Let’s look at the data. A Charger EV’s performance metrics reveal some fundamental engineering signals typical of big battery upgrades to old dirty burners. At 5,925 pounds, this vehicle clocks in some mass inefficiency. That beefy three ton design for a two-door car is objectively weird from a systems perspective.
Despite big car weight inefficiency, the 670hp electric drivetrain coupled with AWD achieves 0-60 in 3.3s compared with the Hellcat’s slippy rear-wheel 3.6s. This delta is expected given better traction coupled with electric motor advantages (peak torque at 0 RPM) versus an always disappointing ICE torque curve dependency.
What’s telling is the two converge at 100mph (8.0s vs 7.8s) and quarter-mile trap speeds (119mph vs 125mph), demonstrating battery-electric has a designed performance curve under sustained load. The 136mph top speed limitation further confirms power delivery designs of the current battery architecture.
The braking performance (151ft from 70mph) is adequate given its mass, but “seesawing” behavior and “excessive understeer” during skidpad testing sounds like some suboptimal weight distribution and chassis tuning. That means significant security concerns in emergency avoidance scenarios.
All in all, the Hellcat is yesterday’s lettuce. Nonetheless the Charger EV simply beats it, without flourish, and could have done much better… given where performance norms are at these days for new cars. I had expected a sub 3s performance, maybe even approaching sub 2s. And better handling. Low and middle center of gravity should be leveraged into a handling upgrade.