• Mercedes-Benz’ Vision One-Eleven sports car concept makes its debut appearance.
Mercedes-Benz has unveiled a new sports car concept. The Vision One-Eleven design study features a supercar silhouette that reinterprets the automaker’s One-Bow design signature, and it is simultaneously inspired by the C 111 series of experimental vehicles produced by Mercedes in the 1960s and 70s.
The interior starts gets a lounge-like approach but with a number of elements that say ‘supercar’ loud and clear.
Mechanically, the concept gets an axial-flux motor developed by British electric motor specialist YASA, since 2021 a subsidiary of Mercedes-Benz AG.
The design of the Mercedes-Benz Vision One-Eleven
The images tell the story of the design the Mercedes-Benz’s Vision One-Eleven sports car concept, but the highlights, most of which harken back to those C 111 design studies, include:
- Low-slung front end with 3D pixelated appearance for the front panel
- Gullwing doors
- Distinctive orange-and-copper colour scheme
- Wider back end featuring a sharply drawn diffuser
- Red taillights with pixelated look
- Very low to the ground (rising to just 46 inches or 117 cm in height)
- Opaque side windows camouflaged with a pixel pattern
- Large wheels under flared wings
- Low-slung front and rear skirts finished in matte black
The interior of the Mercedes-Benz Vision One-Eleven
In a nutshell, this interior melds lounge-like space and comfort with performance car elements, but all of conceived as the autonomous electric sports car of the future. There are two “settings” that drivers can choose from. There’s race mode, with the backrest upright, and then there’s lounge mode, in which the seats are fully integrated into the interior sculpture, merging sills, the centre tunnel and luggage compartment into a single unit. The other notable features of the interior include:
- Contrasting colours and materials (the latter made from 100-percent recycles polyester)
- A honeycomb structure for the dash and other flat surfaces
- Bright orange leather for the armrests and center console
- Polished aluminum accents on the steering wheel and armrests, as well as for the pedals
- A minimalist approach
- A new concept for the seating, with the seat cushions flush-fit into the floor
- Angle-adjustable seat backrests featuring diamond-quilted upholstery
- A free-standing center console
- A leather-clad steering wheel with a host of controls
- A compact touchscreen with high-res display to the right of the driver (with no data cluster in front of the driver)
- A new interpretation of the MBUX hyperscreen focused on the use of flexible interfaces
The powertrain of the Mercedes-Benz Vision One-Eleven
The high-performance, lightweight and compact-sized axial-flux motor is accompanied by all-new battery technology, which features liquid-cooled cylindrical cells with unique new cell chemistry. The technology behind this new type of EV powertrain is currently in development over at YASA and is destined for future EVs coming from the Mercedes-Benz brand. We’ll spare you the technical jargon, but suffice to say, as per YASA’s Tim Woolmer:
“Axial-flux motors are significantly lighter and more compact, yet more powerful than comparable radial-flux motors currently used in 99 percent of all electric cars… Compared to radial-flux motors, they have considerably higher and more enduring power reserves, which delivers a whole new level of performance.”
- Tim Woolmer, Founder and Chief Technology Officer of YASA
