Posted on 09/23/2011 12:03:24 PM PDT by Red Badger
A gallery of electric and hybrid vehicles on display at the International Motor Show in Frankfurt, Germany.
Prototype and production hybrids and electric cars debuted this week at the International Motor Show in Frankfurt, Germany. Car manufacturers showed off sportier designs—and some outlandish models.
The i8, shown here, is BMW's first plug-in hybrid sports car. It can reach 62 miles per hour in 4.6 seconds, has a top speed of 155 mph, and can achieve 87 miles per gallon. It weighs 3,200 pounds. A version of the car will probably be on sale by the end of 2013.
Credit: Internationale Automobil-Ausstellung
The Audi Urban concept car looks like a cross between a go-cart and a space capsule. The 1,058-pound electric car requires passengers to climb in through the top; it houses a 7.1-kilowatt-hour battery and takes about 17 seconds to get to 60 mph.
Credit: Internationale Automobil-Ausstellung
The RAK e (pronounced “Rack-ee”) has a lithium-ion battery that yields 62 miles per charge, and a top speed of 74 mph. The tiny two-seat design (reported weight is just 836 pounds) is targeted at young drivers.
Credit: Internationale Automobil-Ausstellung
The Ford Evos is not meant to go into production, but the company says the design will inform the development of future vehicles appearing as soon as 2012.
The plug-in hybrid shows the potential for cars to connect to the cloud and use social-networking tools and other sources of information. Ford envisions future cars tapping into a user’s calendar and prepping the cabin with whatever music the user was previously listening to.
Credit: Ford
The Lexus 2013 GS450h hybrid sedan is a faster, more energy-efficient version of Lexus’s previous hybrid. It can reach 60 mph in 5.6 seconds, and the company touts its high-performance sports-car-like handling.
Credit: Lexus
The Mercedes and Daimler AG Smart was developed in collaboration with chemical company BASF.
The electric concept car's transparent roof is made of solar panels that supply energy for climate control and the sound system. Plastic wheels make the car lighter, and organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDS) inside the car supply low-power energy. An infrared-reflective film material developed by BASF also helps keep the inside of the car cool.
Credit: Internationale Automobil-Ausstellung
I like the Ford Evos....too bad it’s not going to be a production model.
Put a four-cylinder in that, and I’d be highly interested.
I like em all except the Audi and the Lexus. The Ford and BMW look great.
For your reading pleasure...........
I guess I’m too practical and live in the real world. Besides the Ford and Lexus none of the new prototypes I’ve seen could handle the roads where I live.
There would be pieces of the undercarriage ground off all over town, and heaven forbid you have to take one down *gulp* a dirt road...
Why the heck does a car have to do “social networking”?
Good point, if I was ever T-boned by some ditzy woman updating her Facebook page while driving I’d be suing her and the manufacturer both the next day.
Looking forward to Ridley’s semi-remake of Alien. Not so sure about a remake of Blade Runner. A prequel might work.
The Rak E is an Opel. The thing in the back is probably an Opel version of the Volt. Ford needs to get away from that European mesh grille. They should use a variation of the US Ford 3 blade razor grill or something else. The mesh grille looks like crap. The rest of the car looks good and the BMW is super.
I bet BMW pulls it off. Don’t be suprised if they blow away what Fisker, Tesla and all the USA lib Dem car scam companies are trying to do. If BMW prices this around $50,000 to 60,000 then Tesla and Fisker are dead meat.
After careful consideration, I award the “Godawful ugliest car” award to the SMART electric.
None of these would ever be allowed to foul my driveway!
Surprised Ford is pushing the most useless “innovation” of all, MORE distracted drivers with their heads in the “Cloud”?
In the U.S. the only way to make most of these electrics legal would be to reduce them to three wheels so they qualify as motorcycles.
I will NEVER drive an electric car unless I build it myself, these are ridiculously complex, overly expensive, and too ugly to be allowed into production.
We already have plenty of rolling eyesores with the Honda Element and varied Scion atrocities.
The greenies are pushing this crap as an attack on our current infrastructure, these pieces of trash could only succeed with Chevy Volt type subsidies and major changes in DOT crash regulations.
A pox on all of them, and their backers!
Electric car batteries won’t like climbing mountain passes or cold weather (examples, high US elevations with eight months of winter, northern latitudes).
You’re thinking of lead-acid batteries. I don’t think lithium ion batteries react to cold the same way as lead-acid.......................
I’ve seen the arguments around the Net going both ways. But at lows down to -40 with 80+ mph winds for cold charging (dishonest tax policies and commie regulatory limits on buildings) and mountain grades for many miles, I won’t try it.
Nothing less than 4WD (not the misleading AWD: one-wheel-drive with three diffs) and at least a two-ton, six-cylinder, 22 mpg vehicle with good ice tires for me on ice over the passes. Let the gapers from distant suburbs stall or slip over the sides. ...not to mention their being routinely diverted from a major highway to long trips on back roads (revenues for other liberal counties).
So readers can easily get information on that issue,...
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