The Formula Student team at the Academic Motorsports Club Zurich (AMZ) broke the world-record at the Dübendorf air base near Zurich. The previous record stood at 1.779 seconds and was set last year by a team at the University of Stuttgart.
The car was developed and built in less than a year by a team of 30 students at ETH Zurich and Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts. The grimsel features lightweight construction (using carbon-fibre materials the car weighs just 168kg) and electric drive technology.
Each wheel on the four-wheel drive electric racing car has a specially developed wheel hub motor that is capable of generating 200hp and 1700Nm of torque. A sophisticated traction control system regulates the performance of each wheel individually, allowing the car's acceleration to be increased even further.
To date, no large-scale production car – even one with a combustion engine – can reach an acceleration comparable to the grimsel. The fastest production car, the Porsche 918 Spyder, can only manage to travel from 0-60mph 2.2 seconds.
