Concept Cars Essay, Research Paper

Concept Cars

To be known in the future you have to think ahead into the future. This is why concept cars have become so popular in the past couple of decades. Not many people succeed in making a successful concept car; which are also known as a prototype.

It is a very hard and stressful project that takes a lot of patience. Robert J. Waddell, president of Motor Concept Vehicles of Mississauga, Ontario, took over 6 years and spent over 225 thousand dollars in building his concept car (Morrison 1). The process takes so long because it is not just the body of the car that has to be built, but also everything that goes inside it too. After they build a body they have to design an engine that will fit under the hood, and if they don’t like it they have to rebuild the engine or rebuild the body with other measurements. They can make a prototype that uses another type of fuel to keep it running, but to make it street legal it has to be turned into a gas or natural gas powered vehicle.

After an engine has been made it has to go through a few hundred-point inspection, meaning it will check for leakage, cracks, noises, rattles and if necessary even for parts in the engine. “It is difficult to certify customized engines for emissions compliance to the degree it is necessary,” said Waddell (Morrison 2). The engine is then placed into the mold of a structure of the body to see how it will fit. Even after the refinements are completed with the engine the body might still need a bunch of work. This is why they use a Silicon graphics subsidiary, which would build enough software for designing or refining the body surfaces. What this machine does is it focuses on a 500-square-millimeter field that gives them a 420,000 data point that needs to be redesigned or refined. So they have done every possible thing to the body to make it look presentable.

“It takes a lot of time trying to find the best look of a car after it has been built,” said Christian Jansen, MCV development manager. Though it seems very easy to get the best look of a car you also have to think about the engineering in the seating, the brakes, rims and the overall interior of a car. These details are often over looked by some car manufacturers, even though it may take a very long time finding the right pieces that go with the car.

Schroth, a boulder automotive design house is the company Waddell is going with. This particular company makes seat belts for NASCAR racers. They use a patented webbing technique that no other company has that also minimizes the risk of being injured by your belts in an accident. These specific companies that build concept vehicles do not usually use generic items for their cars, but they do put a car together with non-named products to see what it will really look like.

A prototype is usually the same thing as a concept car, but the only difference between the two is that a prototype is a concept car after it has been built. Concept cars such as a hybrid have been made also. A hybrid is a vehicle that runs on both gasoline and electricity that needs to be charged up everyday for use. These particular cars do not have even half the power of a pure gasoline or natural gas vehicle (Video). After a recent survey was taken for the hybrid and the gasoline powered vehicles the gasoline powered one was 89 percent more wanted then the hybrid (Video).

“A concept car has rarely been bought by a normal minimum waged family,” said Jansen. Though it is very expensive it also is a very good vehicle that has been silver spooned to perfection. Even though most of the people in the United States will never own a concept car in the near future it is a very good idea that is being recognized by the media very quickly. These companies that the vehicle manufactures are coming out with are becoming very popular to consumer demand, and in my opinion it will be the birth of new transportation. If history is any criterion, mass-production cars will someday carry some or all of these advancements (Morrison 5).

Morrison, Gale “Racing from the Great White North.” Mechanical Engineering – CIME

Dec. 1998: 64-67. Expanded Academic ASAP.

Infotrac. Mesa Community College Library, Mesa, AZ.

26 June 2001

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