thoughts on automotive design

XJ – Jaguar’s finest.

ronnieretro — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 16:08:38 +0000

I’m a new addition and contributor to this blog. Call me Ronnie Retro. Having worked in the fashion industry for 10 years now my obsession is brand DNA, brand identity and brand reputation. Design is only a small part of the fashion (and automotive) business. In my job I always end up asking “but is it COOL?”

First post is this comparison of the current XJ and the original. The new car may look avant garde and unrelated to historic Jaguars at first glance but closer analysis shows the designers have done their homework and paid their homage. They balanced this beautifully with the need to create something fresh, modern and striking. The current XJ looks the business, especially in black and slinking through London in long-wheelbase guise. Mercs and BM’s pale into insignificance next to it (somehow looking way too mafia or corporate) and only a Rolls can outshine it at red carpet events. As for Maybach… the less said the better. Well done Jaguar. This car has single handedly answered a big fat yes to my first question. It’s COOL.

inspirations & icons: the birth of the jaguar C-X75

Lee — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 10:29:53 +0000

Lovely video here of a stunning concept car

new boxster

Lee — Sat, 21 Jan 2012 18:22:14 +0000

2012 Boxster (top) and 1961 718-WRS Spyder (bottom)

photocopy audi designs

Lee — Sun, 08 Jan 2012 20:07:08 +0000

I want to ask a question, can anyone actually tell the difference between an Audi A4 Avant and an A6 Avant? That means the station wagon to our US friends, or the estate version for Brits. Here in Finland the term Farmari is used (literally translates as farmer’s car). So my readers, since moving house in 2010, my neighbour has owned a nice silver Audi Avant- obviously quite new, and crucially de-badged so nobody can tell if he’s rich or poor. The thing is, I’m a serious car design geek- I could name most cars simply from a rear lamp design for example, but after nearly 18 months I still have no idea if my neighbour has an A4 or an A6! Clearly this works in much the same way as de-badging does for Audi, in that I still can’t tell how rich or poor the guy is! I’ve yet to ask him- but I will, as nobody except the man who writes the check can ever tell an Audi apart!

behind the scenes at BMW

Lee — Wed, 04 Jan 2012 07:55:37 +0000

If you look on the right hand side of my site- the links section now has a new link… which is this one. Recently BMW have added some nice videos and explanations of their design process. Their process is no different to any other manufacturer, so I highly recommend taking a look.

http://www.bmw.com/com/en/insights/bmw_design/index.html

2011 in review

Lee — Sun, 01 Jan 2012 15:26:25 +0000

The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2011 annual report for this blog.

Here’s an excerpt:

The concert hall at the Syndey Opera House holds 2,700 people. This blog was viewed about 11,000 times in 2011. If it were a concert at Sydney Opera House, it would take about 4 sold-out performances for that many people to see it.

Click here to see the complete report.

they like ‘em big… but sometimes also small

Lee — Sun, 04 Dec 2011 19:15:18 +0000

Nice image showing just how big US “sportscars” are, in comparison with Japanese ones (also popular in Europe of course).

US vs Japanese sizes

GM seeded apples….

Lee — Tue, 29 Nov 2011 10:29:20 +0000

Here’s a really interesting article written about GM’s history and it’s invention of car styling and marketing as we know it, linking it to the current design-led dominance of Apple. The similarities are clear, especially the annual new product releases as “events”. Steve Jobs also mentions this influence in his biography, when asked about which other companies are as closely integrated in terms of engineering and design (styling) and create and control all aspects of their products very carefully, he replies “auto manufacturers”. Link below.

