Toyota FT HS: An Electric Sports Car for 2010

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Summary

Introduced as a concept car in 2008, the FT HS is a technological spectacle. It's outward appearance looks like something out of Star Trek and the technology inside is equally as impressive. The number one attraction to this vehicle is that it is a sports car. On top of that, it is an electric sports car. Speculation is abound as to whether or not the market will ever see the FT HS, but speaking for myself, I would love to see this come to market. It could have the ability to break it wide open.

Full Preview 2010

Introducing a Prius on steroids

"We feel there's a hole in our lineup," says Kevin Hunter, the vice president of Calty Design Research. "Toyota hasn't had a sports car since the Supra was dropped in 1997. We need some emotional punch in our lineup, a halo product."

Toyota envisions that punch to be a rear-wheel-drive Hybrid Sports Concept (HSC) that develops 400 horsepower. "It's a new kind of sports car for the 21st century," adds Hunter. "Eco and emotion in a sports car concept with a performance target of 0-60 mph in about 4 seconds and a price tag in the mid-$30,000 range."

A 3.5-liter V6 engine would deliver most of the thrust, and it doesn't require too much brainpower to connect the dots to the DOHC 3.5-liter V6 in the Lexus GS 450h, which already makes 292 hp at 6,500 rpm. You wouldn't have to look too far to find an electric motor to deliver the rest, because the water-cooled, 650V electric motor used in the GS 450h makes 197 hp at peak output, though this is just for seconds at a time. In a fuel-efficient future, a jolt of acceleration from an electric motor might become the equivalent of an injection of nitrous oxide into your gas-powered engine.

All this has overtones of ecological friendliness, of course, but as the buzz about global warming and greenhouse gases becomes a part of daily life, Calty's designers remind us that a hybrid Powertrain will have a certain quotient of respectability that you won't find in a supercharged big-block V8. The FT-HS is even painted white because white is not only a pure motorsports color, but it's clean which, Hunter tell us, supports the car's hybrid message.

Putting it all Together

The FT-HS Hybrid Sports Concept that Toyota will roll out at the Detroit auto show is about the size of the Lexus SC 430. The HSC measures 170.3 inches from tip to tail, and it has a wheelbase of 104.3 inches. It's 73.2 inches wide and 50.8 inches high. Much like the SC 430, the front track is narrowly wider at 63 inches, while the rear track measures 61.2 inches.

This is meant to be a 2+2-style car, large enough for occasional backseat passengers. The restrictive trunk volume of the Lexus GS 430h shows us just how difficult this task can be.

The HSC's long wheelbase should help balance the weight of the sizable battery pack that will be required. In fact, the HSC's weight distribution might even approach the magic mean of 50-percent front/50-percent rear as a result.

Building a foundation for the future

The HSC has a hyper aggressive triangular profile, and this theme is repeated throughout the design. "Vibrant clarity is our new Toyota design language," Hunter tells us. "And the car is packing plenty of J-Factor, which is the local and global acceptance of Japanese design."

As envisioned by the Calty team, the engine will be visible through a hole in the hood to emphasize its hybrid nature. That dark  portion in the middle of the hood is actually the engine cover poking through, much like a shaker hood scoop from the 1960s. "An aesthetic driven by function. The hard edges all over the FT-HS are aerodynamically functional. We also wanted to boil down the shape of the car to its minimum requirements. We call that 'Subtractive Mass.'"

Also functional are the large air intakes ahead of the rear wheel wells, which will direct cooling air to the rear-mounted battery pack. A full belly pan enhances aerodynamic slipperiness. The car rides on carbon-fiber wheels that carry 245/35ZR-21 tires in front and 285/30ZR-21 tires in the rear and according to Hunter were very difficult to make.

Solo space

Toyota's designers also postulate a unique retractable roof, which will slide and then lie down inside the car covering the backseat, rendering the car a two-seater. Thanks to the tiny servo-motors we see in motorized hardtops these days, perhaps anything is possible, and the top is functional on the concept car.

The interior has the same aggressive style as the exterior, and the sharp edges look to us like the work of a sculpter. Toyota calls it "Solo Space." "The interior is all about the driver," says Hunter. The seats are little more than thin pads attached to the surrounding structure, and the driver is meant to hold a hub less steering wheel, an ever popular feature of design renderings since the 1960s. There are also paddle shifters on the unique steering wheel, which has a unique outer red ring that turns around an inner ring.

Advice and Conclusions

There's a lot about the Toyota FT-HS Hybrid Sports Concept that reminds us of the far-fetched sketches that production designers create for bad sci-fi movies. It's pretty unlikely that the muscle-car fanatics within Cobo Hall at the Detroit auto show will spare it a second glance. The Toyota Supra left these shores 10 years ago and Lexus took over the prestige role for the whole company. But as Toyota has crafted generation after generation of reliable yet uninspiring automobiles, the family of Toyota buyers has begun to look a little old. A sports car might be the right thing to wake up a new generation, especially since Toyota has a relevant performance heritage thanks to ownership of a Formula 1 team since 2002, a piece of victory at the 2003 Indianapolis 500, and a new fleet of cars in NASCAR's Nextel Cup for 2007.

Early Conclusions

The technical challenge presented by a hybrid sports car isn't small. Lithium-ion batteries are about half the weight of nickel-metal-hydride cells, but they are extremely sensitive to temperature and burst into flames when overheated. In addition, lithium-ion batteries don't like to be recharged quickly. It's even about to become cooler, because the power structure in Formula 1 is talking about regenerative braking for the racing cars by the 2009 season and the reuse of waste engine heat by 2010. There's a lot about the look of the Toyota FT-HS Hybrid Sports Concept that might seem awfully speculative to the crowd at the 2007 Detroit Auto Show, but it's probably a mistake to dismiss it. Inside this computer-generated image is a dream of a Toyota Supra for the future.