The Renault Twizy was never meant to be quick. It was meant to be clever. Narrow. Urban. A rolling answer to the question, “What if a car was mostly door?” With its tandem seating, sci-fi plastic bodywork, and scissor doors that looked like they’d been borrowed from a rejected Tron sequel, the Twizy carved out a niche as the world’s most charming electric appliance.
Speed? Not its department.
Which is precisely why the lunatics at DM Performance decided it needed 80 horsepower and enough torque to bend reality.
The Mild-Mannered EV Goes Full Supervillain
The build begins the only way these stories ever do: with violence. Out came the Twizy’s factory 17-hp (13-kW) motor, a unit that treated acceleration as a polite suggestion. In its place went the powertrain from a Stark Varg—currently the electric equivalent of a 450cc motocross bike, and about as subtle as a brick through a greenhouse.
The numbers are absurd. Power jumps to 80 hp (60 kW), a 396-percent increase that turns the Twizy’s résumé from “reliable intern” to “HR liability.” But horsepower is only half the story. The Stark Varg motor is rated at 692 lb-ft (938 Nm) of torque.
Yes. Six hundred and ninety-two.
For perspective, a Lamborghini Aventador makes 509 lb-ft. A Ram 1500 TRX—a two-and-a-half-ton monument to supercharged excess—delivers 680 lb-ft. The Twizy now produces more twist than both, in something that looks like it should be parked next to rental e-scooters.
Torque is what you feel. And in a vehicle this small, this light, and this fundamentally unprepared for such nonsense, torque is everything.
Surgery, Not a Swap
Fitting motocross-bike fury into a French quadricycle required more than optimistic zip ties. DM Performance removed the original rear cradle entirely and fabricated a custom mounting solution. The Twizy’s direct-drive transaxle gave way to a bespoke chain-drive setup—because nothing says “this will end well” like industrial chain noise behind your seat.
To stop the differential from instantly converting itself into glitter, the team engineered a custom stainless-steel casing and packed it with high-pressure grease to approximate limited-slip behavior. It’s less “OEM refinement” and more “mechanical deterrence.”
Then came suspension. A set of Maxpeedingrods coilovers was bolted in to reduce body roll—and, presumably, reduce the likelihood of the Twizy attempting to reenact a gymnast’s floor routine mid-corner.
Lighter. Meaner. Slightly Unhinged.
The original 100-kg (220-lb) battery was replaced by the Stark Varg’s 32-kg (70-lb) pack. It’s lighter, slightly higher in capacity, and capable of discharging energy at a rate that suggests it holds grudges.
The result is a machine that weighs a fraction of conventional performance cars while delivering torque figures that belong in a pickup truck brochure. Power-to-weight here isn’t impressive. It’s irresponsible.
Drag Strips and Donuts
The resulting “Stark Twizy” didn’t stay in the workshop. It lined up against an Audi S1 Quattro in a 100-mph drag race—and won. Let that settle in. A vehicle originally designed for European city centers just outran a rally-bred hot hatch to triple-digit speeds.
Then the builders took it drifting. And because subtlety is clearly not in the business plan, they performed donuts around a Lamborghini Aventador—a scene that feels less like a comparison test and more like performance art.
Not Their First Bad Idea
This isn’t DM Performance’s first experiment in miniature mayhem. They previously built a Stark-powered Citroën Ami, though they admitted the Twizy’s rear-wheel-drive layout makes it a better canvas for hooliganism.
And if electric chaos doesn’t satisfy your appetite, they’ve also created a turbocharged, Hayabusa-swapped tuk-tuk trike producing 305 hp in a 460-kg package. That’s less a vehicle and more a physics demonstration.
The Point of It All
The Twizy was once a symbol of urban efficiency. Now it’s proof that the electric age doesn’t have to be sterile. It can be loud (mechanically), sideways, and deeply, profoundly silly.
Car enthusiasts often ask whether EVs can be fun. The answer, apparently, is yes—provided you’re willing to install motocross-bike torque into something the size of a vending machine.
Somewhere in France, an engineer who worked on the original Twizy is staring at the ceiling, sensing a disturbance in the force.
And in a small UK workshop, someone is probably looking at a lawnmower and thinking, “Eighty horsepower should do it.”
Source: DM Performance