Innovation Europe > News > Innovation blog > Electric Ride - Ferrari

The approach to the Ferrari factory in Modena is through a less than lovely industrial estate. But when you enter the factory, it's as though you've stepped into a James Bond set. The whole place is immaculate. A tree-lined avenue stretches throughout the whole complex providing shaded spaces for employees to sit and talk. There is even sections of trees and shrubs within the factory proper. The buildings are new and attractive, designed by architects. One administrative complex was roofed with water-covered pebbles with japanese garden style walk-ways.

This general environment is one reason why Ferrari has won prizes for being a good place to work. Another reason is that Ferrari values its employees and encourages them to take on 'technically impossible' design challenges.

One such challenge was to produce a hybrid car that would not compromise any of the Ferrari values of quality and ultra-performance. In my interview with Ferrari technical director, Roberto Fideli, we learnt that the  Ferrari Hybrid - the HY-KER will be available in three years time. Ferrari are using hybrid technology to increase power and performance while simultaneously reducing emissions. In creating the hybrid Ferrari have avoided increasing the vehicle weight or reducing the space available to man and engine.

But when I asked him when we could expect an all-electric Ferrari, he smiled and said he did not expect such a car would exist within the next 20 years. When I suggested the Tesla demonstrates that such a car is possible, he repeated the point and went on to explain that part of the driving experience of the car is the sound, the characteristic howl the car makes. He wasn't impressed when I suggested that this could be reproduced with speakers!

This hybrid project is aimed at ensuring that Ferrari will be in a position to comply with future CO2 emissions standards, particularly in terms of the urban cycle. City driving is traditionally where sports cars are most penalised as their engines are designed for maximum efficiency and performance at high revs, whereas the urban cycle involves low revs and low engine loads.



Technically the hybrid Ferrari is an elegant solution to combining two drive-trains. Ferrari has employed its racing experience to adapt an advanced, lightweight hybrid drivetrain to the 599 GTB Fiorano with the aim of ensuring that vehicle dynamics are unaffected. This was achieved by all system components, such as the batteries, being positioning below the centre of gravity.

The result is a centre of gravity that is even lower than in the standard car. 

Ferrari has also applied its F1 technology to the design, engineering and construction of a new kind of electric motor which helps optimise the longitudinal and lateral dynamics of the car, enhancing traction and brake balance.

Weighing about 40 kg, the compact, tri-phase, high-voltage electric motor of the HY-KERS is coupled to the rear of the dual-clutch 7-speed F1 transmission. It operates through one of the transmission’s two clutches and engages one of the two gearbox primary shafts. Thus power is coupled seamlessly and instantaneously between the electric motor and the V12.

The electric motor produces more than 100 hp as Ferrari’s goal was to offset every kilogram increase in weight by a gain of at least one hp.

 Under braking the electric drive unit acts as a generator, using the kinetic energy from the negative torque generated to recharge the batteries.

Controlling and integrating the two drive trains is a dedicated electronics module which was developed by applying experience gained in F1, one technical edge that Ferraris competitors will find hard to match.

Richard Scrase

More information here: The Experimental HY-KERS Hybrid vehicle