I'd love one of those axle/motors. 400v isn't going to be necessary...unless you want to hit whatever the Lexus' max speed was.
See? Battery pack was "only" rated for 288v. 400v is the system voltage. Toyota uses a voltage multiplier, something else I would love to get my hands on, that presumably is used to boost battery voltage (perhaps only when necessary) to get more RPMs out of the motor. And maybe increase efficiency? Dunno, since there would be losses from boosting the voltage.
The Insight uses a 600v, 250a IGBT brick. The Civic hybrid has a 300a one. If you had a 288v battery, at 300a, you'd be able to put out 86kw at top speed. Lets say it maxes out at 1000 rpm at the wheels...that would put you in the neighborhood of 600 ft-lbs at 300 amps, at the wheels, after gearing. Bit weak, compared to a first-gear take-off, but after that, you'd be laughing. (if I didn't mess up my math)
Of course, we need to figure out how to control the IGBT first. and then you need a lot of batteries.
