If you’re a lover of super-fast automobiles, you’ll likely know all about Jaguar’s breathtaking hybrid-electric
C-X75 supercar concept car.
The sensation of last fall’s Paris auto show, it featured a quartet of electric motors driven by two mini gas-turbine engines to give it a theoretical 205mph top speed and a range of 500-plus miles. Plus, it had a body so gorgeous that it could make grown mean weep.
But C-X75 was just a concept, designed to grab headlines and get kids to pin posters of it on their bedroom walls.
Now guess what? Jag has just announced that it’s going to put the C-X75 into limited production. Just 250 will be built priced at around $1 million a pop, with the first cars available in 2013.
And the really cool thing about it is that Williams F1, the legendary British Formula 1 race-car company will help develop the car. Which means that it’s guaranteed to go really, really fast.
The only thing that changes with the car as it goes from concept to production reality, is that Jetson powertrain. While Jaguar is going full-steam-ahead with developing the gas turbine technology for future Jags, it won’t be ready in time to power this new supercar.
Instead, the production C-X75 – and yes, the name will change for production models – is likely to get a version of the 1.6-liter four-cylinder turbo engine that Williams is developing for Formula 1. Expect 500-horsepower or more.
But to keep the C-X75’s ‘green’ credentials, it’ll have big electric motors and a battery bank driving the front and rear wheels which will give the car a zero-emission, electric-only, range of 30-plus miles.
When you want real supercar power, that Williams motor coupled with electric power is predicted to give the Jag 0-to-60mph acceleration in less than three seconds, zero-to-100 in under six and a top speed in excess of 200mph.
This is certainly a bold, gutsy move for Jaguar, at a time when it should really be focusing all its efforts on building a 3-series BMW rival and niche versions of its XF sedan.
But now with buckets of money in their back pockets from Indian industry giant Tata, Jaguar execs want to show the world their company is now a serious player in the luxury car business.
With a hybrid supercar that can run head-to-head with a Bugatti Veyron, they’ll certain do that.
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