Autocar March 2, 2022

ELECTRIC CAR sales grew by three-quarters last year (and were up 130% in the first month of 2022) but the charging network to support them grew by only a third over 2020. No wonder, then, that range anxiety has been replaced by charging anxiety, with the less seasoned or prospective electric car drivers now more worried about whether they’ll be able to find an available charger they can use. We know all about the unreliability of parts of the charging network, and the inconsistency of the price paid per unit of electricity and the user experience of different providers. (See p63 for this week’s example of that.) Filter these out and the anecdotal evidence is growing that an even bigger issue is emerging: there are simply not enough chargers to support the rising…

Aston Martin is pushing ahead with plans to strengthen its image as a bona fide British rival to Ferrari and in 2023 will reveal an entry-level supercar with a mid-mounted V8 to take on Maranello’s new 296 GTB. It will be the third addition to Aston’s mid-engined supercar line-up, following the launch this year of the Cosworth V12-engined Valkyrie hypercar and the 2024 launch of the V8-powered Valhalla. The trio were shown together for the first time at the Geneva motor show in 2019, but Aston has since undergone a dramatic process of reinvention under new management and ownership, with the evolution of the Valhalla production car testament to a shift in priorities over the coming years. Like the Valhalla, the entry-level mid-engined supercar – originally called the Vanquish but likely to…

Our cup runneth over. Just when you thought the established mid-engined supercar makers had the sector sewn up, along comes yet another one. The Aston Martin ‘Vanquish’, or whatever it’ll be called, will join the new Maserati MC20, and the latest Corvette, as new entries to the mid-engined fast car realm, alongside, of course, the ones from makers that already operate in this sphere: the Ferrari F8 Tributo (becoming 296 GTB), McLarens various (Artura soon), the Lamborghini Huracán and the Audi R8. Oh, plus some niche choices: the Honda NSX. An upcoming new Noble M500 (even more niche). And a new Lotus Emira positioned underneath every one of them, threatening to make them all look silly. Who can find space within that? To carve out its niche, I think the new Aston would…

Morgan has turned to the start of its 113-year history as inspiration for an all-new £40,000 three-wheeler, the Super 3 – which, it believes, will lift vehicle production at Malvern to unprecedented levels and give the marque a bigger global presence than ever when it hits the market in August. The new model, Morgan’s first clean-sheet design since the Aero 8 in 2000, is a new take on the traditional three-wheeler that company founder HFS Morgan first started selling in 1909. It ditches the motorcycle-derived V-twin engine that has been a recurring theme in Morgan three-wheeler history in favour of a front-mounted 1.5-litre Ford inline triple, a normally aspirated 118bhp version of the one that powers the Fiesta ST. Unlike any previous Morgan three-wheeler, the Super 3’s engine is carried on an…

How did you decide on the size of the Super 3? “Beyond the fact that we knew we wanted it to be as small and agile as possible, it was down to the size of the engine – which needed to be carried inside the body – and to the fact that we wanted to be able to carry big people. Once we’d decided the engine and the cabin package, we had the size.” Did you try to make it look like other Morgan three-wheelers? “No, though we did use some underlying principles that make a Morgan, such as the design of the rear body and the horseshoe-shaped nose cowl that’s similar in radius to the four-wheel models’. But even that cowl has extra functionality on the Super 3: it has nostrils that…

Morgan bosses readily admit that the Super 3 will eventually turn into an EV, although for now nobody is keen to discuss details. The official line is that the company has “lots of plans for” this new monocoque chassis and that the internal steel bulkheads can be liberally moved about to house battery banks, inverters and smaller, differently sited electric motors. Back in 2016 at the Geneva motor show, the company unveiled the EV3, a superb-looking battery three-wheeler, along with a forward plan to sell 19 premium editions at £50,000-plus in 2019, its centenary year. The idea imploded: a promisingsounding battery and powertrain supplier simply defaulted at the last minute and it was too costly and too late to find a replacement. But the idea – and the EV3’s wonderful single-headlight…