Photo: Audi
The Audi RS Q e-tron isn't just a remix of the company's Extreme-E off-road racer. No, it's a totally different animal with all-new technology. Most of that tech is centered around the battery which will likely have to hold its own from the start to the finish of every stage at the 2022 Dakar Rally.
In Extreme E or even Formula E racing, there are a lot of known quantities. Teams know exactly how long the car will have to go before they need a charge or a new battery. At the Dakar Rally, no such knowledge exists.
Every stage at the Dakar is unknown until just before the start when roadbooks are handed out to teams. That's when they finally know where they're going and what sort of terrain they'll be up against that day. That's presented as an intense challenge to Audi with their all-electric RS Q e-tron.
“With our drive configuration in the RS Q e-tron, Audi is a pioneer in the Dakar Rally,” says Lukas Folie, the high-voltage battery engineer. “Defining the challenges for this type of competition was very demanding. There are simply no empirical values in motorsport for such a concept and for this type of endurance competition.”
To handle the challenge, Audi has basically planned to never charge the RS Q e-tron during the stages themselves. Instead, they're relying on technology to both manage power output during the day and to regenerate as much energy as it possibly can on the road.
They're allowed a maximum output of 288kWh but only allowed to provide up to 220kWh of charge to the battery so they will adjust power levels based on the terrain each day. Then, they'll recover all that they can with regenerative braking. That's the same sort of tech on many hybrid cars today, just much more extreme.
The race begins on January 2nd, so we don't have to wait long to find out how successful this strategy will be for Audi.
Every stage at the Dakar is unknown until just before the start when roadbooks are handed out to teams. That's when they finally know where they're going and what sort of terrain they'll be up against that day. That's presented as an intense challenge to Audi with their all-electric RS Q e-tron.
“With our drive configuration in the RS Q e-tron, Audi is a pioneer in the Dakar Rally,” says Lukas Folie, the high-voltage battery engineer. “Defining the challenges for this type of competition was very demanding. There are simply no empirical values in motorsport for such a concept and for this type of endurance competition.”
To handle the challenge, Audi has basically planned to never charge the RS Q e-tron during the stages themselves. Instead, they're relying on technology to both manage power output during the day and to regenerate as much energy as it possibly can on the road.
They're allowed a maximum output of 288kWh but only allowed to provide up to 220kWh of charge to the battery so they will adjust power levels based on the terrain each day. Then, they'll recover all that they can with regenerative braking. That's the same sort of tech on many hybrid cars today, just much more extreme.
The race begins on January 2nd, so we don't have to wait long to find out how successful this strategy will be for Audi.
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