for the road ahead

After listening to the great challenges, but also opportunities presented by Niklas we will now focus on where a designer can make a difference. What first comes to mind thinking about the environment are the effect of Aerodynamics. It is exponential to the speed so the way you drive here at Autobahn in Germany the majority of the energy is used to overcome the wind resistance.

Obviously driving slow in a traffic congested area the aerodynamics has little or no effect on fuel consumption. I think you in the sports goods industry have a good understanding of the effect of this. Look at the difference between the design of a time trial bicycle and a mountain bike. Every detail of this bicycle has been designed and optimized for minimal wind resistance. Even the spokes are flattened, to be a few millimetres narrower. Or the extreme effort for breaking the speed record in downhill skiing. That suit doesn’t look to be the most comfortable, but it is efficient. We know that this is not for most people, they prefer to just have fun in the snow.

The optimal shape for low wind resistance is a teardrop and that is a difficult shape to put wheels on and people inside. But there have been attempts throughout history. This is an Alfa Romeo that was specially made for Count Ricotti in 1914. The aim was like the bicycle and the down hill skier to achieve higher top speed with little interest for the environment. Unfortunately this car was actually a lot slower than the standard car due to the higher weight of the body. The understanding and use of aerodynamics developed, but most application in the car industry was superficial and styling driven. It was not until the late 60´s when the effect of wings to create down force was applied to cars.

In the fifties we saw the big tailfins, hoping that they would remind people of the space age. Not until the early eighties did the focus on aerodynamics turn towards fuel consumption. At Volvo we have actually had our own wind tunnel since 19?? even though looking at the cars from that time you could find it hard to believe. Sometimes it could actually be hard to just look at a car and judge its effectiveness. At the time we put a Porsche 928 into our wind tunnel and it was worse than our boxy shape. We actually tried to put the Porsche backwards and then it performed better.

Of course depending on the car and the traffic situation you will use the car in, the effect of aerodynamics will be different. But a slippery car will always be better for the environment, so the designers have a responsibility to make the new designs more efficient. You can see that we now are getting back to using the teardrop shape again, this is the Volvo 3CC a concept car from a few years ago.

Jonathan:
Next thing that will have an impact are the material choices. Here you have to consider the complete cycle of the material from manufacturing to eventually recyclability. At Volvo we have always put focus on this and are today quite proud of our achievements.

Stefan:
The material you choose can also have an impact on the total weight of the car and being a moving object, weight has a direct relationship with energy use. So if we are able to lower the weight of the car it will reduce its negative impact on the environment.

We have as you can see some extreme test cars for the future using carbon fibre and other high tech materials. The total weight of this car was just 10 kilos, but then again it doesn’t have any power train or hardly anything else for that matter.

The eventual introduction of new power train technologies will give us new opportunities. As the big combustion engine up at the front can be replaced by something else you can start to rearrange the components. If we look at what we did in the C30 re-charge concept you saw that the electric motors are hidden in the wheels and take almost no space at all. The car has a conventional position and size of the combustion engine, but since the engine is only there to charge the batteries you can position it wherever.

If we then also consider what Niklas said about our ambition to create cars that will never be involved in accidents we can even reconsider the whole structure of the car.
We will basically have the possibility to change the rulebook for how a car looks.
Isn’t that exciting Jonathan? How would you use this on the interior?