Koenigsegg will build a $1M hybrid supercar without camshafts
This likely builds on a new partnership announced earlier this week.
Koenigsegg, the Swedish automaker known for building some absolutely stunning (and riotously expensive) supercars, is hard at work on its next model, and according to a new interview, it should pack some impressive tech.
In an interview with Top Gear, Christian von Koenigsegg said his company is looking to add a higher-volume car to its ranks. "We've been looking to expand our offering because basically, our brand has outgrown our production volumes by quite a big margin," von Koenigsegg told Top Gear. "But we do think if we make a super-exclusive, custom built supercar at a slightly lower price ... we could get the volumes into the hundreds."
Of course, "a slightly lower price" means approximately 1 million euro (about $1.1 million), since most of Koenigsegg's cars cost about twice that much. But offering the level of quality and performance expected of the Swedish manufacturer at half the price does sound like a bargain in a weird sort of way.
The Agera RS will set you back approximately $2 million, and you'll have to wait in line for one.
Von Koenigsegg told Top Gear that he wants the car to be "completely CO2-neutral." The company hopes to achieve that by pairing a hybrid-electric system to Koenigsegg's camless combustion engine. Known as "freevalve," it replaces a traditional camshaft with a series of actuators that individually control each valve within the engine. It can keep some valves closed or shut off entire cylinders to improve fuel economy when necessary, and it's capable of running on multiple fuel types.
In his interview with Top Gear, von Koenigsegg explained that this engine could be started with pure alcohol instead of gasoline, even in very cold temperatures, eliminating the need to use fossil fuels (and the emissions they generate) for a portion of the drive. "The idea is to prove to the world that even a combustion engine can be completely CO2-neutral," he said in the interview.
Some of the efforts going into this car are likely the fruit of a recently announced partnership. National Electric Vehicle Sweden (NEVS), the company that bought the husk of Saab's automotive arm in 2012, announced earlier this week that it bought a 20-percent stake in Koenigsegg. The two will develop green vehicle technology together, with an emphasis on electrification. A million-dollar hybrid supercar sounds like a good starting point.
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