http://www.completekitcar.co.uk September 2019 51The whole car has been conceived to make
the most of the energy it consumes. It’s
based, very obviously, on the MEV Exocet
which usually takes its mechanicals from a
Mazda MX-5. For the Electrocet, Stuart
made the base chassis as light as possible.
You barely notice, but it’s lower and shorter
than standard and, because it’s not needed,
the transmission tunnel is deleted. Stuart
has also ditched the MX-5’s subframes in
favour of fabricated tubular steel items, and
made his own wishbones. Skinny 5J wheels
running on eco tyres reduce not only weight
but also rolling resistance.
The Mazda steering rack is still there, but
the power assistance has been removed in a
bid to shed pounds. The donor differential
and driveshafts remain, and the wheelbase
has been lengthened by using offside upper
wishbone on the nearside and vice versa.
This allows more space for the motor, which
connects directly to the diff. The diff itself is
a 4:1 ratio, which is the perfect match for the
motor spinning at 5000rpm.
And the electrics? It has 34 cells of
lithium ion manganese where the engineconsumes. That may initially sound like a
difficult equation to get your head around,
but what it does is give you a figure that
makes it easy to compare the efficiency
of one EV against another – rather than
just asking how far it will go on a single
charge. Where a Tesla Model S 90D
consumes 200Wh/mile, Stuart claims the
Electrocet uses just 80Wh/mile.
Of course, there aren’t many areas in
which the Model S and Electrocet are
comparible. One is a luxury saloon, the
other an basic open sports car – you
wouldn’t compare a Jaguar XJ with a
Caterham Seven. But it does illustrate the
point that, whether you’re discussing ICE
and EV, light weight is key to efficiency.
To return to the question of range,
the Electrocet can cover 100 miles on a
single charge. That’s because Stuart’s daily
commute is 16 miles, so he can go to and
from work for a week and charge the
car on Friday night. To achieve a greater
range, the car would need more batteries...
which would increase the weight and
make it less efficient. At least some of the mechanical parts are familiar!Instruments and switchgear are fairly basic.Battery pack where the engine would usually be.Mid-mounted motor directly drives the Mazda MX-5 differential.048 MEV Electrocet.indd 51 01/08/2019 4:13 pm