1) It seems that Mercedes is working on large hub motor cars that they call “high performance” http://www.roadandtrack.com/new-cars/future-cars/news/a3146/brabus-electric-4wd-mercedes-e-class-at-2011-frankfurt-auto-show-26277/
2) Another man sent me a link to a video in China of a 13 inch wheel scooter fitted with a hub motor smoking off a V8 Mercedes and an Audi R8.
Video address: http://v.youku.com/v_show/id_XNzI1Njc3MjY4.html
That's funny! No smoke or even chirping from any of the tires (rather amazing in the case of the scooter), the cars give the scooter a 15' head start before fully engaging their clutches, and you can tell, just by watching, that feet are very light on gas pedals. I grew up with drag racing, and saw much more convincing races between snowmobiles (wheels replacing skids) and nitro-fueled minibikes. My dad's four cylinder Volvo drag cars were much faster off the line than any of the vehicles in this (gag?) video. I think this would make a wonderful addition to the ZEV website.
The E-Scooter had a very much longer rear swing arm than my Thunder has, which should allow much higher torque loading without tire chirping, with a few 100 Amps pushed through such a hub motor. In China there are absolutely berserk E-Scooter tweakers. I recently saw a video from China of another scooter with this body, with a cycle analyst, that showed peak currents of over 400A at 78V and rocket-like acceleration. Against such a contraption those cars have no chance in a drag race...
And Darus, that was not Mercedes, but a tuner called Brabus behind that hub-motored showcar. This was four years ago...
My rides:
2017 Zero S ZF6.5 11kW, erider Thunder 5kW
Sorry, ME, but I remain deeply unconvinced. I saw the extended rear on the scooter: that is done to stop drag bikes from doing a wheelie and flipping over, and what you get instead is lots and lots of wheelspin. There was no evidence of this in the video, and as I wrote, the guys in the cars were either very, very inept or were letting the scooter win. The clincher for me was the apparent lack of real speed even at the end of the "race."