Audi A6 E-Tron “To Have” ~300 Miles Of Electric Range, Production In 2018
Originally published on EV Obsession.
The long-rumored Audi Q6 E-Tron will be headed to production starting in 2018, according to recent reports. The model will reportedly feature an all-electric range of ~310 miles per charge — this just remains more talk/PR from Audi, though, until we see something concrete.
The news was revealed during the company’s recent annual meeting, which also saw mention made of the (rather obvious) fact that the Q6 E-Tron is set for release between Audi’s Q5 and Q7 SUV models.
Our sister site Gas2 provides some more information:
Very few details have been released yet, but we do know that Audi’s head of engineering, Dr Ulrich Hackenberg, has promised that it will not look like any other Audi that has come before. The closest guess is that it will resemble the Prologue Allroad concept the company unveiled earlier this year at the Shanghai Auto Show. The Prologue design language has also been highlighted in the Prologue Avant and Prologue Coupe concepts. The Q6 E-Tron will share its platform with the 2016 Q7 e-tron and upcoming 2017 Volkswagen Cross-Blue SUV.
The Q6 may be offered with gasoline and diesel engines as well as plug-in hybrid variants, according to the folks at Transport Evolved. But the biggest news is that the E-Tron version will have approximately 310 miles of all electric range. It’s closest competitor, of course, will be the much anticipated Tesla Model X. But industry observers think the Model X, which will be heavier than the Model S it is based on, will have “only” 200 miles of range. In the world of electric cars, range is as critical to sales as cubic inches were back when great thumping V-8 engines ruled the road.
It should be remembered here, though, of course, that Tesla’s (quite real) Model X is set to hit the market this year, whereas Audi’s (still vaporous) Q6 E-Tron is set for 2018. Three years is a long time in the electric vehicle sector. The market may very well be in a completely different state by the time that Audi’s offering is nearing release — potentially limiting success notably. The Tesla Model X, on the other hand, seems rather likely to carve out a nice chunk of sales for itself. Plus, the X will have amazing acceleration, Tesla’s much-loved tech/infotainment, falcon-wing doors, free Supercharging, and reportedly the driving feel of a sports car. “Competitor” is a relative term.
Audi will not have a system of dedicated charging stations like the Tesla SuperCharger network that offers drivers free electricity for life, as just noted, but it is known to be working on wireless recharging technology that will eliminate the need to plug in its car entirely. That’s something.
Will the Q6 E-Tron be able to compete with the Model X on price and features? We don’t know the answer to that question yet, since not many details about either car have been released. The only thing we know for sure is that while Tesla has been struggling to get production of the Model X started, the rest of the world’s automakers have been hard at work preparing their own electric SUV models to compete with it.
Image by Zachary Shahan | EV Obsession | CleanTechnica (CC BY-SA 4.0)
Have a tip for CleanTechnica? Want to advertise? Want to suggest a guest for our CleanTech Talk podcast? Contact us here.
CleanTechnica Holiday Wish Book
Our Latest EVObsession Video
CleanTechnica uses affiliate links. See our policy here.
EEStor once reported that they have a 1,000 mile range electric car powered by their superbaduper capacitor. It was a vaporware “… since not many details about either car have been released.”
A Conversation With Gen. Wesley Clark
CLARK
There’s not that much of a but in this. It’s an amazing thing. You know,
I used to work with DARPA, a lot and they would also complain, we’ve got all these technologies and we paid this money and nobody wants it. DARPA had an electric car that ran 300 miles without needing recharge. They paid a company to develop it in 1994. DARPA went to the army and said, hey, we’ve got a car for you.
It’ll go — the army said, we’re not interested in cars.
They went to the marines — if the army doesn’t want it, we don’t want it.
http://thedianerehmshow.org/shows/2014-10-09/conversation-gen-wesley-clark
Also, this article got the Tesla Model X’s expected range wrong. It’s supposed to have about 10% less range than the Model S which means that the Model X 85D will have a 243 mile range and the Model X 70D will have a 216 mile range.
LG Chem has recently stated that they have a 300 mile range battery (pack). Problem is, they didn’t mention weight and cost. Tesla could pile more batteries in their ModS and create a 300, 400, 500 mile range. Just add money and endure more weight.
