Indian electric car company REVA will unveil two new electric cars at the forthcoming Frankfurt International Motor Show (IAA) on September 16. The REVA NXR is a four-seater, three-door hatchback family car aimed at urban drivers while REVA’s showcar, the NXG, is a sporty two-seater with a targa roof that was designed by Dilip Chhabria of internationally-renowned automotive design company DC Design. REVA says it has added a unique technology to its cars that addresses ‘range anxiety’ – worrying about running out of charge mid-journey. The REVive telematics technology acts like an invisible reserve fuel tank. Drivers telephone or SMS REVA for an instant remote top-up should they run out of charge. At present, details are scarce about how REVive actually works but REVA assures us all will be revealed at IAA.
Another release from REVA at the Frankfurt show will be its website, Revaglobal.com, allowing customers to register online to gain priority for the vehicles. The NXR can be ordered at the show as production is scheduled for early 2010. However, the NXG doesn’t go into production until 2011. Further technology and pricing announcements will be made at IAA. Gizmag first the covered the original NXG concept car back in 2005.
The Bangalore-based Reva Electric Car Company is a joint venture between Maini Group of India and AEV LLC of California, and backed by US investors Global Environment Fund and Draper Fisher Jurvetson.
Today, REVA is infiltrating the world auto market and selling, or being test marketed, in 24 countries. It claims to have the largest deployed fleet of electric cars on the market with more than 3,000 EVs on the road and more than 70 million kilometers (43.4 million miles) of user experience.
Currently, the company is building a new ultra low carbon vehicle assembly plant in Bangalore and hopes to produce 30,000 vehicles per annum.
Looked at the 2 seat sportster. No roll cage at all, just a lookslike a wind spoiler back thingie way back there...I\'ll pass
This claim is as wild as that by SSC's that Gizmag reported on almost a year ago, http://www.gizmag.com/worlds-fastest-production-car-to-go-electric--with-several-years-between-charging/10070/
"The drive train under development will feature a revolutionary power source allowing for extended time between charging intervals with the possibility of several years between charging."
The secret behind that has yet to surface, so far as I know.
Maybe REVA has you hoist a large lightning rod on top of the car, channel radio frequency energy into the battery to give it a boost (in about 40 years), or remotely retracts a floor panel to let you operate the car like the Flintstones did.... The only thing that it could possibly be is the remote activation of a spare battery or fuel cell or somesuch, and then it makes no sense why it would need to be activated over the telephone. Maybe your call just gets forwarded to AAA... I hope Gizmag covers this and provides us the answer.