Photo: APMA
With new electric car startups launching left right and center it’s easy to think becoming an EV automaker is a piece of cake these days. Perhaps this is why Canada’s Automotive Parts Manufacturers’ Association (APMA) has launched Project Arrow to bring a new EV on the market.
The United States brought the automobile to the modern era and continues to innovate today with fresh carmakers like Tesla, Rivian, and Lucid, but that doesn’t mean Canadians don’t have a thriving automotive industry. Well, it turns out this industry needs suppliers, and those suppliers just figured out they make enough parts to build entire automobiles. Even electric ones, as APMA’s Project Arrow tries to prove.
The association has devised a plan to offer an electric SUV built entirely using Canadian resources, including the battery, and it already has the Canadian government backing for the project. The adventure started in 2020 with phase one, a design competition to draw the lines of their first electric car. After completing the engineering specifications and supplier request for proposal (RFP) phase last year, the project has entered now the third phase, with the unveiling of the virtual concept.
In an interview with Automotive News Canada, APMA’s CTO Fraser Dunn has revealed that the future Canadian SUV will sit between Tesla’s Model X and Model Y in terms of size. It will also employ some very creative engineering solutions, inspired by the best in the industry. For instance, the Project Arrow SUV will be made up of eight mega-stampings that are laser-welded together. Just like the Tesla Model Y, it will have magnesium mega-casting for the front and rear frames.
Looking through the design drawings, we’re not sure the sliding doors will make it into production. But then again, neither Model X’s falcon doors were thought to and they did anyway. The car’s projected price is anywhere between $40,000 and $60,000, with a production run of up to 60,000 units per annum.
The Canadians are proud to dismiss the Asian battery manufacturers and employ local VoltaXplore, a joint venture between Martinrea International and Montreal-based graphene firm NanoXplore Inc. According to Dunn, Project Arrow also targets autonomous driving with at least Level 3 autonomy.
The next phase of the project will be a concept car next December, with a public display at CES in 2023. We’re more than curious to see how the Canadians will sort out all the problems startups face on the road to a production car. If ever.
The association has devised a plan to offer an electric SUV built entirely using Canadian resources, including the battery, and it already has the Canadian government backing for the project. The adventure started in 2020 with phase one, a design competition to draw the lines of their first electric car. After completing the engineering specifications and supplier request for proposal (RFP) phase last year, the project has entered now the third phase, with the unveiling of the virtual concept.
In an interview with Automotive News Canada, APMA’s CTO Fraser Dunn has revealed that the future Canadian SUV will sit between Tesla’s Model X and Model Y in terms of size. It will also employ some very creative engineering solutions, inspired by the best in the industry. For instance, the Project Arrow SUV will be made up of eight mega-stampings that are laser-welded together. Just like the Tesla Model Y, it will have magnesium mega-casting for the front and rear frames.
Looking through the design drawings, we’re not sure the sliding doors will make it into production. But then again, neither Model X’s falcon doors were thought to and they did anyway. The car’s projected price is anywhere between $40,000 and $60,000, with a production run of up to 60,000 units per annum.
The Canadians are proud to dismiss the Asian battery manufacturers and employ local VoltaXplore, a joint venture between Martinrea International and Montreal-based graphene firm NanoXplore Inc. According to Dunn, Project Arrow also targets autonomous driving with at least Level 3 autonomy.
The next phase of the project will be a concept car next December, with a public display at CES in 2023. We’re more than curious to see how the Canadians will sort out all the problems startups face on the road to a production car. If ever.
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