Pininfarina Sintesi

By Guy Bird

Motor Shows

10 March 2008 12:03

What’s new on Pininfarina’s Geneva Motor Show stand?

Italian coachbuilder and design house Pininfarina showed another stunning concept at Geneva to follow the 2005 Maserati Birdcage and 2004 Nido. The 2008 Sintesi is strictly an ‘ideas concept’ imagining a future vehicle that can communicate with other cars to avoid traffic and accidents and thus reduce the need for current passive safety requirements – like longer and heavier front noses to meet pedestrian impact laws. More compact future active safety technology and electronics will also reduce weight and size and allow a more aerodynamic shape – the Sintesi has a 0.27 Cd drag coefficient.

Its fluid exterior lines – reminiscent of a moebius strip – and generous low-down interior room for four passengers are also possible because of fuel cell propulsion. Four cells are spread out at the base of the vehicle – one for each wheel – and in sport mode muster the equivalent of 215bhp and a 7.5-second 0-62mph.

Other great touches include four butterfly doors and an opaque white honeycomb structure poly resin instrument panel formed out of one piece of Poly1500 resin. 

But don’t write all this off as just pie in the sky. Remember that Pininfarina is also behind the design of the Ferrari F430 and 599 GTB Fiorano and also the production of the Ford Focus CC.  

The whole thing…  

About the future…   

A fantastic Pininfarina show car whose design cues, if not size – it’s a tad shorter than a BMW 6-series but the same height as a Z4 – will inform its self-branded 2009 electric city car.    

5/5

By Guy Bird