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Renault Filante Record is here to push boundaries and break records

Published: 30 January 2025

► Targets EV efficiency, range records
► Filled with bleeding-edge tech
► Inspired by Renault record-breakers of old

No, this isn’t Captain America’s new ride, it’s the Renault Filante Record, a “laboratory on wheels” filled with innovative tech that the French brand hopes will break records. Efficiency rather than speed is the focus, and some of the tech will eventually trickle down to Renault’s production cars. It’s set to get rolling later in 2025 but you can see it at the RetroMobile show in Paris from 3-9 February.

It looks like a blue Batmobile

You’re not wrong. According to Renault, “the designers set out to create a monolithic sculpture of clean, flowing lines that could almost be described as organic.” Fighter jets and 19th Century speed records are cited as influences, there’s also a heavy dose of a particular Renault record-breaker of the past, on which more later.

Renault Filante Record 2025 side profile

All those influences add up to a wild-looking spear of a car. But every aspect of the Filante Record’s styling serves an aerodynamic purpose. Pick out any element of its bodywork and it’s drawn as tightly and smoothly as possible, to control the airflow around, over and away from the car as precisely as possible. Even the suspension components help.

The proportions are slightly odd, the car measuring 5.12 metres long and just 1.71 metres wide, the single-seater cockpit set a long way back. But, again, it’s a highly efficient shape that pierces the air. Computational fluid dynamics (CFD) testing has shown it works, wind tunnel validation begins in Spring 2025.

The colour is called Ultraviolet Blue, by the way. It’s a new shade that appears blue in some lights, violet in others.

New weight-saving battery pack

The Renault Filante Record has a hefty 87kWh battery pack – the same capacity offered in the Scenic E-Tech – but it weighs a comparatively skimpy 600kg. That’s because it employs cell-to-pack construction which does away with modules that usually sit between cell and pack. The technique also reduces the pack’s size and allows more flexibility in its shape. The carbon battery casing cuts weight even further.

Renault Filante Record 2025 rear three-quarters

Renault hasn’t revealed any details on the Filante Record’s motor, power output or performance figures. But the emphasis is on efficiency, not speed, so those stats aren’t especially relevant at this point.

Bleeding-edge manufacturing tech

Renault worked with race car builder Ligier to design the Filante Record’s chassis. Aside from aerodynamics, weight was the key consideration. The target was 1000kg; with a battery pack weighing 600kg, that left just 400kg for the rest of the car. As such, the car’s structure combines aluminium, carbon and steel alloys to maximise strength and minimise weight.

Renault Filante Record 2025 rear end

A technique called topology optimisation was used to make sure each material is only used where it’s needed, in the minimum quantity required for the job it has to do. The aluminium elements are made from a new form of the material – Scalmalloy – designed specifically for 3D printing. Renault notes 3D printing allows parts to be made with extreme precision and minimum waste.

Drive-by wire controls

Yet more weight is saved in the Filante Record by using steer-by-wire and brake-by-wire. The position of the all the controls has been ergonomically optimised, the steering yoke is built around a cylindrical digital screen that shows all the car’s vital data. The yoke is attached to the canopy; when it’s opened, the yoke moves clear of the seat.

Renault Filante Record 2025 cockpit view

That seat is upholstered in canvas stretched over a carbon ‘blade’ frame. Even the ventilation system uses a reduced number of components to keep weight down. Back outside, the Michelin tyres are designed to provide high levels of performance and grip while having as little impact on range as possible.

Renault’s past record-breakers

Renault’s motorsport history is long, storied and needs little explanation here. Less well known are its achievements in breaking speed and endurance records. Perhaps the best-known of Renault’s record-breaking cars is the fearsome 40CV des Records (pictured below), whose 100th anniversary the Filante Record marks.

Renault 40CV des Records

That car set a raft of speed and distance benchmarks over 3 hours, 500km, 500 miles and 24 hours. Tribute is paid in the Filante Record’s styling to the 1926 coupe iteration of the 40CV, aping it’s long, tapering shape, sloping nose and wide-set headlights.

Renault also name checks the Etoile Filante, a 1950s turbine-powered machine whose name is dropped for the Filante Record. The word ‘filante’ comes from the French ‘filer’, which means to spin, stretch or lengthen.

By Graham King

Senior Staff Writer for Parkers. Car obsessive, magazine and brochure collector, trivia mine.

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