[Thuanvinhny]

I remember the time in the 90th, the Japanese were all crazy about Twin Turbos Technology...remember those good time ? not too far back.

Supra TT
300ZX TT
RX7 TT
3000GT VR4 TT
.
.

There were more, but those are the name I could recall. People was so shocked at the technologies, yet the performance number is clearly stated on the paper. Resulted in a slow sale of some of these cars....until the present days, everyone started to get back into the Turbo again.

C-AMG Turbo 4 ?
Evo Turbo 4
STI Turbo 4
Audi Turbo 4

Most of all....ECO engine from Ford...gonna even be on the Mustang.

Yet, the Japanese are all Crazed about the Hybrid now....started off with the Prius...a Turtle Box, yet so Efficient, that was Sold so well every where on the planet...first of the Kind, ofcourse.

Now look into those Racing Team

Ferrari La-Ferrari
Mc-Larren P1
Porsche

Even Hybrid Racing Events...

Wutever....they are all crazed for Hybrid....and those cars are BEASTS. While all of those are in the low million to multi-millions dollar, the Japanese are trying to bring back the Affordable-Performance of New Technologies that was Once Stirred up by themselve

Rumors has it that Toyota is gonna have Supra-Hybrid...also Turbo in the line up....GT-R will be a high-performance Hybrid.....Lancer Evo Hybrid....etc.

The best we are seeing now on the Street is....Q50-Hybrid-Sport...or the Japanese call them "Sky Line" If you remember the "SkyLine" Herritage, you will know that they are very Mods friendly.

If anyone is in the business of Modifying Hybrid system....and EV-battery, Motors...you will probably have a lot of Sponsors, and even make Huge Success in the Pattented After Market for the Hybrid soon.

This Hybrid Technology will be here to stay...even Hydrogen vehicles are still Hybrid.

 

[Thuanvinhny]

Therefore, my next question would be, who are looking into modding the Hybrid system from the Q50s ?

Because 360 HP is a HUGE number.....Supra Twin Turbo was only making 300 HP, but after modding, it could be 500+ or even MORE.

How about the Q50S ? Increase the efficiency of the Hybrid system and improve charging and the battery Pack will likely result in Better MPG and also Low-end Torque, which helps with the Acceleration....may even be possible to bring 0-60 down to the sub 4 seconds?

 

[InfinitiPlusOne]

I agree. Hybrid are here to stay especially now they tune it more for performance than gas saving. I don't think I will go back to the gasser now that I got spoiled by my Q50S Hybrid. The acceleration, power and fuel economy just put a smile on my face every time I drive my car. My next car is either a hybrid or a Tesla.

 

[hunter81]

I love my hybrid. Fingers crossed that the Eau Rouge is revealed to be a forced induction hybrid. If it's going to be 500+ hp with 600+ torque I don't see how they could accomplish that relative torque number without it being hybrid.

 

[erasat]

I agree. Hybrid are here to stay especially now they tune it more for performance than gas saving. I don't think I will go back to the gasser now that I got spoiled by my Q50S Hybrid. The acceleration, power and fuel economy just put a smile on my face every time I drive my car. My next car is either a hybrid or a Tesla.

There is no way I can go back to a gasser now, I've been saying that to my best friend since I got the car back in November and filled the tank just twice in 30 days. With that fuel economy and the power I get in the process I can't even think of owning a regular gas car right now.

 

[Klamalama]

I wonder what will be the equivalent of nitrous oxide, in a hybrid.

 

[Thuanvinhny]

I wonder what will be the equivalent of nitrous oxide, in a hybrid.

A surge in power from the electrical motor system will result in a quicker deplete of the battery, and heat intensively. When heated up, it would damage the system, or the ECU will protect it, and prevent it from happening.

Like the Hybrid in 50 hybrid. The more you floor it, the slower it will get, due to this protection.

So Nitrous in this case will be the equivalent of a quick cool system. Which will allow the system overworked themselves and keep on being cooled for longer period of time.

Once may think of an air conditioned system for the motor and batter, or a quick freeze of real NO2 themselves.

 

[afrosheen]

One big drawback with any hybrid: long term costs. The battery replacements are guesstimated at $4k and up. Nobody knows how electric motors will stand up over a decade or more. Then there are legacy replacement issues. Battery technology is starting to upgrade quickly with breakthroughs just around the corner. This will lead to a parts shortage for certain current hybrids in the near future.

Ignoring that, hybrid tech and smaller, turbocharged engines are the future due to fuel economy. I wonder if Mazda's skunkworks team has a hybrid rotary engine in an underground lab.

