300 km/h in The World's First Electric Sports Car with 48 V Low-Voltage Flow Cell Drive

As Nunzio La Vecchia, Chief Technology Officer, explains:

“The top speed of the QUANT 48VOLT is actually secondary. What matters is that our nanoFlowcell® 48VOLT drive delivers real-world, environmentally friendly performance — by which I mean zero harmful emissions, a comfortable cruising speed and respectable range. But we’re also confronting concerns about electric mobility in a domain few address: safety. The drive of the QUANT 48VOLT is consistently maintained at low voltage, making it the world’s safest electric sports car from an electrical standpoint.”

It’s important to understand: conventional electric vehicles use high-voltage drive systems — often over 400 V — and the industry is already considering 800 V systems to boost EV performance. With the QUANT 48VOLT, nanoFlowcell challenges this paradigm: its flow cell technology enables extreme performance (> 560 kW output) and exemplary range (anticipated > 1,000 km) while keeping the system safely below 48 V.

The intrinsic safety is striking: the poles of the nanoFlowcell® can be touched without danger to life. In contrast to lithium-ion battery systems, there’s no risk of electric shock to bystanders or first responders, even in a severe accident. Thermal runaway — which can cause lithium-ion batteries to ignite — is structurally impossible in the nanoFlowcell® 48VOLT drive.

Whereas the earlier QUANT FE model achieved its athletic performance with a 700 V high-voltage drive, the QUANT 48VOLT runs entirely on low-voltage systems. It deploys innovative 45-phase low-voltage motors, delivering high power along with slender wiring cross-sections. Four motors of 140 kW each make the QUANT 48VOLT the most powerful all-wheel-drive low-voltage electric sports car on the planet.

These motors use a solid aluminium mesh instead of conventional copper windings, reducing size relative to output, saving weight and cost, and simplifying mass production. Because the drive system operates at low voltage, it removes the need for expensive high-voltage safety measures — cutting development and production costs, and in turn lowering the vehicle’s price.

Maintenance is more accessible too: a QUANT with nanoFlowcell® 48VOLT can be serviced by personnel without specialised high-voltage training. This significantly reduces the (financial) burden for future owners, regardless of brand.

The nanoFlowcell® 48VOLT drive offers revolutionary control options. For example, the magnetic field in the low-voltage motors can be dynamically shaped, with electronic fading between different pole-pair settings — effectively integrating a sort of electromagnetic transmission within the motor. Efficiency remains high across the entire RPM/torque spectrum, with the proper “gear” dynamically selected based on driving conditions.

This makes the nanoFlowcell® 48VOLT drive extremely efficient, especially in everyday driving cycles. In comparison with electric drives using asynchronous motors, losses on the same cycle were reduced by approximately 50 %.

With direct control over the flow cell, the heavy and costly supercapacitors once used as buffer storage are no longer needed in the redesigned 48VOLT drive. Because the flow cell itself operates at low voltage, the power electronics in the QUANT 48VOLT have been massively simplified compared to those in the QUANT FE.

To deliver the energy needed for extreme acceleration and high cruising speeds, six flow cells are now used simultaneously — a total capacity of approximately 300 kWh (by comparison, QUANT FE used a single 70 kWh cell). Using multiple flow cells allows faster discharge of bi-ION electrolyte, thus generating more drive energy.

Redesigned cell membranes are used for the first time in the nanoFlowcell® 48VOLT drive. After two and a half years of development, the R&D team succeeded in engineering a nano-technology process to treat the membrane surface so that it achieves many times the surface area within nearly the same dimensions — creating a much larger reaction interface for the bi-ION electrolytes.

Going forward, this new membrane design enables the nanoFlowcell® to fully leverage a higher energy density in the bi-ION electrolyte solution (more than 600 Wh/l).

The QUANT 48VOLT with nanoFlowcell® low-voltage drive is the vanguard of electric mobility — and it diverges sharply from mainstream approaches. The nanoFlowcell® is harmless to health, safe, environmentally friendly and economically viable.

In the words of La Vecchia:

“For many, the QUANT 48VOLT is simply a desirable sports car and among the world’s most advanced electric vehicles. But visionaries will see in that compact power station — capable of supplying electricity to an average household autonomously — the future of affordable, environmentally compatible energy. At present, nanoFlowcell Holdings is showcasing its flow cell technology almost exclusively through stunning sports cars. Yet the company sees enormous potential in other industrial applications, especially in stationary energy systems.”

Technical Data
Top speed km/h: 300
Acceleration (0-100 km/h): 2.4s
Transmission: Automatic
Drive: All-wheel drive
Doors: 2
Seats: 2+2
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Motor
Type: 4 x low-voltage synchronous motors
Fuel type: Electric (bi-ION®)
Maximum power: 560 kW (760 hp)
Maximum torque: 2,000 Nm per wheel
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Flow Battery
Type: nanoFlowcell®
Voltage: 48 V
Capacity: 300 kWh
Rated current: up to 1,500 A per cell
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Consumption
Energy consumption: tba
Tank volume: 2x 200 l
Range: >1,000 km
Harmful emissions: 0