Futuristic electric flounder: Mercedes-Benz unveils Vision One-Eleven

Saturday 17 June 2023

Futuristic electro flounder Mercedes-Benz unveils Vision One-Eleven

Mercedes has the electric car future firmly in view. A look back doesn’t hurt either. The result is a new study: the Vision One-Eleven. The idea of ​​what an electric sports car could look like spiced up with historical quotes.

A sporty two-seater with gullwing doors, orange paint and black contrasting accents? Mercedes connoisseurs will now be thinking of the C 111 experimental vehicle presented in 1970, which still has a modern aura about it 50 years after its premiere. The gullwing, which was never mass-produced, is one of the icons of the Mercedes brand, which today’s designers at the car manufacturer like to use to build bridges between great tradition and a rapidly changing future. The Vision One-Eleven, which has now been officially unveiled in the US design center “IDC Carlsbad” in California, shows what this can look like in concrete terms.

The One-Eleven is no retro romantic. Rather, it embodies the idea of ​​an electric sports car from a somewhat more distant future, which has only been spiced up with historical quotations. “Our all-electric Vision Showcar is the modern interpretation of the C 111, which was avant-garde at the time,” said chief designer Gordon Wagner, who was dressed in a matching T-shirt at the unveiling of the concept.

The color orange is the most obvious reference to the C 111, whereby in the case of the One-Eleven the copper-colored note and an iridescent effect are intended to set the mood for the future of electronics. Fine aerodynamic work on the sculptural-looking and only 1.17 meter flat one-bow body and various black accents are also intended as historical references.

No headlights and taillights in the classic format

There are no headlights and taillights in the classic format. Instead, large displays with coarse pixel grids are embedded in the front and rear, which can optionally display animated written information or quote the C 111’s round light design. The folding headlights of the C 111 were dispensed with, as were the turn signals embedded in the side of the front.

The designers have once again given a modern interpretation to the upward-opening wing doors, which, in contrast to the historical model, do not have any visible mechanical unlocking elements. A variable rear wing, aero elements spiced up with lighting technology or filigree light-alloy giant wheels with 22-inch 325 Pirellis at the rear give the visionary flounder a futuristic-dynamic touch.

This is also offered by the interior, which is primarily kept in white and spiced up with orange and silver-colored elements and at the same time minimalistically furnished. The maximum of two occupants are received here by sports seats with four-point belts with silver-colored leather covers in 70s SciFi style. The only complex feature inside is the rectangular steering wheel with function keys and touch elements. It is flanked by a compact touchscreen inclined towards the driver. A display similar to the light strips on the outside extends across the entire dashboard, showing a wide range of information in correspondingly coarse-pixelated form.

Vision with Augmented Reality

The interior could also look completely different for its occupants, as Mercedes demonstrates with a seat box presented at the same time, which you enter with “Magic Leap 2 Augmented Reality” glasses on your head. Here, the Stuttgart-based carmaker is playing with the many possibilities of the three-dimensional AR world, which can project fascinatingly realistic operating and display elements into the wearer’s field of vision inside the vehicle and many other objects and information outside the vehicle as well. The development project is part of a broader vision aimed at augmented reality, says Mercedes.

The drive of the Vision Eleven One, which combines a new battery concept with liquid-cooled round cells and new cell chemistry with axial flow motors, is also virtual, but even close to series production. Two motors on the rear axle are planned here, which come from the startup Yasa, which was founded in 2009 and was bought by Mercedes in 2021. So far, Yasa has been producing compact and high-performance engines for hybrid drives such as those installed in Ferrari’s SF90. In Berlin, Mercedes intends to mass-produce axial flow units for sporty models with its English motor manufacturer.

The main difference between an axial flux motor and a radial flux motor is the direction in which the magnetic field is generated. In an axial flux motor, the magnetic field is parallel to the axis of the rotor, while in a radial flux motor, it is perpendicular to the axis of the rotor. This in turn allows different designs. As a rule, axial flux motors can be built in a disc shape and are also much more compact and lighter than radial flux motors with the same power, which makes them interesting for applications in sports vehicles, among other things.

Source: ntv.de
Mario Hommen, sp-x

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