The Mercedes-AMG ONE is finally production-ready!
Mercedes has long been working on the ONE, a road-car that is derived from its Formula 1 car. The car has the same 1.6-litre V6 engine you find on Mercedes’ Formula 1 machine, and the first batch of customers will start receiving delivery from the second half of 2022.
By Dhruv Paliwal
Getting a Formula 1 to behave on-road is one thing. Homologating it for daily use is another!
Honestly, as I type these words, it’s still not believable. The Mercedes-AMG ONE has become a reality. The road car, which is based on Mercedes-AMG’s Formula 1 car, has been in the making for years now, has finally reached production-ready status.
The engine in the back of the ONE is a 1.6-litre V6 unit, the same as the Formula 1 car. Now of course, a lot of engineering has gone into making it ready for road-use. Mercedes-AMG has had to condense all its start-up procedures into the act of pressing a single power button, which is quite remarkable as dozens of personnel are required to make sure a Formula 1 car starts up properly. One of the quirks they had to deal with was that the Formula 1 car idles at around 4,000 to 5,000rpm, while the ONE idles at 1,250rpm.
The total powertrain output is rated at 1,049bhp. Apart from the V6 engine, there are four electric motors on the AMG ONE that help reach this number. One electric motor dedicatedly helps spin the turbo for a quick response time. Mercedes says that the acceleration response of the ONE is faster than that of a naturally aspirated V8 petrol engine. Another electric motor sits with the engine at the rear of the car powering the rear wheels. Finally, two electric motors in the front power individual wheels, making it AWD (unlike a Formula 1 car). The battery pack is limited to 8.4kWh which allows for a limited electric range of 18kms.
While a lot of cars now have drive modes, the Mercedes-AMG ONE goes one further. It has six of them! And, you cannot use all of them on the road. The modes Race Safe, Race and EV are for the road. Then you have Race Plus and Strat 2, which are restricted to track usage. They lower the car along with firming up the suspension. Finally, you have the Individual mode which allows you to set customised settings for the road.
As far as buying it goes, well, you better be one of the 275 customers who have already committed to paying $ 2.72 million (over Rs 21 crore) for their cars.
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