Meet the Electric 2023 Rolls Royce Spectre – Winter Testing

In September 2021 Rolls-Royce announced the Rolls-Royce Spectre, a new electric powered model.  

While it is true that Rolls-Royce is considered by many, including me, that they make the “best cars in the world,” electrification will only improve the brand’s stunning characteristics. They will be even quieter, and will be run on green power if charged smartly.

In fact, Charles Rolls drove a 1900 electric car named the Columbia, and made a prophecy: “The electric car is perfectly noiseless and clean. There is no smell or vibration. They should become very useful when fixed charging stations can be arranged”.

Spectre is the fulfilment of the fully electric Experimental Phantom concept named 102EX and 103EX. Rolls-Royce Chief Executive Officer, Torsten Müller-Ötvös, responded to this with an unambiguous promise: Rolls-Royce will go electric, starting this decade. Not so ambiguous so it would seem.

The testing program covered 2.5 million kilometres, simulating more than 400 years of use for a Rolls-Royce, on average.

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ABOVE: 2023 Rolls Royce Spectre – Electric Super Coupe

ROLLS-ROYCE SPECTRE: WINTER TESTING A new Rolls-Royce motor car always begins its life in winter, with testing in this case at Arjeplog, Sweden, just 55km from the arctic circle. Temperatures drop to -26c and are further cooled to -40c.

There are common requirements to the automotive industry such as noise, vibration and harshness (NVH) tests, but all cars are not equal. Everything from materials selected for major hardware components to the density of the door rubbers, bushing compounds, fastening materials and even properties of bonding agents, can affect the NVH. Performance might vary hugely between -40c and 50c , but equally important is the efficiency of the motor car’s heating, ventilation, air conditioning and cooling systems.

By driving on extreme surfaces such as snow and ice, and intentionally trying to unsettle Spectre, the engineers can create dynamic circumstances at low speeds that would ordinarily occur at high speeds. All of this has to be perfect, while keeping the ‘waftability’ that is the Rolls-Royce experience.

ROLLS-ROYCE SPECTRE: ROLLS-ROYCE 3.0 Rolls-Royce 3.0 is the beginning of the Rolls Royce’s (electric) future. The term ‘Rolls-Royce 3.0’ is a reference the process which began in Goodwood, West Sussex on 1^st January 2003.

The first Goodwood Rolls-Royce was Phantom, with its own Bespoke architecture. This was Rolls-Royce 1.0. This was followed by Rolls-Royce 2.0, a new, highly flexible all-aluminium spaceframe to be used for many different models including current Phantom, Cullinan, Ghost and Coachbuild projects. It culminates in Rolls-Royce 3.0 with it integration of a fully electric power train and Decentralised Intelligence into the marque’s architecture.

In component terms, the simplicity of the car has increased significantly. However, the requirement for engineering Spectre – of sending this uneducated car to Rolls-Royce finishing school – is unparalleled. The definition of engineering has changed. Historically, engineering a Rolls-Royce has taken place in workshops. Spectre sees this pivot into the digital space.

Spectre is also the most advanced, and most connected model ever, with 141,200 sender-receiver relations, and has more than 1,000 functions with more than 25,000 sub functions. By comparison, Phantom has 51,000 sender-receiver relations, 456 functions and 647 sub functions.

Spectre’s smarter electronic and electric powertrain architecture has no centralised processing. This increases cable length of 2 kilometres for current models, to 7 kilometres in Spectre.

ROLLS-ROYCE SPECTRE: ARCHITECTURE Spectre, an Electric Super Coupé, is the brand’s spiritual successor to Phantom Coupé.

The design process respects models of the past while catering to future client’s desire for a Phantom-scale Electric Super Coupé. Rolls Royce bosses wanted the first fully electric Rolls-Royce to be highly emotional, showing an electric powertrain technology can still provide

Rolls-Royce’s is quite proud that their proprietary architecture is reserved exclusively their own models and does not underpin mass market cars. In simple terms, what is under a Rolls Royce won’t be found under a BMW. Remember, BMW owns Rolls Royce.

Worthy of mention is Spectre’s wheel size. It will be the first coupé equipped with 23-inch wheels since 1926.

Spectre’s  floor is placed to provide an aerodynamic channel for the battery, with a perfectly smooth underfloor profile. This allows for a low seating position and cocooning cabin experience.

The bulkhead has been moved to deepen the dashboard location and amplify the effect of the dramatically low windscreen rake and incredibly efficient airflow profile. This gives the big coupé a drag coefficient (cd) of just 0.26 in early prototypes..

ROLLS-ROYCE SPECTRE: THE EXTRAORDINARY UNDERTAKING CONTINUES With the winter testing phase completed, Spectre will continue its global testing programme. The Electric Super Coupé still has to complete nearly two million kilometres before the marque’s engineers will consider this undertaking complete prior to first customer deliveries in the fourth quarter of 2023.

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