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RoadTesT

Wanting to take a real shakedown road trip with the Fisker Karma, we scanned the map for a proper destination and came up with a place called Biosphere 2. Located in Arizona, some 440 miles east of our current offices in Newport Beach, California, this remote facility is a sort of a futuristic architectural wonder that doubles as an experimental greenhouse/enclosed environmental laboratory in the mountains northeast of Tucson.

It seemed like an appropriate choice because, like the Karma, Biosphere 2 is both quite beautiful and built to explore the boundaries of environmental technology. It was also expensive to build, somewhat controversial and government subsidized. Fisker got a federal grant of $529 million to develop and build their cars (only $169 mil-lion used so far on the Karma), and Biosphere 2, which started out as a private foundation, is presently owned and supported by the University of Arizona, so it all fits together, ja?

Fisker Karma EcoChicPossibly more Chic than Eco, depending on where you drive

:: By Peter egan :: Photos By guy sPangenBerg

ElEctronically rEPrintED FroM sEPtEMbEr 2012

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:: The Fisker Karma fits right in at Biosphere 2, with its hybrid power-train and animal-free EcoSuede covering its four individual seats. Haptic display, below, is a little sluggish, while the fully digital in-struments, far left, are easy to read.

In hitting the road with the Karma, however, we wanted to do more than just find a symbolic photo backdrop; we also hoped to put some real road miles on the car and see what it was like to live with. That, and answer the basic bystander questions that popped up vir-tually every place we stopped: “What exactly is this car, and what is it trying to do? What’s it for?”

Is it an expensive ($116,000 as tested) and powerful (402-hp) luxury 4-door sports car that just happens to have a hybrid gasoline/electric drivetrain, or is it a boundary-pushing technological mar-vel that will allow even the very wealthy and discriminating car buff a chance to participate in reduced carbon emissions? Nearly everyone wanted to know what it was like to drive. So did we. But first, a look at the basic architecture of the thing.

The Karma is classified as a plug-in hybrid with the drivetrain in series con-figuration. Which is to say it’s a rear-drive car with a gasoline engine under the shapely hood—a 260-bhp turbocharged GM Ecotec 2.0-liter inline-4. As in a die-sel locomotive, the engine never drives the rear wheels directly. Instead, it runs a 175-kW generator that charges a large lithium-nanophosphate battery pack that runs down the center of the car’s alumi-num frame. The battery, in turn, powers a pair of 201-hp electric motors located fore and aft of the rear axle.

So what we have here is a 403-hp car with prodigious quantities of instantly available electric motor torque—959 lb.-ft. starting from zero rpm. All of this wizardry is not made from helium, of course, so the Karma’s weight—5430 lb.—somewhat mitigates the effect.

Twin “gas caps” sit on the rear flanks. One accepts 9.0 gal. of premium unlead-ed and the other a 110- or 220-volt plug-in. Full charging time is 10–12 hours

(aka all night, plus breakfast) on 110 volts, and the 220 takes about half as long. A “Hill” paddle to the right of the steering wheel also feeds coasting en-ergy into the battery, as does a 120-volt solar panel in the roof that helps power the car’s 12-volt accessory systems.

The Karma’s sensuous body flows tightly over a set of tall 22-in. wheels separated by a very long 124.4-in. wheel-base. That’s almost 9 in. longer than my old Cadillac DTS, though the Karma’s styling doesn’t suffer from this stretch, nor, as we shall see, does the car’s han-dling. All’s well that ends, as a friend of mine often says.

On the morning we left Newport Beach, the battery was fully charged and it lasted for exactly 30 miles of mostly city driving before the gasoline engine kicked in. As we hit the open highway, I found the Ecotec gas engine surprisingly quiet and non-intrusive from inside the car; you hardly notice the transition from pure battery to charging modes. You do notice the fuel gauge drop, how-ever. On our first fill-up, only 180 miles after running out of charge, we got 19.9 mpg. (Overall mileage for the 880-mile trip would be 20.5 mpg.) That makes for fairly short range, so you have to keep your eye on the fuel gauge.

