This Twingo prototype’s looks are a far departure from the outgoing model, which used a corporate fascia and a unique rear-engine, rear-wheel drive layout. The general shape is shared with the first-gen Twingo, while the fascia is a charming, modern take on the original car’s quirky, joyous headlight design. The new car even gets the offset triple vent openings on the hood, but here, they’re far more pronounced and stick out of the body, rather than sitting flush.

Gallery: 2026 Renault Twingo Prototype

Renault has yet to release any specifications on the upcoming Twingo, but promises an incredible efficiency number of up to 6.2 miles per kWh. For some context, that would make it the most efficient electric vehicle on sale in the U.S., surpassing the rear-wheel drive Ioniq 6, which can only achieve 4.2 miles per kWh.

The new Twingo will slot under Renault’s new electric Renault 5 hatch and its Renault 4 compact SUV, using the same “AmpR Small” modular architecture. Design, engineering, and production will be the responsibility of Ampere, Renault Group’s small EV subdivision.

Renault says the new Twingo will carry a starting price “under €20,000,” or around $21,700 at current exchange rates. An especially enticing entry price considering most EVs on sale today are too pricey for the average buyer to afford.

That combination of attractive design, impressive efficiency, and affordability makes the fact that we’ll likely never see the new Twingo for sale in North America all the more tragic. The most we can hope for is this car inspiring automakers with dealerships on this side of the pond to take small, cheap EVs more seriously.

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Dubbed Concept 20-23, the design study envisions a sporty urban electric car that takes inspiration from Nissan’s participation in Formula E, as well as online simulator racing. It also pays tribute to the brand’s heritage of bold hatchbacks.

The name of the concept reflects 20 years of Nissan Design Europe (NDE) being located in the heart of London, as well as Nissan’s traditional number 23 (ni san) and the current year.

Gallery: Nissan Concept 20-23

The Nissan Concept 20-23 was designed at NDE by a team including some of the studio’s younger members. The brief was simple: to design a car – with no constraints – that they would like to drive on the streets of London.

Since this is an exterior design model only, there are no specifications available, but seeing as Nissan describes it as an urban EV, it’s probably sized similarly to a Micra subcompact hatchback.

Shaped By Aerodynamics

The Concept 20-23 adopts a basic three-door hatchback body style that’s adorned with extreme aerodynamic elements front and rear, including deep skirts that direct the airflow away from the front of the car through apertures to cool the brakes and out through vents just behind the front wheels.

Seen from the side, the Nissan Concept 20-23 features bulged wheel arches filled with large motorsport-style wheels mounted on low-profile tires; the wheel arches have vented louvers at the top to reduce the pressure that can create air resistance in the wheel bay.

The side profile also reveals the extended skirts that hug the body side on the lower portion of the car, while angular slits frame the air outlet behind the front wheel and the air inlet for the rear brakes.

At the back, there’s a massive single-piece roof spoiler and lower portion defined by a squared off diffuser and the horizontal bar below it.

In contrast with the vehicle’s tough-looking aerodynamic elements, the LED headlights and taillights consisting of a thin upper and lower semi-circle give the Concept 20-23 a friendly appearance. The turn signal is part of the same semi-circle LED unit, while a wide bar underneath emphasizes the vehicle’s width.

Highlights also include the scissor doors that hinge upwards from the base of the A-pillar, the exterior grey paint with a textured finish, the number 23 on the rear three-quarters, and a roof scoop designed to provide additional interior ventilation.

Minimalist Interior With A Focus On Performance 

Speaking of the interior, the Concept 20-23 is an exterior model only, but that hasn’t stopped Nissan’s interior designers from creating a cabin in tune with the wild-looking exterior.

The performance-focused interior features a brace bar running across the door openings, two deep bucket seats with a large head support reminiscent of racing cars, and an extended steering column that ends with a steering yoke with multiple controls and adjustments.

The minimalist cabin features only two screens displaying vital information, but it’s not easy to locate them in these images.

“The young team here at NDE was given a simple brief: design a fun electric city car that you’d like to drive every day in London,” said Alfonso Albaisa, Nissan’s Senior Vice President for global design. “The 20-23 Concept that they designed is a compact hatchback which is strongly influenced by the online racing world. I love the story it tells about how the worlds of modern city living, online gaming, and zero emissions mobility intersect.”

Unfortunately, Nissan did not provide hints as to what type of electric powertrain would suit the Concept 20-23 best. The company’s plans with it remain unknown, too, but given that it’s an exterior model, we assume it will provide design inspiration for future Nissan EVs.