How the iPhone got tail fins: Lessons Apple learned from GM

thanks to venturebeat.com

right, wrong and french- the future of the electric car

Lee — Thu, 20 Oct 2011 09:00:10 +0000

A glimpse of the future right now in 2011, are the new wave of electric or hybrid cars. Like the late great Steve Jobs achieved with the iPad, the car manufacturers of this world are attempting to move our vehicles from one age to the next. Where Jobs has moved us from the PC age, to the true home computing age, cars are about to move from using fossil fuels to much more environmentally friendly means of propulsion. The interesting thing here is that the car manufacturers seem to have got this all wrong, a lot like Microsoft did with tablet computing, they are applying their old business models and old engineering brains to this new problem. So I’d like to explain my point by putting each new hybrid/electric or whatever vehicle into right or wrong categories. So let’s start with wrong:

These cars just haven’t been designed with the correct attitude or market positioning in my opinion- the result is a product inferior in almost every way to a standard fossil fuel car. We can look to other product categories, such as computing with the ipad, or a more mature analogy of the flatscreen TV market. Here the manufacturers and innovators of plasma and LCD flat panel TVs absolutely did not aim to replace the average cheap tube TV. Remember we all had 21″ cheap brands, from Argos? Did Pioneer launch a decontented, basic functionality, 21″ plasma TV? No. Flatscreens entered the market at 42″ size, and they were not at all affordable. In fact the first one on sale was a Phillips 42″ which cost $15,000 in 1997 (Pioneer launched theirs later that year). People had literally never seen or heard of TVs as expensive and as large as these new generation. Early adopters with plenty of cash loved them, and “the big plasma” TV remains a status symbol, as the recent riots news stories were keen to remind us (despite them being cheap Argos items themselves now). So, early adopters are charged huge prices for extremely advanced technology- and the profits from these sales are used to push innovation and manufacturing into larger volumes and cheaper methods so that gradually prices dropped. We are now at a stage where all TVs are slim, LCD (an even more outrageously expensive technology at first) and larger than we ever had before. So why on earth do car manufacturers think they can immediately offer a car- with completely new technology, at the same price and to the same customers as current fossil fuel cars which they have spent the last 70+ years refining into a cost effect product? Complete madness, and the result is severely compromised vehicles using cheap underdeveloped technology solutions, which are still not cheap enough, so the manufacturers are forced to subsidise the true cost and make no profit at all! Here’s my list of the worst offenders.

Honda Insight: A rough, cheap feeling and sounding hybrid (according to journalists) which was designed with only one purpose- to undercut the price of the Toyota Prius. No thanks Honda- and you should know better (in fact your engineers do… see the FCX Clarity).

Nissan Leaf: A loss making marketing exercise aimed at making Nissan famous for introducing the first proper electric car. I owned a Nissan which beeped and warned me frantically when it’s petrol-filled fuel source reached only 100km range left. The Nissan Leaf’s total range when fully charged? 100km…. let’s hope they didn’t use the same dashboard warning software.

Reva G-Wiz: Not much to say about this- except it exploited a loophole in one particular city’s laws. Barely even a car, simply a plastic box with a close resemblance to those trolleys you can sit your kids in at the supermarket.

Mitsubishi i-Miev: Too narrow and unsafe looking- but a decent design effort for a city car, still aiming at being cheap rather than cool though. Marketing nightmare, I mean look at it? Who is it for?

Ok- so those guys got it wrong- but guess what, some manufacturers are getting it right and it is no accident that they are either totally new companies not tied down by traditional or restricted thinking (some have been started by total novices!), or they are companies that are so old they actually needed to think radically to stay alive and relevant. These companies are charging- quite rightly- a premium for this future technology. They are designing state-of-the-art transportation, that uses extreme engineering and new technologies and they are aiming those expensive and exciting products at rich and excitable new age consumers. The early adopters are of course very happy to lead the way, to show the world they are changing it with their wallet. These are the future success stories in the automotive arena- perhaps Telsa or even Fisker might in future become the Apple of cars? Who wants to bet that Tesla will be number 1 auto manufacturer in the world (currently Toyota) 25 years from now?

Tesla Model S: Not completely ground-breaking in exterior design, but it does have that modern electric car aesthetic of smooth surfaces and less body openings than usual. It also has an astonishing touch screen interior (as does the Fisker) and the entire company is doing things very differently, run by an ex-internet billionaire (paypal founder). This is Tesla’s second model, the first being a product that had almost no practical application other than to show-off the technology and to tempt those rich early adopters into joining in the development party. Genius.