From the moment we pulled away from the office, my immediate impres-sion of the car is that it feels solid and well-built, with superb ride and taut-yet-fluid suspension compliance. The steer-ing is perfectly weighted, for my tastes, with just the right touch of heaviness on-center, responsive turn-in and good road feel through the wheel. A sense of refine-ment and quality comes through instant-ly. Not for nothing have designer Henrik Fisker and Chief Operating Officer Bern-hard Koehler come to us through BMW and Aston Martin. This chassis could be

a product of either company, and that’s high praise. Interestingly, members of the suspension design team also worked on the Ford GT program.

Augmenting ride quality, the 6-way adjustable seats accommodated my tall frame and iffy lower back quite comfort-ably, with good lumbar support. Also, the a/c cranked out plenty of cold air, despite temperatures being above 110 degrees F for most of our trip. Our car was the top-of-the-line EcoChic model, with a “non-animal” interior that has seats made of fabric-based suede and a small amount of wood trim made from timber reclaimed from California forest fires or sunken logs from the bottom of Lake Michigan. Next step down is the EcoSport model with leather trim ($111,000) and the bottom of this very posh barrel is the $103K EcoStand ard. In any case, fit, finish and materials in our EcoChic model were appropriately flawless for a car in this price range.

The only barrier to total bliss with-in the Karma’s cabin is the touchscreen nav/sound/temperature control system, which is unnecessarily complicated and nonintuitive, requiring much study of the owner’s manual to, say, turn the fan down. After experimenting with the touchscreen for a while, photographer Guy Spangenberg said, “It’s a good thing this is a low-emissions car, because the smoke coming out my ears could ruin the atmosphere.” A few simple knobs would make this car’s interior much friendlier. It’s what I call a Jagger/Richards dash: You can’t always get what you want.

In western Arizona we stopped at a rest stop after using a half-tank of fuel, and as we pulled back onto I-10, two warning lights lit up on the dash—a loose fuel-cap symbol and a check en-gine light. We checked the fuel cap, which seemed properly tightened, and

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then called the Fisker engineers. They said the gas-cap light would go out when we filled up again and the engine light—part of the same system—would have to be reset at the dealership. We suspected heat expansion, as it was an oven-like 112 degrees at the rest stop. As they claimed, the gas-cap light went out after we refu-eled, and the engine light stayed on for the entire trip. The car ran fine, however. Like a train, literally.

On a winding stretch of desert road near Biosphere 2, I found the Karma to be quite flingable and fun to drive. It has immense grip and transitions to light un-dersteer if you push it hard, turning in with an easy, intuitive precision. Though it feels weighty and solid, its low center of gravity makes it quite nimble, and the only effect of the long wheelbase seems to be a stable and composed ride qual-ity over bumps. The big brakes work well, with a moderately hard pedal and just a hint of grabbiness as you slow to a complete stop. The Hill paddle also has a braking effect, almost like downshifting a conventional gearbox, and adds several miles of range on a long descent.

The transmission (normally shifted via a button on a little pyramid that looks like a New Age crystal) has a Sport setting on the left steering wheel paddle, which gives you full available torque and power by raising engine rpm and charging rate. This pays off in sustained hard driving, but the car already has so much torque on tap that using the Sport mode doesn’t effect a dramatic transition. The Karma is at its best moving quickly through traffic, but still has reasonably good passing pow-er on the highway. It’s not in the manic ZR1 league, but fast enough to please all but the most lead-footed. In testing, we did 0–60 in 5.9 seconds and the quarter mile in 14.7 sec. at 94.2 mph. Top speed is electronically limited to 125 mph.

Interestingly, whenever you shift gears

on the “magic crystal shifting pyramid,” a long streak of colored light flashes un-der a semi-opaque panel on the console etched with the veins of leaf fronds. The car also emits various beaming, spacey sounds to tell you it’s running or, at low speed, to warn pedestrians that an other-wise silent electric car is coming. These noises sound, variously, like the Music of the Spheres or Jimmy Page warming up on a theremin. In any case, they’re almost subliminally quiet and somewhat soothing. Just don’t eat the mushrooms in Arizona and you’ll be fine.

