Dream garage

Background: This is the future of Alpine - Dream garage

In Formula 1 this year, things were mediocre at best for Alpine. With 120 points, the works racing team finished sixth in the team standings, a full 160 points behind fifth place (Aston Martin). Finishing in the no-man's land of the premier class of motor racing is certainly not what the proud French team had in mind. After all, the glamor of Formula 1 should also radiate to the sports cars from Dieppe (Normandy). Especially as seven new cars will be rolling out of the dream garage (as the Alpine managers call the program) by 2030.

They are to be emission-free on the road. This is what the all-powerful Renault boss Luca de Meo stipulated during his visit to the English Channel. "However, emission-free does not necessarily mean battery-electric," clarifies Robert Bonetto, Vice President of Alpine Engineering. The racing prototype Alpenglow, which is powered by a hydrogen combustion engine, shows what the engineer means by this. Nevertheless, sporty e-mobiles are at the top of the agenda. When it comes to the power-electric cars, everyone is waiting for an electric A110. The Alpine par excellence, which is set to rival the Porsche E-Boxter.

The many fans of the original Alpine will have to wait until the end of 2026. The Alpine A110 E-ternité concept, in which the battery packs are stowed at the front and rear and not between the axles, shows what the car could look like. In order to usher in the electric Alpine era, the Renault subsidiary is spending a lot of money and putting the electric two-seater on a new APP (Alpine Performance Platform) architecture, which, as Robert Bonetto emphasizes, will not be a derivative of an existing Renault architecture. However, the Alpine developers are lowering expectations in the same breath. There will be no one-to-one transformation of the agile mid-engine sports car into the electric age.

One of the traditions that will be retained in an E-Alpine is authenticity. "We're not faking anything," explains product manager Charlie Biardeau, rejecting the artificially generated combustion engine noise and gearshifts that are part of the package in the Hyundai Ioniq 5N. The sound of the electric motor is modulated to the maximum, but not distorted. Nevertheless, the E-Alpine A110 is intended to offer the owner a special experience in which the driver merges with the car, so that the next A110 will also be the beacon car for the entire Alpine model range.

In order for the new architecture on which the E-A110 is based to pay off, synergies must be created and the technical shell used. This will also be the case at Alpine, which is why the new architecture will be very flexible and enable different vehicle types. However, this basis will not be used for all of the seven models mentioned. The Alpine A290_ß is the sporty brother of the Renault 5 E-Tech Electric, which will make its debut at the Geneva Motor Show. The Alpine A290_ß will therefore also be based on the CMF-B EV platform. Not without changes, of course, which give the sporty small electric car the pep that the production model does not have. The front end of the A290_ß will be modified. The Alpine also gets torque vectoring and a multi-link suspension.

The study already gives a concrete preview of the production model. The dimensions for the Alpine A290, which will also appear next year, have been finalized: 3.990 meters long, 1.820 meters wide and 1.520 meters high. The short wheelbase of 2.53 meters guarantees agility. This is a noticeable difference to the concept car: 4.05 meters long, 1.85 meters wide and 1.48 meters high. One thing the Alpine engineers are working on is the brakes, where the transition from recuperation to "analog" deceleration should be smooth. Charlie Biardeau promises an exact pressure point and that the brakes are easy to modulate. "We have driven many competitor products and were disappointed," says the technician. The A290 will have around 165 kW / 224 hp, which is certainly more than the Renault 5 E-Tech Electric, with which it will share the batteries, but which were developed for the Alpine.

A BEV-C crossover GT, which will roll off the production line at Alpine's birthplace in Dieppe, will complete the dynamic e-trio in 2025. Alpine is relying on NMC batteries (nickel-manganese-cobalt), whose cells are produced by the start-up Verkor in a twelve gigawatt factory in Dunkirk. "The Alpine will be the first car with the Peformance battery," promises Frédéric Lenindre, head developer of the electric powertrain. Unlike the Scenic, the twelve modules in the Alpine have a capacity of 89 kilowatt hours, which is two kWh more. The batteries use 400-volt technology. Charging from ten to 80 percent should take around 20 minutes. By 2028, this time should fall to twelve to 15 minutes. Alpine will continue to rely on NMC batteries in the future, which will further increase the energy density. This will help the Alpine dynamic equation.

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1. Despite struggling in Formula 1 this year, Alpine aims to bring seven new, emission-free electric cars to the market by 2030, as stipulated by Renault's boss, Luca de Meo.
2. One of these new electric models is expected to be an electric version of the iconic Alpine A110, which is expected to rival the Porsche E-Boxter.
3. The engineering department at Alpine is currently working on a new APP (Alpine Performance Platform) architecture for the electric A110, ensuring it retains its agile mid-engine characteristics while improving performance.
4. In order to create synergies and reduce costs, some of the new models, such as the Alpine A290_ß, will share platforms with existing Renault models, like the CMF-B EV platform used by the Renault 5 E-Tech Electric.
5. The future Alpine architecture is designed to be highly flexible, allowing for the creation of various vehicle types, not just sports cars.
6. The new Alpine A290, set to debut in 2023, will feature a shorter wheelbase than its concept counterpart, ensuring exceptional agility and handling.
7. In an interview, Charlie Biardeau, the product manager for Alpine, confirmed that the new Alpine A290 will have around 165 kW (224 hp), making it more powerful than the Renault 5 E-Tech Electric it will share batteries with.

Source: www.stern.de