Volkswagen XL1

Even if your interest for cars doesn’t qualify you as a fan, you’ve certainly heard about concept cars, specially during auto shows. They’re always intended to take everyone’s attention, such as Citroën with Survolt’s design, but the purposes vary. While that one came only to impress at these events, others anticipate the automaker’s future trends. The design ones can come indirectly, like with Ford Evos, but the technological ones come much more clearly, like VW’s latest project to receive the production version.

Volkswagen’s projects of a super-efficient car have been developed for more than a decade, since the first prototype was showed in 2002, the 1-Litre concept car. All those studies have been done under Ferdinand Piëch’s management, which helps to explain the big similarities since the first project to this article’s car: the intention of achieving the lowest possible consumption rates was always there, like with every other automaker, but only VW has specificated it to the special number of 1 l/100 km, which can be expressed also as 235 mpg and 100 km/l and has been achieved since that first vehicle. The challenge, therefore, became adapting the test prototype to the production model. There was another concept car which seemed to take the studies to a different structure, called L1, but the final vehicle has very much in common with the first one. The essential concern with the aerodynamics has been expressed in the streamlined body, which is 153.1 inches long, 65.6 inches wide but only 45.4 inches tall. The wind flow also demanded a narrower rear axle with covered forged magnesium 16” wheels, although bigger and wider than the 15” front set – by the way, there is carbon fiber here, indeed. This car uses it on the monocoque, while other parts combine materials such as aluminum and magnesium. Another good part is that creating a super-efficient vehicle didn’t stop VW of making it look sporty.

The front fascia even follows its current design trend (looks like a compressed Scirocco’s), and there are several items to enhance the design without leaving the rules of aerodynamics: the arch-shaped LED tail lights give a futuristic touch, while the windows with small opening parts remind sports cars like McLaren F1 and the gullwing doors of the old race cars, opening with part of the roof to make the occupants’ entrance easier. The interior abandoned the original tandem configuration to have the seats almost side by-side. The cabin doesn’t expose much luxury, keeping the good impressions to the visible carbon fiber parts and, specially, to the door-panel monitors, which are fed by rearward-facing exterior cameras to serve as rearview mirrors. XL1’s extensive use of lightweight materials pays off at the final 1750 pounds, while dropping 1-Litre’s original aircraft-inspired canopy in favor of a conventional cabin didn’t disturb this car’s drag coefficient, resulting at 0.189. That’s why its hybrid powertrain needs only a two-cylinder 800-cc diesel engine with 48 hp, paired to a 27-hp electric unit to give a combined 69-hp power and 103-lb-ft torque; the DSG seven-speed gearbox with rear traction gives 0-60 mph in 12s7 and the top speed limited to 100 mph. XL1 will start with fifty units sold in Europe, but even if the acceptance spurs more units to be produced, this car’s profit won’t ever come in money. VW’s concern is to adapt most of XL1’s technologies to the conventional cars, just like it was revealed with up!: it’s expected that most of this powertrain is going to be applied to the supermini’s future hybrid version.