of IM’s L7 was only at the data level. For example, we only knew about its ultra-low 0.21Cd drag coefficient, 0-100km/h acceleration time under 3 seconds, chassis tuning by the Williams Advanced Engineering team, as well as technical points such as four-wheel drive, four-wheel steering, and the “Snake Move” resulting from them.

But when it comes to actual racing, there may be some differences. After all, paper specifications and data are different from the actual driving experience.

This is why at the L7’s launch event, almost the entire scene was concentrated on Tianma Mountain racetrack. What IM wants to do is to allow not only the guests attending the press conference but also real users to truly see, touch, and drive this performance-oriented L7 model, and showcase it to potential users watching the live broadcast.

The performance exhibited by IM L7 is not just on paper. For example, its ground clearance is really lower than that of the BMW 5 Series, with a height of only 490mm. However, achieving such a body height requires tremendous effort. After all, thinner batteries are not something anyone can possess. It requires a strong system and supply chain strength to support it.

In this regard, IM’s solution is to build a horizontal battery cell. Making the battery “lie down” will undoubtedly reduce the thickness of the battery pack, but it will also lead to a reduction in battery life (after all, the chassis space is limited). At this point, what IM needs to do is to increase the density of the battery. According to IM, the CTLC range of the L7 can reach 615km.

Obviously, for the current electric cars with ranges of up to 700 or even over a thousand kilometers, this achievement is nothing. However, in achieving a balance between sufficient range and a lower body height, while delivering a better performance experience, IM has done everything it can.Meanwhile, in the field of power, the GWM Smart EV L7 is equipped with the direct waterfall oil-cooled electric motor with the highest power in the industry. The advantage of this motor is not only bringing more than twice the power of fuel-powered cars of the same level (maximum power of 425kW and maximum torque of 725N-m), but more importantly, it can provide the best heat dissipation effect for the motor.

How important is this heat dissipation effect?

We know that the difference between pure EVs and traditional energy vehicles in power output lies mainly in the absence of a gearbox, which means the power output is more direct. At the motor end, the motor can work at maximum power from when the “accelerator” is pressed. But the potential problem is that once the motor overheats during intense driving, efficiency loss will occur (for every 10 degrees Celsius increase in motor temperature, the copper resistance will increase by 4%), resulting in a decrease in power.

However, the direct waterfall oil-cooled electric motor used by the GWM Smart EV L7 can stabilize the motor to output at maximum power for a longer time by cooling it down. It is precisely because of this that the GWM Smart EV L7 can accomplish the drift challenge at the launch event in the best condition.

Obviously, these technical points may seem like small details, but they can intuitively demonstrate the strong manufacturing system of GWM Smart and its policy of not overlooking any potential performance-affecting aspect. Therefore, it is the stacking of these small details that makes GWM Smart dare to call its car the “New World Leading Performance Luxury Car”.

However, in my opinion, the appearance of the GWM Smart EV L7 is challenging not only the ceiling of vehicle performance in the era of electric mobility.

The change in landscape starts with pricing

How much should luxury electric cars cost in China? It is still an unsettled issue.

On this point, GWM Smart has given its own answer, a price of 500,000-800,000 RMB. The second car will not be priced lower than this, which, together with the seemingly good sales in segmented markets, seemingly indicates that Chinese auto brands have the possibility to enter high-end and quality markets by relying on “technological luxury”. However, obviously, GWM Smart does not think so.

Undoubtedly, GWM Smart intended to take the high-end, technological, and luxury route from the start. This can be seen from their initial emphasis on promoting high-quality leather, luxury wood decorations, DLP+ISC headlights, and the intelligent driving assistance technology for urban roads that requires no intervention for up to 40 minutes.

However, they didn’t take these things as a reliance on a higher-end route. At last night’s launch event, the IM L7 not only maintained the Pro version’s 408,800 yuan price, but also introduced a lower-priced version, the Dynamic version, which costs only 368,800 yuan. This means eliminating a series of configurations such as DLP+ISC headlights, induction intelligent car doors, and luxury wood decorations and focusing on a performance-oriented model.

Obviously, if people used to speculate what the “smart era car” that IM claimed should look like, what it should be. Then today, the IM L7 Dynamic version tells us that at least at this stage, they believe that driving control and performance are what it should be.

More importantly, the pricing of this model completely subverted people’s previous speculations. If at the actual performance level, IM wants to target Porsche’s Taycan, which is known for driving control, and BMW’s 5 Series. But in terms of pricing, it played a dislocation competition strategy.

This type of dislocation competition is that it can be compared with the 5 Series in terms of length and the ground clearance, and with Taycan in terms of rear-wheel steering angle, acceleration time, and the persistence of drifting. But in terms of price, it invades the price range of the mid-range of the 3 Series to the low-end of the X3 (including the C-Class and GLC, as well as the A4L and Q5L).

This gives users a completely new space for choice. If Gaohe plays the role of raising the tone and setting the brand and product positioning. Then IM chooses the scientific and engineering male’s route: directly entering the most fiercely competitive market and striving for possible success with strong strength.

Obviously, for IM, what a smart-era car should look like should first be bought by more people before it has any meaning. Whether the arrival of the L7 can truly change the pattern of the electric vehicle market, I hold cautious optimism. I am also looking forward to the market performance of NIO ET7.

The official launch of the L7 will undoubtedly bring many meaningful reference points for more pure electric vehicle manufacturers in their car building ideas regarding driving control. In the future, I believe that IM’s engineers will not only let the flagship satisfy driving control. This also makes more changes for IM L7 and subsequent products more exciting, such as smart technology and fashionable configurations.“`

Challenge will come, but so will opportunities. Therefore, for Zhi Ji and its L7, “passing on the straight” is the best solution, because as long as you run fast enough, you can win more opportunities in the future.
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This article is a translation by ChatGPT of a Chinese report from 42HOW. If you have any questions about it, please email bd@42how.com.