Up close: the Volkswagen XL1
 

I stopped in at the Lane Motor Museum earlier this week; I had forgotten they have an XL1 which was not on display last year. But this time it was out! You can get right up next to it, so I took some pictures from angles most journalists don't think to look at. Here are some of the details.

https://ecomodder.com/forum/member-v...-vw-xl1-01.jpg

It was parked next to a Fisker Karma, a car about the size of a Dodge Charger, which made the XL1 look tiny.

https://ecomodder.com/forum/member-v...-vw-xl1-02.jpg

The radiator sits up front, with a wide, low inlet for cooling air.

https://ecomodder.com/forum/member-v...-vw-xl1-03.jpg

The sides of the front bumper cover come down to form the front edge of the wheel fairings, with the center of the bumper cover cut out.

https://ecomodder.com/forum/member-v...-vw-xl1-04.jpg

A single wiper sits below the hood edge.

https://ecomodder.com/forum/member-v...-vw-xl1-05.jpg

The front wheel arches follow the curve of the tire all the way down, and are faired behind.

https://ecomodder.com/forum/member-v...-vw-xl1-06.jpg

The rear wheel fairings extend almost all the way to the point of the front fairings.

https://ecomodder.com/forum/member-v...-vw-xl1-07.jpg

Side view cameras are used instead of mirrors.

https://ecomodder.com/forum/member-v...-vw-xl1-08.jpg

The front wheel covers are not completely solid; the end of each "spoke" is vented.

https://ecomodder.com/forum/member-v...-vw-xl1-09.jpg

Significant taper to the rear, especially in the upper body.

https://ecomodder.com/forum/member-v...-vw-xl1-10.jpg

Vents at the back are open; the exhaust must vent here too since there is no visible pipe anywhere else.

https://ecomodder.com/forum/member-v...-vw-xl1-11.jpg

CHMSL is sculpted into a shallow divot.

https://ecomodder.com/forum/member-v...-vw-xl1-12.jpg

These vents are open to the engine below.

https://ecomodder.com/forum/member-v...-vw-xl1-13.jpg

There's a paper slot instead of a glovebox with a door, in the name of lightness I suppose.

https://ecomodder.com/forum/member-v...-vw-xl1-14.jpg

The A-pillars do not sit flush with the fenders/hood.

https://ecomodder.com/forum/member-v...-vw-xl1-15.jpg

The profile taper flattens out slightly at the end of the body.

https://ecomodder.com/forum/member-v...-vw-xl1-16.jpg

All in all, it's a pretty remarkable car.

https://ecomodder.com/forum/member-v...-vw-xl1-17.jpg

Great pictures, thanks for sharing. It's an absolute dream car for most hypermilers. Silhouette reminds me of the famous EV1.

Great piece of engineering, it's a shame they never produced it for mass market.

The passenger's seat is staggered toward the back (by about 16"?) to give the seats more hip / shoulder room, and still have a narrower car. The frontal area is only 1.5 m2 / 16.1 sq ft, which is tiny. And the Cd is better than any other production car, so the CdA will be very hard to surpass.

It looked like maybe 6" or 8".

https://ecomodder.com/forum/member-v...-vw-xl1-18.jpg

Sadly, if this did reach mass production in anything close to its current form, I doubt it would find many buyers even at an economy-car price. It deviates too much from what people expect a "car" to be. This has Cd 0.189; Hucho mentioned he expects production cars to reach 0.20 "and that's it," and I'm inclined to agree with him.

That said, I would give my eye teeth to have one of these.

Too bad VW doesn't just release to body to be used as a kit car. Then people could make their own, from electic to LS powered, it would be as cool as a Cobra to me.

Very interesting, glad you noticed this detail.

I wonder what a CFD picking that point would look like.

Adding my thanks, and a permissible level of envy, for your getting to go there (twice?)

I felt the same way about the Volkhart-Sagitta V2. They are offering (through a 3rd party) electric refits for the Beetle chassis.

Too bad nothing was done with the xl1 tech

nothing
 

I've enjoyed it for decades!:)

I think most of the cost is from "unobtanium" materials - if they built it with steel, it would cost far less.