Engine noise in hybrid and electric vehicles are to be recreated with a new technology that is developed by Lotus Engineering.
This safe & sound technology is presently being proved in a Toyota Prius, which normally runs without much sound at low speed and also when it is in complete electric mode. This vehicle is welcomed by the blind and also those who are partially-sighted.
The synch makes use of a road speed sensor and a speaker mounted on the radiator and utters a noise at a representative pitch and frequency to procreate the noise of an engine decelerating down or accelerating up.
This allows a pedestrian to easily know how close the car is, and also its speed. The synthesizer repeatedly kicks in when the car moves into its total-electric mode, and turns off when the engine resumes.
‘Blind and partially-sighted people use the noise of oncoming traffic as a cue for when it is safe to cross the road’ and this engine noise will help them a lot.
The substitute for the Lotus Esprit is been postponed until 2011. This is due to the reason that the British sports car company is planning to produce six different variants of its new Evora model.
The Evora line-up will be made up of a convertible and even an automatic version. The convertible is supposed to be launched late in 2011. The model is drop-top and it is hopped that it will help Lotus to accomplish its sales object of 2000 Evoras per year.
Lotus has an 8 year lifespan which is being planned for the Evora. A report also says that a more prevailing version of the obviously-aspirated Evora will be developed around 320bhp and not like the standard car’s 280bhp and this will be launched within two years.
A hard-core S version is also in the pipeline and this is 400bhp which is available. It is expected that it will be a rival to Porsche 911 in its Turbo-rivalling levels of performance.
In the summer of 2009, Lotus will be releasing their newest beauty. The Lotus Evora.
Click on the image for a bigger view!
As you can see above, this is the newest Lotus. The Evora. The engine is a 3.5 Liter DOHC V6 VVT-i with 280ps @ 6.400rpm and 342Nm @ 4.700rpm. 0-60mph Sub 5 seconds.
The wheels are 18″ alloys in the front (225/40 ZR18) and 19″ alloys at the rear (255/35 ZR19).
Below a couple of images of this ride… click on them for a bigger view.
We all hope, that people that gonna ride a car like this will have a good insurance for their car, because the price of this ride is not available yet,.. but we bet this car will cost a lot 
Another sad thing is, that we didn’t heard about a some sort of economy engine. Running on hydrogen or something. Because the most manufactures are looking for alternative fuels like hydrogen or compressed natural gas. But maybe who knows…
