19 E-Mobility Engineering | March/April 2024 Frauscher x Porsche 850 Fantom Air | Dossier Frauscher shipyard To choose the right marine partner, Porsche’s researchers reached out to a handful of shipyards. Florian Helmberger, head of sales and marketing at Frauscher Boats, remarks: “When [in 2021] Porsche proposed a collaboration, it appealed to us not only because of their reputation for quality engineering, but also because we, at Frauscher, have been working on electric boats since the 1950s. That is due to regulations that mean people haven’t been able to use diesel- or petrol-powered boats on local lakes and rivers for a very long time.” Porsche and Frauscher initially considered electrifying the latter’s 1017 GT, a 9.99 m-long speedboat, typically running on two 430 bhp engines and having a 520 litre fuel tank. It has a deep-vee hull shape, which motivated some of the concept designs by the project engineers in which two battery packs were integrated in a vee-shape parallel with the hull. “We knew that most users of electric boats tend to use them on lakes, whereas the 1017 is more for seagoing owners,” Helmberger muses. “Based on its dimensions, the 1017 was deemed too big for what we wanted to deliver. And, honestly, even with the dual battery pack powertrain that had been proposed, the range wouldn’t be enough to cover the sort of distance that users of larger powerboats want to do. “We did consider putting the nextgen Macan powertrain into one of our smaller boats, like our 740 Mirage, which we’d previously electrified with a Torqeedo e-powertrain. However, we ran the numbers, and it just wouldn’t have worked from a packaging standpoint. We also would have been at the limit for the weight that the small hull could tolerate.” Hence, the 858 was chosen as the model to be electrified. It was considered ideally sized for both the Porsche powertrain and the market for an electric powerboat. Helmberger adds that the change in model coding from ‘858’ to ‘850’ stems from a tradition begun when Frauscher’s small, electric 750 St. Tropez boat – so-called for its length in centimetres – was fitted with a V8. The V8 version was renamed 757, due to its exhaust having made it 7 cm longer. fashion to that EV. This powertrain is typically delivered by Porsche as a skateboard, carrying a control unit, the 100 kWh battery pack, the inverter, either a single rear-mounted e-motor or a front one as well, and suspension and steering systems connecting to the wheels. In the eFantom, just the battery, inverter and standard motor carry over, as well as a modified version of the control unit. There are also some optimisations for the very different use case and operating environment of a powerboat versus a car. Porsche adds that as soon as series development was launched, the project was strongly connected to and steered via the Macan product line, with the line’s vice-president, Jörg Kerner. Combine a Porsche electric powertrain with a Frauscher powerboat and you get the Frauscher x Porsche 850 Fantom Air (Images courtesy of Frauscher except where otherwise stated) The boat’s hull is from Frauscher’s 858 Fantom Air, while the powertrain is a modification of the Premium Platform Electric, co-developed by Porsche and Audi within Volkswagen Group
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