Rimac Concept_One: The Spark

Before the Nevera, there was the Concept_One. Mate Rimac was a 20-something Croatian kid who blew up the engine in his BMW E30 drift car. Instead of fixing it, he put in an electric motor from a forklift. He realized EVs had instant torque. He decided to build the world’s first electric hypercar.

Only 8 units were ever built.

Torque Vectoring: Inventing the Future

The Concept_One introduced Rimac All-Wheel Torque Vectoring (R-AWTV).

• 4 Motors: One for each wheel.
• Gearboxes: Each rear motor has a 2-speed dual-clutch gearbox (to allow for both acceleration and top speed). The front motors have single-speed boxes.
• Control: The car can adjust the power to each wheel independently. It can oversteer, understeer, or grip perfectly depending on the software setting.

The Hammond Crash

The car became globally famous for the wrong reason. In 2017, while filming The Grand Tour, Richard Hammond crashed a Concept_One during a hillclimb in Switzerland.

• The Crash: He carried too much speed into a corner, the car understeered off the cliff, and rolled down the hill.
• The Fire: The batteries caught fire, and the car burned for days.
• The Result: Hammond survived (barely). The crash proved the strength of the carbon monocoque but highlighted the dangers of thermal runaway in EV batteries. Rimac used the data to make the Nevera safer.

Legacy

Without the Concept_One, there would be no Nevera, no Pininfarina Battista, and Bugatti would probably still be using W16 engines forever (Rimac now owns Bugatti). It is the Model T of the electric hypercar age.