Wake me up when someone has a lighter and cheaper battery with no Achilles heel. That’s what will move the industry faster.
Amen
Ditto
just been reading this article in seekingalpha really in depth look at tesla battery for gigafactory.
http://seekingalpha.com/article/2966026-tesla-gigafactory-tipping-point
Yeah. There’s a lot of good stuff in that article.
this link from that article.
http://articles.sae.org/12833/
just seen the date feb 2014 and tesla cost were $160kwh? hadnt realised that low then.
So Audi wants a long-range EV without the supercharger network. Considering the speed and availability of other fast chargers, it’s like buying a petrol car that you would need to fill up using a straw.
Yup. Others will have to build similar networks to compete with Tesla.
Adding another DC-fast charge system would be stupid. Either license supercharger access or help deploy a lot of SAE-CCS chargers that can charge at 100KW.
Tesla doesn’t have a pay per use system. So Audi could pay Tesla for every EV it sells that could use the supercharger system. Tesla would then build more superchargers with the money and become something like a gas station company but for EVs. I don’t think that Audi would want to be assisting Tesla in building their Supercharger network with payment per Audi sale. What is required is a company that sets up pay per use very fast chargers for any EV model and have these along major highways, preferably next to food outlets and restrooms. We need something like a gas station company for EVs. But at the moment there are not enough long range EVs that will be doing intercity travel to justify building this business. Catch-22: You don’t buy an EV because of a lack of charging infrastructure, but there isn’t infrastructure because of a lack of EVs. Maybe a consortium of EV companies could form a joint company to build the infrastructure.
100kW is not enough. Given that eventually we will need much larger battery packs than Tesla currently offers. Plus they will need to be charged much faster than the current 40 to 80 minutes.
The Tesla SuperCharger pumps in 170 miles in 30 minutes.
That’s adequate for a 200 mile range EV driving a 500 mile day. Two stops. Timed right, two meal stops so no time lost. At worst one meal stop and one stop for refreshments and message checks, perhaps a short nap.
I don’t buy the need for larger than the 85 kWh packs that the ModS offers. That’s enough range. More would be nice, a few times a year, but only if capacity increases a lot (keep weight constant or less) and cost drops a lot.
I disagree. I see the Model S as a town car that can barely accomplish real trips. It’s the math behind it.
Start with the roughly 250 miles of range on a fully charged Tesla driven at 65 mph on the freeway and the plan is to travel cross country. First you would never want to go to empty and instead try to charge when the battery gets to about 10%. So you have 90%. Next you probably want to use their quick charge of 40 minutes that gets you from 10% to 80% instead of taking 75 minutes to go to 100%. Now the range is 70%. Now you want to drive at the normal flow of traffic but not be the fastest. That’s 80 mph in California. Take off another 20% from your mileage if you use the tables on the Tesla website. Now you will probably have hills and valleys, probably need either AC or heating, and maybe the battery is aged or there are some other variables which altogether might take another 10% off. Add them all up and you are only getting 40% of the 250 mile range. Or only 100 miles. Hence I see the need for batteries 5X larger than what they currently have. Which will take many decades. Until then we have to live with what we have. Like living in the 70s with an HP calculator waiting for something like an excel spreadsheet. The Tesla is wonderful compared to the dinosaur fossil vehicles, and assorted *ev competition, but it has a long ways to go.
Let’s start with a real world report….
“I too own the P85+ and I just drove it hfrom North Dallas to Austin, which the nav said was going to be 231 miles. I got home with 9 miles left. Had 4 people (2 adults and 2 small children) in the car, with AC on all the way. Cruise control was set to 70 the whole time, unless traffic slowed which it did a couple of times.
Fully charged the car showed a range of 274 miles. ”
200 miles off the initial charge at highway speeds with the AC on. That leaves a 40 mile buffer (231 + 9 – 40) in case the charger isn’t available.
170 miles from a 30 minute charge. Reduce that by 12% (240 vs. 274) and one gets a 150 mile leg. The 40 mile buffer is still in the battery from the initial charging.
A second charge adds in another 150 mile of highway speed with passengers and AC. That’s 500 miles with 40 miles in reserve.
Now, how many days a year do your drive 500 miles? Most people probably take a drive like that two to four times a year.
