If you’ve never heard of a “Concept Car”, it’s about time you did.
A concept car or prototype vehicle is a vehicle specifically designed to be shown to the public, usually at an auto show, to showcase a manufacturers’ ideas, technology, or new designs. This can lead to some pretty wild and some stunningly gorgeous vehicles.
A lot of people agree that concept cars at auto shows across the globe have been pretty terrific. The only problem is that most cars which make it into production look very different than their concept.
Why is this?
If concept cars wow the public so much, why don’t manufacturers just release the show car and watch the customers line up, Black Friday style, just for the chance to have a vehicle that looks that good?
The answer to this is multi-faceted…
Cost:
It takes hundreds of millions of dollars to design a whole new vehicle. Part of this cost goes into the concept. And, it isn’t just the initial cost of creating the concept that usually hampers future production.
The cost to mass produce the exact same car as displayed on the showroom floor would make it unrealistically expensive. Manufacturers throw everything they can into a concept to show off. Putting every bit of futuristic tech and design element into the production car would be enormously expensive. The result is often a dialed back, more practical version of the showcase vehicle.
Regulations:
Regulations are those pesky things that often strip something, in this case a vehicle, from being over-the-top in many ways.
Things like safety regulations aren’t always taken into consideration when designing a concept vehicle. Manufacturers just aren’t willing to sacrifice a great idea or an especially beautifully designed portion of their car to adhere to a bumper regulation, especially if they know their concept won’t ever see an actual street anyway.
Potential:
The whole point of a concept car is to showcase a future vehicle’s potential, but it also exists to gauge the potential interest of the public.
If reactions are good, more than likely, a manufacturer is going to move forward with a certain aspect of the car or sometimes even the vehicle in its entirety. Conversely, public excitement can also allow a manufacturer to employ the “hurry-up-and-wait” tactic, flaunting what may be to come in the future.
Complication:
Much along the lines of cost, the amount of complication in technology and design in a concept car is often too expensive and too unproven to release right away in a consumer vehicle.
The concept car is just that. It’s meant to show off concepts, design direction, and potential technological advances. It only makes sense that an awesome new computer program or safety feature be the best that it can one time at the show so that it can be fully developed later for when you buy the actual car.
Ceiling:
Manufacturers know that no matter how good a car is or how stunning it is, it will eventually fall to newer and better vehicles.
Why not just make sure the vehicle is 100% ready to go, even if it doesn’t look quite as good as it did before? That’s what happens most of the time. And, that’s a good thing. The key is to make the vehicle intriguing enough to keep the customers happy while keeping costs down enough to keep it affordable.
Production cars aren’t always miles away from their concept versions, though.. Here are some of the closest concept to production vehicles ever made:
Plymouth Prowler:
The Prowler is one of the most recognizable cars in history. And, why not? It looks like it rolled right out of the L.A. Auto show floor. The prowler is the best example of a concept car that made it to production, even if it did turn out to be a flop in the real world.
BMW i8:
The i8 has been around for a few years now, but its production figure isn’t any less aged than when it came out. Its supercar hybrid status probably contributed the most to ensure that the production version of the i8 stayed true to the prototype styling.
Lexus LC500:
The LC500 is beautiful. It was nominated for several awards this past year. It also has more LFA-ness than most other Lexus models to date. All in all, it’s not the supercar that will challenge the likes of Lamborghini, Ferrari, and Pagani, but it isn’t supposed to be. Besides that, it looks better than most of those other guys anyway.
Acura NSX:
Another looker, the NSX hasn’t seen as much success or achieved the kind of status its first iteration did back in the 1990’s. Still the NSX is an underrated and technologically advanced machine that is every bit as fast as its competitors.
Hyundai Genesis Coupe:
Ok, so I’m biased, but… Back in 2007, the concept looked almost exactly like the production model when it came out in 2009. Take away some of the over exaggerated exhaust openings and some of the extra character lines on the doors, and it’s a near mirror image.
Of course, there isn’t time to see every single concept vehicle as it compares to the actual production model. There are many concepts that translated pretty closely to their production counterparts, some concepts that never even made it to production, and some concept cars that look nothing like their actual production counterparts.
Chances are, you’ve never really wondered why your car doesn’t look like a rocket ship with machine guns and space lasers, but some people – like me – often wondered why they couldn’t make a car as cool as it looked in the showroom. Well, now you know too!
