Unlike some rivals, Porsche’s existing electric models such as the Taycan and Macan Electric offer only limited regeneration control and Steiner said: “Our strategy is not one pedal drive.”
He added: “ If you ask any race driver, none would choose a one-pedal system because you should have control of recuperation and braking on the same pedal as seamlessly as possible. In cornering, if you don’t have the right feeling on the pedal, you don’t have trust in the stability of the car. You don’t see it by watching the cars, but if you ask drivers, you feel the difference on the brake pedal.”
Steiner said this brake feel – a key element of Porsche’s trademark handling – is “what makes a car superior ”.
He said: “Fast straight-line acceleration could be done by more or less anybody. But the brake pedal – the feel on the brakes and good handling in corners – that’s something we’ve learned in Formula E. We still see room for improvement on the road, including with efficiency.”
Steiner added that the emphasis on integrated braking is about “physics” because it is always more efficient to use the car ’s kinetic energy to slow it , with the aim of avoiding the use of the brake discs as much as possible.
He said: “With a one-pedal system, you sometimes start to regenerate earlier than you should do, so you’re already decelerating when the brake discs kick in , so as a driver, you have no influence at all .”
By contrast, “if you have all the braking on the brake pedal, then you as the driver can do the modulation you need – and also feel the reaction of the Tarmac, steering and things like that ”, he said. “So you can control the car with the brakes as well as the throttle and, in our view, this is superior to a system that does something you can’t control.”
Core platform will aid sports car handling
While the 718 twins will feature integrated regen and braking systems, there will be a focus, as in Formula E, on maximising the amount of energy recaptured to optimise efficiency. That, in turn, will allow the cars to be fitted with smaller batteries, aiding packaging and reducing the cost and, most crucially, weight.