A 5x increase in capacity? 1,000 miles? Who needs that? It’s hard to average 60 MPH on a trip. That would mean almost 17 hours of driving.
I suspect we’ll see higher range options later on for those who are willing to pay for them. But anything over a “solid 200 miles” is an unnecessary expense for most drivers.
I knew we’d disagree. Anecdotal testimonies from owners are not the same as using results from the Tesla website. Tesla’s website lists no cars getting a range of 274 miles like this owner saw. In fact if we go with their high end P85D model we only get a 253 mile range. Then there is the 20% drop in mileage which Tesla clearly publishes on their website here.
Everybody loves Tesla but we have to stick with the facts they show on their website.
http://www.teslamotors.com/models
http://www.teslamotors.com/blog/model-s-efficiency-and-range
Sure the display can show more mileage and you can get 340 miles on a single charge if you drive 50 mph. But a leg on my trip is not like that.
You’re the guy who drives 80+ on CA highways?
If so, 1) you’re breaking the law and 2) you’re probably having to slow down when you hit someone driving slower than 80 in the fast lane and when you think you see a Highway Patrol vehicle and then speed back up. Changing speed eats efficiency as does driving over the speed limit.
I consistently go 80 mph from SF to SD, at the flow of traffic or a bit under, and always have people passing me. If it were up to me I’d remove most of the speed limits. Yes, technically I’m breaking the law. And as the graphs show show on the Tesla site 80 mph is about 20% less efficient than driving 65. I don’t speed up or down much though at 80. I don’t tailgate and stay 2 to 6 s behind, etc..
Well, driving at high speeds will lower your range. At roughly 500 miles you’d need to stop a couple of times to charge. Perhaps a third time. People who do that sort of driving often are very much the exception.
For those people I can see manufacturers offering a higher range option for extra money. It wouldn’t be worthwhile for most people.
I really need 4wd and good ground clearance. Most people don’t. I expect I’ll have to pay extra when I buy my next vehicle, electric or gas. I try not to decide what the greater market needs based on how/where I drive.
I did not say that the driver drove 274 miles. That was the estimated mileage based on whatever standard Tesla uses assuming a mix of driving. Not all day at highway speeds with the AC running.
The driver drove 213 miles and had 9 miles of range remaining.
Reread my comment. Note how I used 240 and then discounted the 170 miles in a 30 minute quick charge to 150 miles.
First I’m not sure where you get that 170 miles from a 30 minute charge. Tesla is now only stating a 70% charge if and only if you start at 10% and go up to 80% in 40 minutes. Which would be 178 miles on a P85D. If you start at 20% it’s going to take much longer than 40 minutes to add 170 miles. Probably closer to an hour.
Google Tesla Supercharger. Open Tesla’s page and look down below the location map.
If you show up with a considerable percentage of your battery full then that may slow things down.
(Links don’t post correctly when posting from email.)
But let’s use your numbers. 240 at 70 with a full charge. Pull in with 20 miles (8%) remaining. Charge to 80% in 30 minutes. That 72% now lets you drive 144 miles. Two stops at 30 min each and you’ve done 488 miles. That’s a day full of driving for most people. If you need to go 500 then stop for another 5 minutes somewhere. Or make one 30 min stop and two ~20 minute stops. Whatever.
You’ve got a choice between either optimising the system or working out ‘burn my butt’ solution so to give yourself something to grumble about….
I see what you are talking about now. That’s a bogus number though because it is based on subjective driving styles and not on battery charging percentage. To the right of that shows the actual battery percentage you can expect. They clearly state on a 85 kWh battery it takes 40 minutes to charge from 10% to 80%. Or 75 minutes to charge to 100%.
Time needs to be changed to 40 minutes, maybe 41.
From 80% to 10 or 8% at 65 mph you get 178-183 miles. Take 20% off for 80mph, another 10% for hills, battery age, extra weight, ac/heating, what not, and it is down to 128 to 131 miles per leg. About 30 miles better than I originally calculated because I’m taking the percentages off the miles actually driven. So 130 miles per leg, except for the first leg which gets you maybe 155 miles because you start with a fully charged battery.
I think we should be in full agreement at this point?
If the person driving a fully charged P85+ got 220 miles at 70 MPH and you claim a 20% loss by driving at 80 MPH my calculator says that is 176. (I left a 20 mile safety buffer.)
