Opel has developed a prototype for a first electric rally car built to meet FIA specifications, revealing its new Mokka GSE Rally which has been designed to meet the recently introduced eRally5 regulation.
Motorsport’s governing body had ratified a technical regulation to allow all-electric vehicles to be homologated at the bottom of the current rallying pyramid in 2022; three years later, Opel will give a public debut to the first vehicle built to those specifications at this week’s ELE Rally Eindhoven – albeit in prototype form and not in a competitive context.
With its ADAC Opel Electric Rally Cup one-make series based around the Corsa-e, Opel was already the main proponent of electric powertrains in rallying. It’s now unveiled its vision for the next step to succeed the Corsa, unveiling a prototype with more than double the power figure of the first-generation Corsa-e (280bhp vs 130bhp).
Opel’s targets are ambitious with its new eRally5 machine: it claims the new machine will “promise performance on a par with a Rally4 car,” with two of the main improvements from its Corsa-e predecessor coming from new engine software tuning and battery management.
A specific homologation date for the Mokka GSE has not been confirmed but Opel did hint that it “could thus be used worldwide in multiple customer sport competitions from the 2026 rally season.”
As was the case on the units supplied by Compact Dynamics during the World Rally Championship’s hybrid era, there is an alarm and indicator system fitted to the Mokka GSE – but with a different design.
The car’s battery is fully encased and has its own underbody chassis protection; a visual and acoustic warning system will fire in case of malfunction. Opel has also claimed the car’s entire high-voltage system will automatically disable within tenths of a second should onboard g-force sensors measure a rapid deceleration in case of an accident.
Earlier this month Opel introduced new charging infrastrucutre for its all-electric series, restoring 80% of charge in its Corsa-e rally cars in under half an hour, which can now be powered by a low-voltage supply rather than requiring a transformer connected to a medium-voltage grid.
