My reasons for building electric cars are split into two categories: oil and engineering. We’ll discuss oil first. The two main points here are that oil is running out and our usage and harvesting of it is causing irreparable damage to our planet. I’ll prove it to you.
Hubbert Peak Theory
In 1956, Marion King Hubbert, an American geoscientist, came up with the Peak Oil Production theory. What he figured out was that if you make a graph with time on the X-axis and oil production on the Y-axis, it will look like a bell curve. Oil production started small because we were still developing the techniques for finding and harvesting oil. As
the processes were mastered and the infrastructure built, oil production rose until it peaked in the mid-70’s. It’s no coincidence that the Golden Age of muscle cars was also during the mid-70’s. Oil production then started to decrease as we used up the oil from the high quality, easy to find deposits. In order to keep producing oil, we now have to look harder to find oil deposits of lower quality. More effort and money has to be spent to produce each barrel of oil. From here, the price of oil keeps climbing and supplies keep dwindling until there’s nothing left. US oil production has followed Hubbert’s Theory pretty closely which currently puts us on the back side of the bell curve. That means big companies are starting to go through some pretty ridiculous measures to continue to find oil. Here’s what the future of oil production holds for us all:
Author Archives: Will@FluxAuto
Bugatti Veyron 16.4 Grand Sport Vitesse
Bugatti released this video promoting their latest special edition of the Veyron. This is the Grand Sport Vitesse. “Vitesse” means “Speed” in French. It’s even more powerful than the regular Veyron Grand Sport which only has 1000 hp and it has an open top. The Vitesse’s specs include 1200hp and 1100 ft-lbs of torque which take it to 60 mph in 2.6 seconds and a top speed of 255 mph. Needless to say, it’s the fastest production open top car that the people of Abu Dhabi can buy.
Source: Bugatti YouTube Channel
Brammo Empulse
Electric motorcycle company, Brammo, just released this promotional video for their upcoming superbike, the Empulse. It uses an AC induction motor, exclusive 6 speed transmission and lithium ion batteries for a top speed over 100 mph and a range over 100 miles. The production models start shipping in May. Prices start at $10k for the 6 kwh model to $14k for the top of the line 10 kwh model with the only difference being the battery capacity.
Source: Brammo YouTube Channel
Ducati Streetfighter 848 CAD Drawings
Engineering meets Design in these Computer Aided Design (CAD) drawings of the Ducati Streetfighter 848. Ducati released these images at the US press launch for the bike. Head over to Asphalt and Rubber for the rest of the CAD images and a review of the bike.
Chris Harris Confirms the FT-86’s Awesomeness
If you’re like me, then you’ve been closely following the development of the Toyota FT-86 since the camouflaged development mules were first spotted on the Nurburgring. That’s because Toyota’s official press release for the car claimed that they were going to revisit the sports car heritage responsible for their previous classics like the 2000GT, Supra, Celica Alltrac, AE86 and MR2.
Chris Harris had the opportunity to drive the FT-86 (known as the GT-86 in the UK, Scion FR-S here in the US) for the Drive YouTube Channel. The reason I absolutely love Harris’s reviews is because he doesn’t just say “this car is fast” or “this car handles well” unlike a certain terrible American version of a British car show where 2 of 3 hosts are people who aren’t into cars. He goes so much further in depth to paint a picture for you of exactly what it’s like to be in the driver’s seat and that’s what car reviews should be. His review of the FT-86 demolished all of my doubts about the development of the car. Toyota and Subaru have done it. They made a fun, driver focused rear wheel drive car for the masses. It’s going to be awesome.
Source: Drive YouTube Channel

