KEEP ON RUNNING

The new Mercedes-Benz CLA has been revealed as the UK's longest-range and most efficient electric car.

- STORY: CHARLIE MARTIN

Arriving later this year, the entry-level CLA 250+ with EQ Technology will be capable of driving up to 790km between charges, claims Mercedes, and will still manage 690km if driven exclusively at motorway speeds.

Although pending homologation, these figures should mean the CLA EV leapfrogs all other electric cars available in the UK. That includes Mercedes' own flagship EQS 450+, which manages 775km per charge from a 118kWh battery.

That remarkable range is the result of Mercedes' efforts to minimise the CLA EV's energy consumption: it has a nickel-manganese-cobalt battery with a capacity of 85kWh.

This means the CLA EV achieves an efficiency figure above 8kmpkWh — which many manufacturers consider the key to taking EVs to the next level.

PUNCHY YET ALSO FRUGAL

The CLA EV's impressive range figure is in no small part thanks to its aerodynamic design. Although the car is larger than its predecessor in every dimension — 25mm wider (at 1,855mm), 25mm taller (at 1,468mm) and 30mm longer (at 4,723mm) — lots of work went into minimising its frontal area, and smoothing the flow of air around it.

For example, the wheels are set further in-board of the arches than previously. Small inlets on the front bumper (and corresponding outlets at the rear) guide the flow of air around each corner, relatively undisturbed by the alloy wheels' flush-faced designs.

The efforts net a slippery drag coefficient of 0.21, just behind that of the EQS (0.20) and ahead that of the Tesla Model 3 (0.22).

The CLA EV's new rear-mounted permanent magnet motor is also significant to its efficiency. It uses a new silicon-carbide inverter that brings greater output in a smaller package, reducing weight, while the engineers claim its torque density is boosted by the magnets being inserted in a double V formation, concentrating their field.