8.26.2011

Volvo C30 Electric plug into show


t least four plug-in battery cars will be at the show, with Mitsubishi headlining its baby $49,000 iMiEV again, Nissan going public in Australia with its Leaf, and Renault racing to airfreight its new Fluence Z.E. from France for its first public appearance since a down under sales confirmation.But it's Volvo which is adding the impact - literally - with its C30 Electric.The car for the show is the survivor of the first public crash test involving a production-ready battery-powered car. It was hit with a 40-per cent offset-frontal impact at 64km/h, one of the toughest crashes anywhere in the world, to highlight the work done by Volvo to protect its safety-first reputation as the world moves towards electric cars.there was no deformation of the battery pack, no severing of crucial cables and computers, and no leakage of battery fluids during or after the impact.Our tests show it is vital to separate the batteries from the electric car's crumple zones to make it as safe as a conventional carpresident of Volvo Cars, Stefan Jacoby.The results of the crash test were no surprise at Volvo, which has already moved on from the single-frontal test with development of its C30 Electric."The test produced exactly the results we expected. The C30 Electric offers the very same high safety level as a C30 with a combustion engine. The front deformed and distributed the crash energy as we expected. Both the batteries and the cables that are part of the electric system remained entirely intact after the collision,Ivarsson, senior safety manager at Volvo in Sweden.While the crash-survivor C30 Electric stars for Volvo at the show, the company also has its V60 plug-in hybrid for display and is also previewing a new go-faster car to put some variety into its display. The newcomer is the S60 T6 R Design, which is coming to Australian showrooms in limited numbers from August.Volvo Australia is still finalising details, including the price, but promises a car that's been tweaked by its Polestar motorsport partner to produce 242 kiloWatts and 470 Newton-metres of torque, enough to slash the sedan's sprint to 100km/h to around 5.8 seconds. It also has unique wheels, some new trim pieces, and a high-performance Heico exhaust
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