Gadgetory

I'm Wayne Cunningham here at the 2013 Detroit Auto Show taking a look at the Volkswagen cross/blue concept now this seems like one of the most technically advanced cars at the show and it could come to production me w's trying to make a business case for it right now it's got a diesel engine in front 190 horsepower and it also has a 54 horsepower electric motor integrated with the double shift gearbox that's a six-speed gearbox so that makes it a hybrid powertrain but there's more it also has a hundred and fourteen horsepower electric motor on the rear wheels so that actually gives it all wheel drive actually four-wheel drive when you consider they can ship the torque around any way they want they can throw a bunch of torque to the back front it can be working at the same time it can drive in different modes it can driving all-wheel drive mode four-wheel drive mode and also just front-wheel drive mode if they just want to economize as much as possible now it's also a plug-in hybrid we see the plug right here it's got a 9.8 to kilowatt-hour lithium-ion battery and we can drive from 14 miles on electric power alone VW estimates it's going to get about 89 miles per gallon equivalent that's taking the electric powertrain into consideration or 35 miles per gallon just working as a hybrid it's an interesting form factor to beat up you designed this specifically for the North American market they're calling it an SUV I'm thinking more like a minivan or crossover we see a pretty robust hood here pretty squared off hood we have these vents on the top of the hood that's kind of like land rovers done in the past we also have these LED headlights and that's that's more of a concept car element probably won't see that come to production it's actually a six seater there's three rows of seats inside front row middle row with two independent seats and a rear row with two independent seats as well although BW says when it comes to market you can also have a rear bench and see passengers the rear seats really come in to the rear cargo area so you want to fold those down they actually fold flat to maximize the rear cargo space they've got a few tricks inside too with the tech they've got a couple of mini iPads mounted in the backs of the headrest for the second row passengers then the front seat has a 10.2 inch touchscreen LCD also the instrument cluster is an LCD panel they've got these metal rings in it to kind of set aside the gauges make the tachometer and the speedometer look like they're actual analog gauges although it will also change theme depending on what kind of mode you're driving and it's got Eco sport that sort of thing if folks wagon puts us into production it'll slot between the Tiguan and the Touareg it'll be one of their newest cars and they're just trying to figure out if they can make it work right now I'm Winn Kenan I'm here at the 2013 Detroit Auto Show