Vaporware or not? Aptera assembles its first five validation models.
Vaporware or not? Aptera assembles its first five validation models.
是“雾件”还是真车？Aptera 完成首批五台验证车型组装。
Among the many advantages the Chinese auto industry appears to have over foreign competitors is its ability to quickly turn a new idea into a car that customers can buy. At the other end of the spectrum, we have Aptera, which has been trying to bring a three-wheeled, ultra-efficient electric vehicle to market since 2006. Clearly, there have been more than a few stumbles along the way, but this week, the long-running saga got a new verse as the first validation models were assembled, bringing the EV one step closer to the market.
中国汽车工业相较于外国竞争对手的诸多优势之一，似乎在于其能够迅速将新创意转化为消费者可以购买的汽车。而在光谱的另一端，我们看到了 Aptera——自 2006 年以来，该公司一直试图将一款三轮超高效电动汽车推向市场。显然，这一路走来磕磕绊绊，但本周，这段漫长的传奇迎来了新的篇章：首批验证车型已完成组装，使这款电动汽车距离上市更近了一步。
Aptera’s new low-volume assembly line is in Carlsbad, California, and workers there just assembled five EVs, which make their way through 14 stations. “Every vehicle we run through this line teaches us something,” said Chris Anthony, co-CEO of Aptera Motors. “With five vehicles now off the line, we have a growing foundation of data, a team that is getting sharper with every build, and a process that is proving itself in real time. That is what gives us confidence as we move toward our goal of customer deliveries.”
Aptera 位于加利福尼亚州卡尔斯巴德（Carlsbad）的新小批量生产线刚刚组装完成了五台电动汽车，这些车辆经过了 14 个工位的装配流程。“我们在这条生产线上组装的每一台车都在教会我们新的东西，”Aptera Motors 联席首席执行官 Chris Anthony 表示，“随着五台车下线，我们积累了越来越多的数据基础，团队在每一次组装中都变得更加精干，生产流程也在实时验证中不断完善。这正是我们迈向交付目标时信心的来源。”
“What we are building here is not just vehicles but the system to build them well,” said Steve Fambro, co-CEO of Aptera Motors. “Each cycle through the line improves precision, efficiency, and repeatability. This is how we plan to meet our customers’ expectations when they finally get their hands on their own Aptera vehicle.”
“我们在这里构建的不仅仅是车辆，更是能够高质量制造车辆的系统，”Aptera Motors 联席首席执行官 Steve Fambro 说道，“生产线上的每一个循环都在提升精度、效率和可重复性。这就是我们计划在客户最终拿到属于自己的 Aptera 车辆时，满足他们期望的方式。”
Like nothing else
独一无二
Should Aptera succeed and begin delivering vehicles—it says it has “nearly 50,000 reservations on record”—those customers will receive an EV that looks like nothing else on the road. Its front wheels have an open-wheel design; they’re shrouded in aerodynamic pods but mounted out wide from the streamlined cabin, which looks much more aerospace than automotive. The vehicle seats just two occupants and their luggage, but it takes up a surprising amount of room on the road—it’s actually an inch and a half wider than the gargantuan Hummer EV, if you can believe it, a vehicle so wide it scarcely fits in parking spaces or EV charging bays.
如果 Aptera 能够成功并开始交付车辆（据称目前已有“近 5 万份预订”），客户将收到一款外观与众不同的电动汽车。其前轮采用开放式设计，被包裹在空气动力学轮罩中，并从流线型车舱向外延伸，看起来更像是航空器而非汽车。该车仅能容纳两名乘客及其行李，但在道路上却占据了惊人的空间——你敢相信吗？它实际上比巨大的悍马 EV 还要宽 1.5 英寸，而悍马 EV 本身就已经宽到几乎停不进标准停车位或充电桩位了。
Visits to those charging bays are meant to be rare; the EV aims to deliver a range of 400 miles (644 km) from a 44 kWh battery pack—10 miles/kWh (6.2 kWh/100 km) is the claim for the $40,000 launch edition. (Should Aptera succeed, it plans a much cheaper version with just 250 miles/402 km of range.) Its drag coefficient of 0.13 is lower even than Volkswagen’s 1980 ARVW concept, and while I can’t find a published frontal area for the Aptera, its cross-section is clearly much less than that of a standard car shape. And as you’ll note from the pictures, that aero body is clad in photovoltaic panels that provide up to 40 miles (64 km) of range a day, Aptera says.
前往充电站的次数预计会很少；该车旨在通过 44 kWh 的电池组实现 400 英里（644 公里）的续航里程——售价 4 万美元的发布版宣称能达到 10 英里/kWh（6.2 kWh/100 km）的能耗水平。（如果 Aptera 成功，他们计划推出续航仅为 250 英里/402 公里的更廉价版本。）其 0.13 的风阻系数甚至低于大众汽车 1980 年的 ARVW 概念车。虽然我找不到 Aptera 公布的迎风面积，但其横截面显然远小于标准汽车。正如你从图片中看到的，其空气动力学车身覆盖了光伏电池板，Aptera 称每天可提供高达 40 英里（64 公里）的续航里程。
Third time’s the charm?
事不过三？
But Aptera, or some version of it, has been saying these things for 20 years now. The original incarnation of the company ceased operations at the end of 2011; among its woes then was the fact that the Obama-era ATVM loan program that helped Tesla so much would not fund a three-wheel vehicle, leading to years spent redesigning a four-wheel version. In 2012, a Chinese OEM obtained Aptera’s intellectual property from one of the company’s creditors, promising that cars—now three-wheeled again—would be on sale by the end of that year. The following year, its plans had expanded to include a gasoline-powered version, but this incarnation went dark in 2014.
但 Aptera（或其某种变体）已经这样说了 20 年了。该公司最初的实体在 2011 年底停止运营；当时困扰它的问题之一是，曾大力资助特斯拉的奥巴马时代 ATVM 贷款计划拒绝资助三轮车，导致公司花费数年时间重新设计四轮版本。2012 年，一家中国整车厂从债权人手中获得了 Aptera 的知识产权，并承诺在当年年底前销售汽车（此时又变回了三轮）。次年，其计划扩展到包括汽油动力版本，但这一实体在 2014 年也销声匿迹了。
In 2019, Aptera’s original founders relaunched the venture and returned to work, trying to make their dream a reality. Plans for hub motors fell by the wayside in favor of a conventional drive unit, but the design was locked down, and journalists were able to ride in one of the prototypes last year at CES.
2019 年，Aptera 的创始人们重启了这项事业并重返工作岗位，试图将梦想变为现实。轮毂电机的计划被放弃，转而采用传统的驱动单元，但设计方案已经敲定，记者们去年在 CES 上已经能够乘坐其中一台原型车了。