We had a great time exploring Bio-sphere 2, where the gigantic Aztec-pyra-mid-like greenhouse encapsulated a vast rain forest of breathtaking heat and hu-midity, while the air conditioned offices next to the Coke machine were also of great scientific interest to Guy and me. They had an outdoor electric-car charg-ing system, but we couldn’t stay long enough to put any discernible charge back into our battery. The whole facility is absolutely beautiful, perched on a sce-nic ridge of Sonoran desert overlooking the Santa Catalina Mountains. I may have to go back and get a degree in botany or window glazing so I can live there.

On the trip home, we came perilously close (15 miles remaining range) to run-ning out of gas. The fuel gauge goes down rapidly on its second half, especially when you’re climbing into a headwind. The good thing is, however, you can get fuel and keep driving—uphill at 75 or 80 mph, with plenty of kick to spare—which pretty much defines the Karma’s versatility.

If you had a short daily commute (say, from Bel Air to Universal Studios) and could plug the car in at night, you’d never have to stop at a gas station. But if you want to get out of town for the weekend, you can—accepting that the highway mileage will be worse than a Corvette’s.

It’s worth remembering, though, that the Karma is a 4-seater, and you can actually put humans back there. Children or small people will be happiest, but even I can fit in the back seat for a reasonable distance. Also, there’s a small, moderately useful trunk, even if the oddly curved hinges intrude on its depth.

So who is the Karma built for?Well, someone who has more than

$100K to spend and wants a handsome high-performance 4-seat sports car that draws a crowd of curious car buffs wher-ever it goes, an unexpected sight that’s a little outside the norm, visually and tech-nically. It also has to be someone who doesn’t mind the mixed blessings of free lunch and slight inconvenience that come with owning a plug-in hybrid.

That lunch is not totally free, of course. The EPA uses a complicated mpg-equiv-alent formula for fuel use at electrical powerplants, and that gives the car an official rating of 54 mpge for the first 33 miles of range. After that, it drops to 20 mpg combined city/highway. This is still class-leading efficiency among high-end performance hybrids, but, needless to say, it’s not going to make a big dent in world oil consumption anytime soon—unless the Karma stays in town and lots of folks buy them. Could happen, I suppose; Fisker has sold just under 1000 of these cars so far. And, as we’re discovering, re-duced energy use comes from winning a plethora of small battles rather than a few big, easy ones. Everything helps.

Perhaps we should just consider this a luxury sports car that’s taking us in an interesting and upbeat direction, provid-ing style and performance without the depressing onus of a gas-guzzler tax. The Karma may be an outlook on life as much as a car. Maybe that explains the name.

To learn more go to www.fiskerautomotive.com

* Electronically limited.

92146Copyright © 2012 Hearst Communications, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

For more information on the use of this content, contact Wright’s Media at 877-652-5295.

..............................................2013 FISKER KARMA EVer..............................................LENGTH: 196.8 in.WHEELBASE: 124.4 in.HEIGHT: 52.4 in.GROUND CLEARANCE: N/AIssue: September 2012Date Out: 06/18/2012..............................................

p e r f o r m a n c es p e c i f i c a t i o n s

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47% 53%

enrichedgasolines

The Official Fuel Partner of Road & Track

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InterIor noIse

TIME TO DISTANCE ft0-1 (rollout)0-1000-5000-1320 (1/4 mi)

sec0.43.38.1

14.7

0 SEC. 5 10 15 20

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2012 Fisker Karma Eco Chic1/4 mile: 14.7 @ 94.2 mph

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t e s t n o t e s

ProPulsIon

warranty

advanced safety

fuel economy

accommodatIons

Battery

InstrumentatIon

chassIs

acceleratIon

BrakIng

handlIng

2012 fIsker karma ecochIc www.fiskerautomotive.com

TemperaTure: 94° F • HumidiTy: 18% • elevaTion: 350 FT • Wind: Calm • loCaTion: irvine, Ca

:: The Karma launches with ease. Activate Hill mode 2 and Sport mode. Then, once the gasoline engine begins charging the battery, simply hold the car with the brakes and preload the throttle.

:: The brakes bring the heavy Karma to a stop with ease, even repeatedly. The transition from regen to hydraulic braking is smoothly executed.

:: Stability control cannot be fully disabled. Nevertheless, the Karma has decent transient response, with heavy understeer at the limit.