That person drove with three passengers and the AC on. And there are hills between Dallas and Austin.
If your calculator says that 220 * .8 = 155 then we probably disagree.
There’s no need to take this anecdotal data when the Tesla website has it all spelled out. But oh well.
He got 240 miles in his car at a full charge.
216 mile range if charging when battery hits 10%
173 mile range after 20% wind drag at 80 mph
Now charge for 40 minutes to put the battery at 80%
192 mile range
173 mile range if stopping when battery hits 10%
138 mile range with 20% wind drag at 80 mph
449 mile range with 80 minutes of charge (138 + 138 + 173).
I see I made a mistake the first time I calculated. However is there anything wrong here? Now?
And these are new car mileage numbers with no battery degradation or hostile conditions. So I see the Model S as a starter EV. I fully expect the range to double every decade while the weight and size remains the same until range is no longer an issue. Maybe in thirty years…
Let’s let your numbers stand. I’m going to stick with 500 miles with a couple of half hour recharges if one is driving within the speed limit.
And I’m going to continue to argue that there’s no need for more range for almost all drivers. Exceptions can almost always be found, but exceptions are not market drivers. Exceptions call for niche products.
I suspect capacity will increase. But initially that increase in capacity will be used to reduce vehicle cost rather than greatly increasing range. Once people can purchase a ‘solid 200’ mile range for under $25k then things might move toward longer ranges. Above $25k I can see some percentage of EVs offering more range.
Except that Audi is compliant with the CCS standard, whereas Tesla is not. CCS stations already outnumber Tesla chargers in the VW’s core market, Europe. Chademo is not far behind.
The supercharger network really is nothing special. It’s not better from a technical perspective than CCS or the later iterations of Chademo, and is backed by a single manufacturer only.
Most CCS chargers give less than 50 kW hence useless for long-range EVs. Also, most CCS stations have only 1 plug (or just a few with shared power) so, again, useless for wider use.
The supercharger network is the only charging network capable of supporting long-range EV travel with acceptable level of comfort. That’s special enough for me.
Most existing and almost all new CCS stations have 70kW DC charging, which is plenty for EV charging. The standard allows even higher rates if needed.
And there are still more CCS plugs in Europe than Superchargers.
70 kW is not fast enough in all cases. In fact, we need faster than Tesla’s 100 kW in order to minimize the number of highway charging stations we will need to install and the amount of time people spend charging while on a trip.
Having two or more incompatible systems makes no sense to me. It may not matter much on heavily traveled routes but it would make it harder to extend rapid charging into other areas. The boonies can probably get by with a rapid charger ever 50 to 100 miles but having two standards would mean twice as many chargers.
You think 70kW is fast enough? Tesla’s Superchargers are 120kW and are slated to be upgraded to 135kW to enable faster charging. The goal should be a 15 min. 10-80% charge, not 30 min. for 70 miles of range which is what CHAdeMO and CCS chargers are currently capable of.
If you were trying to charge a 200-mile EV on a long trip, you’d be sitting there for over an hour to get to 80% or 160 miles vs. 40 min. with a Supercharger.
The goal is as little charge time as possible. If most people are not content with 120kW Supercharge times, what makes you think that they will be satisfied with just 70kW?
Kudos to Audi for years of constantly improving vaporware.
LOL! So true. They’ve announced (and never delivered) more ETron cars than I can remember.
At least they should have a car that looks aerodynamic if they want to be taken seriously.
Thinking outside the box is not the Audi way, apparently.
A6 or Q6? The headline and the prose disagree.
And why would I want all of the complexity and hassle of a gas engine that I will never, ever use, since the car has 300+ miles of range? This one doesn’t pass the smell test.
But will it have over the air updates like Tesla does.
So their benchmark for a cutting edge EV that is 3 years away are the specs of a Model S from 3 years ago. Is Audi run by a bunch of monkeys?
It is 2015 and there is still not a single EV Audi that is remotely competitive with the Model S.
In 2016 it will be the same and they won’t have anything to compete with the Model S or the Model X.
In 2017 it will be the same and they won’t have anything to compete with the Model S or the Model X.
So in 2018 they will apparently have something to compete with a circa 2012 tesla.
Shame on Audi and their “engineers.”