Donut Lab presents wheel hub motor with 630 kW

Donut Lab is based in the Helsinki area and is a subsidiary of the Finnish motorbike manufacturer Verge Motorcycles. The first ‘donut motor’ was developed some time ago for its Verge TS electric motorbike, which resulted in the motor having an empty rear tyre.

Donut Lab has now transferred the concept to other types of vehicles and confidently claims to have the world’s best torque and highest power density. The car version of the wheel hub motor fits into a 21-inch tyre, weighs just 40 kilograms, achieves a torque of 4,300 Newton metres and an output of 630 kW.

As several wheel hub motors are usually combined with each other, a vehicle with two of these wheel hub motors would already have a combined output of 1,260 kW. This would allow such a vehicle to compete in the hypercar segment. The Rimac Nevera, for example, has an output of. 1,408 kW, using four internal electric motors with permanent magnets.

“After a long wait, we finally get to present the next generation version of the most important component of our technology platform. Its performance capability is out of this world. Our donut motor has now also expanded into an entire motor family, which includes size options and performance classes for various uses,” says Marko Lehtimäki, CEO of Donut Lab.

Integrating the donut drive directly into the tyre eliminates the need for a power transmission, which should make the vehicles considerably lighter, more economical and easier to manufacture, according to the manufacturer. At CES, Donut Lab presented a total of five electric wheel hub motors, which are intended for various fields of application. In addition to the 630 kW car version, these include versions for lorries with 200 kW power, for motorbikes with 150 kW, for electric scooters/mopeds with 15 kW and a ‘mini donut’ for drones with 3 kW.

“This is the first electric motor that truly responds to the current requirements of electric vehicles and opens doors to completely new types of solutions. We’ve managed to bring something new to operators in the field that has previously not been possible – and this, in a nutshell, is Donut Lab’s mission,” said CEO Lehtimäki.

The company promises vehicle manufacturers considerable cost savings when using its drive system. This is because the drives are relatively light. In addition, should the same performance be achieved with a smaller amount of active mass, the costs should be significantly reduced.

In addition to the electric wheel hub motors, Donut Lab offers other important components within its modular Donut platform, namely battery modules, computer units and the software for controlling the vehicle. The company’s vision is for customers to be able to select the components they need from a catalogue and couple them quickly and easily with standard connections. According to Donut Lab, the components are designed to function optimally individually, but together they form a harmonised overall package and ensure high performance.

Source: Info via email, donutlab.com