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The new Hyundai Santa Fe adopts a boxy exterior appearance that makes the new model look more chiseled than any previous generation.

Hyundai describes the XRT as “a concept model tailored to cater [to] diverse needs of outdoor enthusiasts.” It uses the Calligraphy trim as a starting point and adds a variety of components. There’s a roof rack with a spare tire. A ladder is on the rear. A small storage case is on the side at the rear. The customized SUV wears more rugged tires than the stock vehicle, too.

This story is developing…

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China remains a lucrative market for luxury sedans. Many of the world’s automakers not only offer luxury saloons in the Asian country, but they also offer China-specific models. Lincoln is no different, revealing the Zephyr Reflection at 2021 Auto Shanghai. It’s a sleek, modern concept that previews the production version that the company will debut later this year. Lincoln designed the vehicle “solely” for the Chinese market.

The Zephyr Reflection sports a familiar Lincoln look, though it’s been thoroughly reworked to look wholly unique. The Lincoln badge at the front is prominent, sitting against a new grille with a starburst pattern that further accentuates the bold badge. It also sits framed between chrome strips that extend to the sleek headlights before blending into a bold body line over the front fender and down the side of the sedan. Underneath the new face is a sporty-looking bumper with big (fake?) intakes pushed to the lower corners.

Gallery: Lincoln Zephyr Reflection

Inside, Lincoln gives the concept a dash-spanning panoramic screen that houses the instrument cluster and massive infotainment display. The entire setup consists of three different screens. The Zephyr also sports Lincoln’s new human-machine interface language called Constellation, which is available in three themes: Normal, Sport, and Zen. However, specific details about the tech are scarce at the moment.

The interior is a minimalist’s playground, with the touch button-based gear selector being the most prominent instrument panel feature. Below that is the center console with a sleek controller, more capacitive-looking buttons, and a storage cubby at the front.

The concept doesn’t look too wild, so it’s unclear how much of the design will change between now and the production version’s reveal. We doubt it’ll change by much inside or out. Lincoln revealed the Zephyr Reflection at Auto Shanghai 2021 alongside the Lincoln Corsair PHEV, which is joining the company’s Chinese lineup for the first time.

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Lincoln

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Back in the ’90s, before the reign of the Ford Raptor in the past decade, there was the SVT Lightning. The go-fast ninth and tenth generations of the Ford F-150 were popular among enthusiasts, and that’s all thanks to the Blue Oval’s Special Vehicle Team (SVT).

With a supercharged 5.4-liter V8 that makes 360 horsepower (268 kilowatts) and 325 pound-feet (440 Newton-meters) of torque in its latest iteration, the SVT Lightning was exceptionally fast at the time.

But did you know that the Lightning almost had an SUV brother based on the first-generation Ford Expedition called the Thunder?

Gallery: This ’90s Ford F-150 Lightning Packs a Supercharged Surprise

Just like what the GMC Typhoon is to the Syclone, the Thunder was supposed to be the more practical version of the Lightning that didn’t come to fruition. Why? A Donut Media interview (video embedded above) with John Coletti, SVT’s Chief Engineer from 1994 to 2004 sheds light on the story of the stillborn concept.

The SVT Thunder was practically a Lightning with three rows of seating. Coletti and his team have built a prototype towards the end of 2000 by shoehorning the same supercharged V8 and the Lightning platform into the Expedition.

The result was expectedly great. A 0-60 mph sprint of just 5.6 seconds, which was nearly 4 seconds quicker than the normal Expedition. While fast SUVs aren’t a surprising thought these days with the Jeep Grand Cherokee Trackhawk and Dodge Durango SRT Hellcat around, the SVT Thunder would have been a precursor to what these exciting SUVs embody today.

Unfortunately, timing wasn’t on SVT’s hands back then. The first-generation Expedition only had two years left in its lifespan in 2000 (the second-generation model was introduced in 2002), so introducing a special version of the nameplate would have been a waste.

To this day, only one prototype was built by Coletti and his team at SVT. Such an anticlimactic ending, we reckon, but it is what it is.

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Donut Media

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A lot has happened in the world since 2017, so we can’t blame anyone for forgetting about the Infiniti Q60 Project Black S concept. It boasted 563 horsepower (420 kilowatts) and was supposed to make use of Formula One powertrain tech. However, the company has officially canceled the undertaking, according to Automotive News.

“The concept continues to inspire us,” Infiniti spokesperson Kyle Bazemore told Automotive News. The Project Black S is never seeing production, though.

