A unique and novel concept car not only allows car companies to showcase their own car-making capabilities and technical background, but also allows consumers to understand the future development trends and prospects of cars. Therefore, in concept models, we can often see many shocking new technologies and advanced designs.
Concept Recharge is the beginning and declaration of the pure electrification of Volvo . It has many designs that will be mass-produced in the future, so we can also get a glimpse of the design direction of Volvo's future pure electric models from it.
At first glance when you see this picture, you may wonder what kind of car this is, is it a sedan, a station wagon, or an MPV? The answer may not be clear yet. After all, it is just a concept car. Volvo may adopt such a design to be closer to actual needs.
Pure electric vehicles do not require a large amount of air intake like fuel vehicles, so the air intake grille on the front face is no longer necessary. However, many pure electric vehicles on the market retain the air intake grille, but it has become It's just closed, this is also for the sake of consumers' visual experience. After all, it may be difficult to accept the sudden switch.
But Volvo is different. Since I don’t need it anymore, why should I use it? So on this concept car, there is only a shield-like front face and a LOGO that can illuminate independently and wear a "seat belt".
Of course, the familiar "Thor's Hammer" headlights on Volvo are also indispensable. After all, this is Volvo's most recognizable design in the past ten years. However, on this concept car, the headlight has a mechanical change. It can be physically flipped to light up another light group when the daytime running lights are turned on, which is somewhat similar to the way of switching lights. Doesn't this bring a sense of ritual and science fiction?
The side of Concept Recharge has the flavor of an MPV or station wagon. The extremely short front and rear overhangs and wheels larger than a pie make the body proportions very coordinated, but this is more to create more space inside the car. This is also the key to why the Concept Recharge has such a low floor.
It is worth mentioning that the concept car Concept Recharge also adopts a side-by-side door design that is only found in many top luxury cars. This is not just for style. After all, the side-by-side door design is indeed the most considerate of rear passengers. Ways in and out. The position of its "door handle" is also very hidden, even more hidden than hidden. In fact, it is hidden on a line on the door. Just touch and swipe it, and the door will open automatically. If you don't think about it carefully, you won't know how to open this door.
It is no exaggeration to say that this concept car has subverted many people's inherent concepts of a pure electric family car. Whether it is the interior or exterior, the simple and clear interior layout can well reflect the beauty of simple luxury style.
Both the Tesla and the Concept Recharge concept car adopt a relatively simple layout. When seeing a Tesla, many people may have a rough impression of being too fussy or rough, but On the contrary, it doesn't happen at all on Concept Recharge, which only gives you a sense of light luxury and simplicity. The design concept originated from Scandinavia is brought to its extreme in this Volvo pure electric concept model.
Even Concept Recharge’s dashboard, armrest area and under the seats are almost hollow and suspended style, without too many unnecessary designs, interpreting the aesthetics of minimalist . The interior space and practicality of the car are also much better than those with traditional layout.
Concept Recharge also follows a people-oriented design and has many very user-friendly functional configurations. For example, the adjustable lumbar support on the seat allows passengers to adjust the height of the lumbar support to a position that suits them. Children can adjust it higher and adults can adjust it lower.In addition, there are also functional configurations such as
window projection, gesture game In-Car Game, equal vision, rear music atmosphere lights, etc. that can take care of all passengers in the car.
It is worth mentioning that the interior of Concept Recharge is made of environmentally friendly and renewable Nordico material. This is a new interior material developed by Volvo, a biopolymer from Sweden and Finland. made of pine resin, wine corks and PET materials. Compared with traditional leather materials, it is not only lighter, but also more environmentally friendly, and its texture is almost the same as traditional materials.
When it comes to the world’s safest cars, the first brand that pops up in most people’s minds is undoubtedly Volvo. So, what novel safety technologies are there in Volvo’s concept cars? After all, Volvo is a brand that even wears seat belts on its cars.
The lidar on the roof of Concept Recharge can collect environmental data around the car and provide a sensing distance of 250 meters, which is also the longest sensing distance in the industry. When the vehicle is traveling at a speed of 120Km/h, it can It senses danger more than 1 second earlier than the human eye, and can brake more than 50 meters earlier in this second. This short second can often avoid many impending car accidents.
Concept Recharge also has the industry’s first-tier software and hardware configurations. Only configurations that keep pace with the times can better protect the safety and experience of passengers. Volvo is also the only car company that offers high-specification lidar, high-precision maps and driving monitoring systems as standard equipment in its entire range. There is no doubt that Volvo is a good example among car companies. Volvo has never been sloppy in terms of safety.
In the future, Volvo will also launch the unsupervised highly automated driving function "Ride Pilot" with lidar assistance. We did not see the word "assisted" in the words, indicating that this is a real automatic driving system . This also means that the driver can do whatever he wants while the car is driving, including sleeping, eating, watching movies, and more. However, it remains to be seen when this will be achieved.
Of course, these configurations will not only appear on concept models. Volvo also revealed that the next generation flagship model (possibly XC90) will be equipped with Luminar’s third-generation Iris lidar, 8 cameras, and 5 Millimeter wave radar and 16 ultrasonic sensors and other configurations, coupled with NVIDIA DRIVE Orin, the most powerful computing platform for autonomous driving Chips and continuously updated and improved software systems allow this highest standard autonomous driving system that combines software and hardware to be implemented in flagship models.
At the same time, Volvo is also one of the very few car manufacturers with complete independent research and development capabilities. Autonomous driving is the general direction for the development of most pure electric models, and the same is true for Volvo.
Concept Recharge will also be built based on a new pure electric platform. According to the chassis characteristics of pure electric models, the body wheelbase and wheel hub size are lengthened, the suspension stroke is shortened, and the flat floor design is designed to create a more practical, beautiful and concise interior cockpit. . After all, the chassis and body structure of pure electric vehicles and fuel vehicles are qualitatively different, and the cockpits should also change accordingly. This will also be implemented in Volvo's next generation models.
Battery technology has always been a pain point in curbing the development of pure electric vehicles, so Volvo has also been committed to breakthroughs and improvements in lithium battery technology. It is expected that in the next ten years, the battery energy density of Volvo's models will exceed 1000Wh/L (700Wh/ kg) milestone, the actual cruising range will be around 1,000 kilometers or even higher, and the battery recharge time will be shortened by nearly half. Only after solving range anxiety and energy replenishment speed can pure electric vehicles completely replace fuel vehicles and be fully popularized.
(XC90 pure electric version rendering)
The design concepts and technologies on Concept Recharge are not illusory.Relevant staff said that the designs on this concept car will appear on Volvo's mass-produced models, but not all of them will be mounted on the same model. Instead, each design may appear separately on any model. . For example, does the XC90 that appeared before have some flavor of Concept Recharge?
Concept Recharge is a concept car that basically represents Volvo’s design direction in the pure electrification era. It will be more or less present in future mass-produced cars. Sooner or later, the technology on Concept Recharge will be reproduced in mass-produced models one by one. This concept car shows us more unique and advanced ideas and has more prospects for future pure electric models. I believe that with Volvo’s technical foundation and historical accumulation, the design and technology on Concept Recharge will soon become popular.