List Price: $115,000 Standard equipment: 10.2-in. haptic touchscreen, voice-activated navigation system, 295-watt 9-speaker AM/FM/MP3, USB- and aux jack-equipped audio system, onboard 3.3-kW charger, limited-slip differential, Bluetooth, 6-way power adjustable front seats, heated front and rear seats, keyless ignition, dual climate control, xenon headlamps, dest charge ($1000). As Tested: $116,000

These scales show how the fisker karma performs relative to other cars cur-rently in our Road Test Summary. Identified in each category are the extreme values (better ➙) as well as the median values (B) of our current test data.

0–60, sec13.3 2.6

B5.9

B

1/4 miLe, sec19.2 10.2

B14.7

B

1/4 miLe, mph70.5 142.9

B94.2

B

60–0, ft143 106

B116B

80–0, ft252 185

B204B

Library 30AT idLe 49ConsTAnT 50 mPh 69ConsTAnT 70 mPh 73

mAx in 1sT geAr 78Jackhammer 100

tIme to sPeedmPh sec0–120 31.90–110 22.80–100 17.10–90 13.20–80 10.20–70 7.80–60 5.90–50 4.60–40 3.50–30 2.50–20 1.60–10 0.6

Sound readings in dBA.

sLALom, mph57.6 77.5

B66.5

B

Balance: heavy understeer; 700-ft slalom, 100-ft spacing.

sKidPAd, g0.72 1.12

B0.91

B

Balance: moderate understeer; 200-ft skidpad

LengTh 196.8 in. widTh 78.1 in. heighT 52.4 in. Curb weighT 5430 lB scale: 10 In.(254 mm) dIvIsIonsdrawIng By tIm Barker© road & track/hearst magazInes, Inc.wheeLbAse 124.4 in. TrACK, f/r 66.6 in./67.0 in. ground CLeArAnCe 4.5 in. TrunK sPACe 6.9 cU Ft

0–60 mph 0–1/4 mile Top Speed Skidpad Slalom

5.9 sec

14.7 sec

125* mph

0.91g

66.5 mph

Configuration gasoline/electric series hybrid

engine alum. block & head, dohc, I-4t

displacement 1998 cchorsepower (sAe) 260 bhpfuel injection directrec fuel premium

motor two AC permanent magnet synchronous motors

Cooling liquidPower electronics liquid-cooledhorsepower 201 hp/150 kW; 402

hp/300 kW combinedTorque 959 lb-ft combined

Type lithium prismaticLocation under floor, central tunnelCooling liquidno. of cells 315weight 606 lbenergy capacity 20.1 kWhCharge mode Level I, IIrecharge time@ Level i (110V) 12 hours@ Level ii (220V) 6 hours

140-mph speedometer, power/regen, fuel level, range

front, side and curtain airbags; traction & yaw control

our driving 20.5 mpgePA hybrid/gas 54 mpge/20 mpgCapacity/range 9.0 gal./195 milesrecommended fuel premium

Layout front engine/ rear motors, rear drive

body/frame unit steel, aluminumbrakes front: 14.6-in. vented, floating

discs/ 6-piston fixed calipers rear: 14.4-in. vented discs/

4-piston fixed calipersAssist type vacuum, ABSwheels f/r cast alloy, 22 x 8½/22 x 9½

Tires f/r Goodyear Eagle F1 Supercar, 255/35WR-22/285/35WR-22

spare tire puncture kitsteering rack & pinion, variable

assist and ratiosteering ratio 14.8:1steering wheel 14.8 in. diameterTurns, lock to lock 2.8Turning circle 40.4 ftsuspension, f/r upper & lower A-arms,

coil springs, tube shocks, anti-roll bar/multilink, coil springs, tube shocks, anti-roll bar

Test weight with driver: 5600 lbweight-to-power ratio: 21.5 lb/bhp

seating capacity 4head room, f/r 38.0 in./34.0 in.seat width, f/r 2 x 16.0 in./2x 15.0 in.front leg room 46.0 in.rear knee room 22.0 in.seatback adj. 50 degseat travel 8.0 in.Lat. seat support average

basic warranty 5 years/60,000 milesPowertrain 5 years/60,000 milesrust-through 6 years/unlimited