Gallery: Infiniti Project Black S Prototype

Former Infiniti boss Roland Krueger was reportedly the person spearheading the Q60 Project Black S concept within the company. However, when he left to take over Dyson’s automotive development, the program died with no one else to push it onto the market.

The Q60 Project Black S used a twin-turbo 3.0-liter V6 with three motor-generator units for energy recovery and a 4.4 kilowatt-hour lithium-ion battery for storing the power. In total, this setup was good for 563 hp (420 kW) and 350 pound-feet (475 Newton-meters) of torque. It was able to reach 62 miles per hour (100 kilometers per hour) in under four seconds, the company estimated. The automaker completed two fully running prototypes for testing this powertrain.

As of August 2019, Infiniti’s decision-makers were making the final choice about whether to put the Project Black S into production. Clearly, they gave it the thumbs down.

Dealers aren’t broken-hearted about losing the Project Black S. “I would much rather see something like the QX60 [crossover]. That’s a volume vehicle, that’s where this company needs to go,” Ed Lennon, the Infiniti National Dealer Advisory Board chairman, told Automotive News.

Under Renault-Nissan-Mitsubishi’s new strategy, Infiniti is focusing on appealing to the United States and China. This plan might include not replacing any of its rear-drive coupes and sedans when they reach the end of their lifetimes. More crossovers are likely on the way.

Source:

Automotive News

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Not all concept cars feature space-age styling and fictional power sources. Sometimes, they are merely cooler versions of a car you can buy right now. That’s what Volkswagen offers with its handsome Jetta GLI Blue Lagoon concept, and though you can’t buy this tweaked car from a dealership, you could build it yourself if you really wanted to.

VW fans will likely recognize the Blue Lagoon tie-in. 2004 saw the sporty Mk4 Jetta GLI enter the US market, and it arrived wearing an eye-popping exterior shade of blue called Blue Lagoon. This 2021 concept honors that classic GLI, though curiously, it’s not painted the same color. Instead of simply heading to a paint booth with the old hue in-hand, the team behind the concept turned to aftermarket body wraps until a near-match for Blue Lagoon was found. As such, the 2021 Jetta GLI seen here is actually a black car wrapped in ORAFOL Midnight Blue Metallic.

Gallery: VW Jetta Blue Lagoon GLI Concept

Obviously, there’s more to the concept than just the color. VW’s team turned to Air Design for aftermarket side skirts and the subtle rear spoiler, with Fifteen52 handling the Critical Aero Design front spoiler. The GLI sits a bit lower courtesy of H&R coil-overs, and 20-inch BBS wheels fill the arches. Inside, the Blue Lagoon GLI gets a golf ball shift knob and leather Recaro front seats.

The rest of the car is standard-issue Jetta GLI, which isn’t a bad thing. Power comes from a turbocharged 2.0-liter four-cylinder, sending 228 horsepower (170 kilowatts) to the front wheels through either a six-speed manual or a seven-speed dual-clutch automatic. It’s a lively machine in a declining sports sedan segment, so it’s nice to see VW giving the car some extra love, if only in concept form.

“The Jetta GLI has been an enthusiast favorite throughout its 37-year history,” said Sean Maynard, VW enthusiast and motorsport marketing specialist. “Paying tribute to the Mk4 with this build concept celebrates the passion that goes into these vehicles.”

This one-off Jetta will tour with the Volkswagen Enthusiast Fleet at events throughout the US.

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Volkswagen

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Hyundai is looking to the not-too-distant future with its latest project, called the Tiger X-1 Ultimate Mobility Vehicle. Designed by the automaker’s forward-looking New Horizons studio – in partnership with the software and design experts at Autodesk and Sundberg-Ferrar – the Tiger X-1 can theoretically deliver parcels and supplies to remote locations without a crew on board to operate the vehicle.

The Tiger (which stands for “Transforming Intelligent Ground Excursion Robot”) is the second Ultimate Mobility Vehicle from New Horizons, building on the lessons learned from the Hyundai Elevate concept from 2019. Like the Elevate, the Tiger features all-wheel drive, and each wheel is mounted to an articulating subframe, allowing the unmanned cart to climb and walk over obstacles that are too large to drive over. It also gets 360-degree locomotion, meaning the wheels can swivel independently of one another, allowing for forward and side-to-side movement, as well as rotation.

According to Hyundai, the Tiger X-1 was designed to function as a mobile scientific exploration platform, enabling on-the-fly deliveries to extreme, remote locations from more centralized bases. Helping the vehicle in this mission is an unmanned aerial vehicle, which can deliver the Tiger to a suitable drop zone near its destination, as well as recharge the cart if need be. Owing to its modular design, the X-1 can accommodate a variety of cargo bodies, but it is designed to be completely unmanned, unlike the passenger-transport Elevate.

