The article was originally produced on March 4, 2019, some facts and prices may have changed since then.
It wasn’t a cheaper entry-level model that everyone speculated about, but a bigger, stronger, faster and more expensive Koenigsegg than ever before! Let us present the new model Jesko!
Rumors about a new Koenigsegg that would be shown at the Geneva Motor Show in 2019 have been rife for a long time and that it would be about a cheaper entry-level model with hybrid drive called Ragnarök. But oh how wrong we all were. Enliven got to come down to the factory the week before the car show opened its doors and the curtain went off the new car, Koenigsegg Jesko.
The history of Koenigsegg stretches back as far as 1994 when the company was founded. But that’s not really the whole story because Christian was born 22 years earlier to his mother and father Brita and Jesko von Koenigsegg. But this particular story does not even begin here, as Christian’s father has a key role in the latest creation from the company in Ängelholm.
Jesko von Koenigsegg was born in 1938 and has stood behind Christian all the way both mentally and financially. At one point when the money ran out, the family sold their house in Stockholm to support Christian’s vision of building super sports cars beyond the ordinary. How many parents would have done such a thing to help their children is a question that arises. With hindsight and a 1.5-billion deal with Chinese Nevs, you can probably say that the decision to sell the house was not wrong. As a tribute to Jesko’s commitment and support, Christian has therefore chosen to name the new car after him, Koenigsegg Jesko!
Moreover, completely without Jesko’s knowledge and as a surprise until the unveiling at the fair. The name used when communicating with the father during the course of the project has been ”Dominate”. Another small tribute to father Jesko is that the exhibition car in Geneva will be white with green elements. The same colors used by the stables that bred Koeingegg’s racehorses.
As usual, rumors abound wildly before the launch of new models, and when it comes to a company like Koenigsegg, they are more numerous and more imaginative than usual. In this case, we have heard rumors of a cheaper entry-level model called Ragnarök with hybrid drive and more. Instead we got the Jesko, a 5 liter V8 with twin turbo units that with the tank filled with E85 delivers 1600 horsepower! Thanks to advanced new aerodynamic technology, a downforce of over 1000 kilos can be achieved. A new 9-speed dual-clutch box called the Koenigsegg Light Speed Transmission (LST) has also been developed. Four-wheel steering has also been added.
The carbon fiber chassis has been redesigned for more space, a prerequisite for even taller people. No exact performance figures have been presented yet, but after a conversation with test driver Niklas Lilja, we can look forward to impressive figures both straight ahead and on the racing track. It was Niklas who was behind the wheel when the record was broken for the fastest series-produced passenger car on a public stretch of road in the Nevada desert with 457.49 km/h.
The completely newly developed V8 engine with twin turbochargers impresses! New technology for the flat crankshaft (flatplane) has meant that it weighs only 12.5 kilos, making it the world’s lightest. This in turn means that you can get more power and a higher rev, which is now at 8500 rpm before the rev stop. The new and larger turbo units have an air injection that increases the effect. The technology involves injecting air with a pressure of 20 bar directly into the turbo, via a compressor, from a carbon fiber tank. The result is that so-called ”turbo lag” is completely absent.
On normal 95-octane petrol, the engine delivers 1,280 horsepower, but if you fill the tank with E85, the power increases to 1,600 horses and an insane torque of 1,500 Newtons. To get all that power down to the tires, a gearbox called duga is needed. In Jesko, there is therefore a brand new in-house developed dual-clutch box, named LST (Light Speed Transmission). What is unique and different compared to conventional dual-clutch boxes is that the LST can shift steplessly between gears, i.e. not gear by gear as is normal. And this almost at the speed of light, hence the name.
In addition, the weight of the gearbox has been reduced from the normal 140 kilos to just 90 on the Jesko. Another completely new technology to keep the weight down is the ultra-light, hollow, 20 inch carbon fiber rims. The technique how to do it is secret but the result is astonishing with a weight of 7.4 kilos and 5.9 front. A fun detail is that when developing and calculating the weight of these rims, when the finished rim was finished it weighed a whole kilo less. In contexts like this, a lot where every kilo is significant.
The Jesko is supposed to be a more track-oriented Koenigsegg than before. Therefore, more downforce is required than previous models. To achieve that, completely new technology has been developed for Jesko. The first thing you see related to this is the huge rear wing. The rear wing is active, so are the flaps that sit underneath and can adapt at different speeds to push the car down into the asphalt. The result is a ground pressure of 800 kilograms at 250 km/h and which rises to 1000 at 275 km/h. For comparison, these numbers are 30% more than the weight/power monster One:1 and 40% more than the Agera RS which was the car Niklas swept the track with in all things called speed records for a standard production car. At speeds over 350 km/h an hour, a ground pressure of over 1500 kilos will develop on Jesko!
When all this power is going down the hill and the enormous downforce is developed, previous models with more than 1000 horsepower have tended to nip in the front when the pressure is the most, imagine an elephant suddenly sitting on the hood at full speed. At Jesko, a so-called triplex system has been introduced, which technically consists of a third front damper that prevents the car from squealing when the pressure is at its highest. The rear trailer is also equipped with this system and together with the new four-wheel steering the Jesko will be extremely stable even at top speeds we can only speculate about so far.
However, it’s not all about numbers, performance and total control when it comes to Jesko. Comfort and convenient technology are also of the utmost importance. One of these things introduced with the Regera model is the Koenigsegg Autoskin technology. Autoskin allows you to open all doors and hoods electronically from the key. They have also divided the respective front and rear parts into two pieces for easier and cheaper replacement in the event of an accident. In order not to try to hide this, a chrome strip has been tastefully placed over the entire car between the two parts.
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