Fisker Karma: (see my previous post): Made in Finland, designed by a Dane in California- who set-up his company there because he realised silicon valley was about to become the new Motor City…. I would bet that he will be correct. He (Henrik Fisker) also designed the Tesla Model S, to which they had a little falling-out over because they claimed he made it purposely less sexy than his own car! The Karma breaks all the traditional design rules because it starts from an entirely new packaging proposition- much like the plasma TV gave us “hang-on-the-wall” thinness. There is even a version that revives that ultimate luxury car product- the shooting brake!

Rolls Royce 102-EX: A real no-brainer here, Rolls Royces are for people to be driven in, who keep them in garages with an attendant driver to charge it up for them and electric motors ensure properly silent running. Owners are also willing to spend any amount to have the world not hate them for their opulence…

BMW i8: The i3 and the i8 from BMW are such radical thinking from BMW, they decided to create an entire new sub-brand, with a new design language also. They are made from materials that BMW have never used in full production before, and in the case of the i8 they emphasize pure performance. It has perfect 50/50 weight distribution, and 0-60 of 5 seconds, both cars use unique packaging only possible because of their EV or hybrid design. A lot like the Karma this new space utilisation creates a completely radical shape- not just design details, but the entire form and layout of the car moves us into the future. Wonderful!

Jaguar CX75: I absolutely love this car, look at how utterly gorgeous it is. Concept car perfection- and now destined for production in 2013. This is Jaguars first hybrid car and they have chosen (unlike Toyota, Nissan) to put it right at the very top of their range, as a halo product. This is of course genius, and makes our rich friends pay for the technology that we might all be driving with in the future. The CX75 concentrates on performance by using absolutely amazing turbine engines to charge the battery packs!

The French!

Renault Twizy: Now this is simply too odd to call- typically the crazy French are doing neither a premium halo product, nor attempting to simply give us an ordinary car with EV tech (ok, so Renault are actually rolling out a whole range which includes the most boring cheap looking saloon I’ve ever seen). No, Renault have decided to make a vehicle that is hard to label- a four wheeled covered motorbike for city streets. It is hard to guess exactly who might buy this device, or if we might see bunches of them droning up the slow lane of the M6 in the UK, or tottering through the vast long forest roads here in Finland (no is the answer to both) trying to swerve around a Moose. This is not a car- but it looks like fun!

As usual, here’s a gallery (and slideshow) of my research for this post.

Click to view slideshow.

sensible and not so sensible volvo

Lee — Sat, 13 Aug 2011 18:33:15 +0000

I’ve had a busy car ownership summer. It all started with a decision to invest some money into my home by renovating the kitchen and one toilet. This meant selling our 1yr old Qashqai- which we both loved to free up some capital. A truly great value and stylish family car, but occasionally it felt a little small for my family (my son was born last June). I developed a strange desire for total practicality and above all SPACE in my car choice. I looked for a Volvo estate, and quickly found a 2000 model V70. This was the first year of the curvaceous era of Volvo design- under the guidance of Peter Horbury, another legendary Coventry graduate. His reinvention of the Swedish brand was sublime and brilliant in surface execution. Curves and shapes inspired by steam treated curved wooden furniture (a Swedish speciality) can be seen for example in the b-pillar and catwalk (or shoulder) profile.

Volvo V70 curves inspired by Ikea- fact!

My V70 was a 2.4 light pressure turbo, automatic. It was huge- just enormous inside and out and it quite literally drove like a bus. It was very smooth, fast and quiet, but you may be wondering why I’m using past tense? Well the V70 has gone. It lasted 3 months for one simple reason- fuel economy. 10.8l/100km average (26mpg UK, 21mpg US!) was totally unacceptable for a family car, so after looking into a few options I went to my Volvo dealer and swapped to my first ever diesel car- a smaller (much smaller inside) V50. Immediately I’m happy to see incredible range and mileage explained by the trip computer. So far my first fill up claims 1090km range on one tank of fuel, and 5.6l/100km (50mpg UK and 42mpg US) average! Diesel fuel is also cheaper than petrol here in Finland so the savings are hopefully going to be massive! The design is rather less wonderful let’s say- it’s slick, and has that non-sporty but quality feel of a good Volvo, but I miss the extra smooth radiuses and more elaborate shaping of the lower surfaces on the V70… anyway, here’s a pic.