One slightly sinister use, according to Sundberg-Ferrar, is uncrewed surveillance. A camera body would attach to the Tiger, allowing it to do some reconnaissance in “locations not suitable for humans.” Hyundai representatives also admitted that some defense and military applications would make sense, helping improve troop safety by undertaking driverless deliveries in hostile territory. The Tiger could also be used to deliver supplies to areas damaged by natural disasters and climate incidents, as well as provide search-and-rescue support.

The Tiger X-1 uses Autodesk’s skills in generative design, reducing weight without sacrificing strength. Like the Elevate before it, the Tiger is a study that Hyundai will evaluate for potential use cases, and as the technology to build it becomes more attainable, it’s possible the Tiger X-1 will be delivering everything from urban packages to relief aid supplies in the near future.

Gallery: Hyundai Tiger X-1 Ultimate Mobility Vehicle

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Hyundai

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If the name “BMW” leaped into your brain while scanning the Ioniq 5 photos, you aren’t alone. The hooded quad LED headlight accents and well-defined hood bulge suggest some design inspiration from Bavaria. The resemblance fades the further aft one’s eye moves down the Ioniq 5’s body; by the time your gaze makes it to the rear doors and tail, you might begin noticing some rather cool ’80s Euro hatchback cues. We see some Lancia Delta Integrale in the Hyundai’s chunky butt, raked hatch, and flared rear fenders. The full-width graphic on the rear where the four square taillights live is unique, and matches the front, though each end of the car features unusually large Hyundai “H” badges that seem out of scale.

The Ioniq 5’s body is generally clean, with restrained surfacing and the aforementioned chunky volumes, similar to the 45 Concept, but there are interesting details, too. The front wheel arch is molded with twisting marks that bring to mind slotted brake rotors or a camera lens, and silvery trim adorns the lower body and lighting elements. The bright portions of the massive 20-inch wheels work in visual concert with the fender adornments, while the inner section is a wonderfully intricate web design reminiscent of the rollers on newer Genesis luxury products.

Underneath its edgy styling, the Ioniq 5 will use Hyundai’s all-new global electric car platform, which arrives as part of a big EV push that will see the Korean automaker spin the Ioniq name off as the brand for its electric cars and SUVs. The Ioniq 5 will be capable of taking on 62 miles of range in only five minutes of charging (per European testing standards) and can even deliver power externally, supplying up to 3.5 kW for 11o- or 220-volt devices. Look for further details and a full reveal of the Ioniq 5 soon.

READ ON
Hyundai’s Ioniq Concept Cabin Is the EV Living Room of the Future
A Week With the 2020 Hyundai Ioniq HEV Limited
The Hyundai Ioniq Electric Offers Serene Simplicity

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It won’t be an exaggeration if we say that Mercedes-Benz has a love affair with portal axles. It probably started with the G500 4×4² before the awesome E-Class All-Terrain 4×4² debuted in 2017. Just a few weeks ago, the Stuttgart-based automaker reinvented the idea for the new era of mobility with the EQC 4×4².

Only a concept at this point, the high-riding zero-emission SUV is finally making its first appearance on camera. A new promotional video features the prototype performing off-road maneuvers and pulling wakeboard world champion Sanne Meijer. With the clip, Mercedes asks a fundamental question – “who says electric cars and action-loaded driving don’t go together?” The answer is simple: “that’s in the past.”

Gallery: Mercedes EQC 4×4² concept

And if you are still on the fence about whether electric vehicles can do proper off-roading, the rugged EQC will surely convenience you. It gets portal axles and a lifted suspension that raises the ride height from the standard 140 mm (5.5 inches) to 293 mm (11.5 inches) – a whole 23 mm (nearly one inch) higher than the G-Class. Not only that, but the switch to portal axles also brings a massive increase of the fording depth by 150 mm (5.9 inches) to 400 mm (15.7 inches).

Those chunky off-road tires you see in action in the video are actually 20-inch wheels wrapped in 285/50 R20 rubber. With all those mechanical upgrades, we’ll forgive the one-off EQC for looking a lot like a Kia Sportage at the back.

Needless to say, unfortunately, Mercedes has no plans to bring that concept into production. Maybe a less hardcore, off-road-oriented version of the EQC is a possibility in the future but it’ll be nowhere near the EQC 4×4²‘s  outlandish off-road capabilities.

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Mercedes-Benz

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