Bio-Composite Body, Electrified Off-Road Excitement: Ariel E-Nomad Concept

Take a lightweight open-wheel race car, make it street-legal, add some bio-composite body panels and a powerful electric drivetrain, and what you get is the Ariel E-Nomad. It’s based on Ariel’s recently launched Nomad 2 vehicle but has been optimized as an EV.

Ariel Motor Company is a low-volume vehicle maker from the U.K. It offers road, track, and off-road-focused vehicles. All of its vehicles are driver-focused fun machines. Its latest creation, the Ariel E-Nomad, is its first four-wheel EV — it already offers the Arial Dash e-bike.

“While the E-Nomad is a concept, it does show production intent for the vehicle and hints at just a small part of Ariel’s future. Once it has been through our usual, grueling testing regime we could opt to add E-Nomad alongside its ICE Nomad 2 sibling, so we’ll take great interest in customer feedback on the concept car,” said Simon Saunders, Ariel Director.

Ariel E-Nomad Concept

While just a concept, the E-Nomad has obvious production intent. It is a rear-wheel drive (RWD), electric off-road sports car that can travel up to 150 miles on a single charge.

It has 277 horsepower and 361 pound-feet of torque on tap to move its 1,975-pound curb weight. That means it can sprint to 60 mph from a standstill in just 3.4 seconds while also delivering near-instant gobs of torque to conquer challenging terrain and rally stages.

Electric-Powered Ariel Nomad

The Ariel E-Nomad concept is powered by a Cascadia Motion IDM90 combined motor, gearbox, and DX inverter drive unit, which weighs only 203 pounds. In this drive unit is a single-speed transmission attached to a Borg Warner eDM motor that can spin to 12,000 rpm.

A 41kWh 450V battery made up of 12 Pegasus V3 modules — with high-energy lithium-ion pouch cell in them — helps enable the 150-mile range of the E-Nomad. The battery pack is located behind the passenger bulkhead and weighs less than 661 pounds.

On a level 2 fast charger, the E-Nomad takes less than 25 minutes to charge from 20% to 80%.

Bio-Composite Body

Ariel vehicles don’t usually have much in the way of bodywork, but the E-Nomad is different, and for good reason. The Bodywork allows a 30% reduction in drag over the gas-powered Nomad. This aerodynamic advantage helps provide driving range and gives the E-Nomad a unique look.

A super-cool feature of the E-Nomad is the bio-composite material used for the bodywork. Ariel says the “Flax fiber bio-composite body panels are 9% lighter than carbon fiber and save 73% CO₂.” The bodywork panels are reinforced with “Power Ribs” made of the same prepreg flax fiber composite material.

Tech

As with all EVs, the E-Nomad has a ton of cool tech baked into its DNA. It has a regenerative braking system and even a one-pedal drive feature. It also has ABS, which is driver-selectable for on- and off-road driving applications.

Two drive modes are on offer: Sport for when you want all the power, and ECO for when you need range and smooth nonviolent power delivery.

Not Available, Yet!

On September 4, the Arial E-Nomad concept will make its public debut at the Cenex Expo 2024 in the U.K.

While still a concept, and not for sale, this electrified version of the already legendary Ariel Atom is very likely to see production at some point in the not-so-distant future.

Ariel says it will “test the prototype extensively to explore the full spectrum of potential future applications.” I read that as they will hoon this fun machine as much as they can to make it even better for when it reaches production. Hopefully, I’m right!

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