 

[Klamalama]

One big drawback with any hybrid: long term costs. The battery replacements are guesstimated at $4k and up. Nobody knows how electric motors will stand up over a decade or more. Then there are legacy replacement issues. Battery technology is starting to upgrade quickly with breakthroughs just around the corner. This will lead to a parts shortage for certain current hybrids in the near future.

Ignoring that, hybrid tech and smaller, turbocharged engines are the future due to fuel economy. I wonder if Mazda's skunkworks team has a hybrid rotary engine in an underground lab.

According to my reading, hybrid battery replacement is rare, even in the 12 year old Prius cars. Recent tests on NY hybrid taxis, with well over 200k miles, show little drop off in performance.

 

[Thuanvinhny]

According to my reading, hybrid battery replacement is rare, even in the 12 year old Prius cars. Recent tests on NY hybrid taxis, with well over 200k miles, show little drop off in performance.

That is correct, according to recent Fed regulations, hybrid have to have 100,000 miles warranties or 10 years, whichever come first.

Beside, if you upgrade the battery, your vehicle will charge and discharge more efficiently, which is the same as saying a new hybrid will be more efficient than older model.

Electric motor is actually less complicated, and easier to replace than turbos. The most important would be connectors, and coils. Connector would likely to be the first to give out, as it will constantly be in friction, but with modern design, they are reletively cheap to replace.

All in all, electric is cheaper to maintain than gasoline alone. But neither one could be as efficient as hybrid.

 

[Q50Fan]

I wonder what will be the equivalent of nitrous oxide, in a hybrid.

Probably even better, it's instant and won't have you worrying about blowing up your engine.

But I wonder if there are any downsides to tuning the electric part of it to get more power, wouldn't want to over work it and have it fail, then cost thousands to fix

 

[InfinitiPlusOne]

Actually, it's 100K miles or 8 years on most states. On certain states (such as CA), it's 150K or 10 years. By the time I reached 150K, the gas saving I had on my hybrid already paid off the initial cost of the hybrid + replacement of the battery and extra $$$ pay for my car insurance.

Let's do some hypothetical calculation:
At 150K miles, I can get at least 50K EV miles.
Say I average 30mpg.
50,000 / 30 = 1667 gallons saving
Gas average say $4 per gallon
1667 * 4 = $6667 saving in gas

My hybrid cost about $1800 more than the gasser (when fully loaded).
Let say the replacement battery 10 years later is about $3000 (probably much less by 10 years later)
So, $6667 - $1800 - $3000 = $1867 extra $$$ to spend

That is correct, according to recent Fed regulations, hybrid have to have 100,000 miles warranties or 10 years, whichever come first.

.

 

[erasat]

In my case the math is even easier, our government is reimbursing 50% of the Car Taxes, and believe me, that alone is huge, for all Luxury cars it is between 18-30%. My car paid $10,000 of taxes alone. So back to the Math, they reimbursed me $5,000 already, the gasser would have paid the same $10,000, so that alone saved me $5K.

PLUS, I've been saving at least $120 a month on gas, for my previous 2 cars, G37 and M37S, I was filling the tank once a week, $60 each time, now I just go to the Gas Station twice a month, Full $120 saving a month.

So in a summary, in 10 years I'm saving:

$120/month X 120 months = $14,400
Initial Saving on Car Taxes = $5,000
Total=$19,400

$19,400 - 2,500 (Gasser price difference) = 16,900
$16,900 - 3000 (Estimated Battery Replacement Cost) = $13,900 Net saving

Alternate calculations using InfinitiPlusOne same method but with my average of 13,000 miles a year and as of now after almost 4 months averaging 45% EV miles but will use only 40% just to be conservative and averaging 32MPG:

13,000 X 10 X .40 = 52,000 EV miles
52,000/32 (MPG) = 1625 gallons saving
1625 X $4 (Avg. Gal Price) = $6,500

6,500 + 5000 (Tax Reimbursed) - 2,500 (gasser Difference) - 3,000 (Battery Replacment Cost) = $6,000

Math is perfect, and as you can see both methods shows a huge difference, so far I can tell you that method 1 for me has been 100% correct, I will need to wait for a full year to see if it holds up all year long and not just for the first 4 months.

Anyway, even in worst case scenario, method 2, $6,000 of savings is a LOT of money, PLUS, driving around with 32 more ponnies and the huge torque difference is a blessing on it's own.

 

[Team_STILLEN]

I believe Hybrids will definitely be the route for a lot of performance cars now and in the future. Upgraded electric motors seem like it would be a logical performance upgrade in the future just like bigger turbos. Not sure how much research has been done in this area but it should be exciting to see how the industry deals with performance hybrids