Ten Things About Infiniti s Amazing Prototype nine Concept, News, Car and Driver, Car and Driver Blog
Ten Things to Know about Infiniti’s Amazing Prototype nine Retro Racer
When Infiniti released pics of the Prototype nine concept last week, the automotive internet wigged out a little. Nissan’s luxury unit had gone back in time and brought forward an electrically powered vision of a Grand Prix past that never existed, which could have been a terrible idea. But in the creative forearms of Nissan’s senior vice president of global design, Alfonso Albaisa, the result turned out to be a bold, tasteful exercise in what-iffery that we’re more than a little bit in love with. Prior to its debut this week at the Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance, we caught up with Albaisa and the Prototype nine on a windy runway in Alameda, California, to gather a few more details about the magnificent machine.
1. It began with a text. “There was no memo,” explained Albaisa. “Amelia Island was coming up, and Allyson Witherspoon [former Infiniti Americas marketing director] was like, ‘Why don’t we do a barn-find type of thing? Just keep it in the back of your mind.’
“I said, ‘Oh, okay, I’m truly busy, right now isn’t the best time.’ Then, just by chance, I stumbled on a document that displayed the very first Japanese Grand Prix from one thousand nine hundred thirty six or something. I didn’t know! I always thought [Japanese Grand Prix racing began] in the 1960s! So then we thought: Oh! Ideal! Now we have generally an era.”
Two. That grille is even more intense than you realized. The outermost bars of the grille are actually the leading edges of that gorgeous side blade/spandex hood vent. The bondage mask ornament was designed to look like what Albaisa described as “maybe the very first one that they did.”
Trio. It cribs parts from an actual Infiniti. Albeit it makes use of the Nissan Leaf’s motor, the battery system consists of a pair of Infiniti battery packs, which fit within the long, narrow nose of the car better than the Leaf’s pack.
Four. The influence is 1940s, not 1930s. While prewar and instantaneous postwar Grand Prix cars collective an aesthetic, Albaisa claimed the car was truly influenced by what was happening in manufacturer race shops after the 2nd World War. The driving position was exaggerated a bit, pulling influence from planes such as Howard Hughes’s H-1 Racer. In spirit, it also draws from the Tama, an EV produced by Fuji Precision Industries, the predecessor organization to the Prince Motor Company, which was absorbed into Nissan in 1966.
Five. It has to be one of the very few machines of its aesthetic to have an ethernet port. The yellow Cat6 cord coiled around the polished shifter looks like an abject anachronism, but it serves to connect the electrical powertrain to outward computers.
6. The body’s construction was a combination of manual labor and modern machinery. The car was designed in CAD. And while the bondage mask was formed by a seven-axis dieless forming machine, the rest was shaped by mitt, with the aid of a CNC laser cutter. The laser cut out vapid chunks of sheetmetal based on the CAD wireframe grid, which were then welded together and hammered into form by Nissan craftsmen at the Oppama factory, which, fittingly, is the company’s oldest plant.
7. The wheels are steel. In the 1950s, most racing machines were rolling on aluminum Borrani wire wheels, but postwar GP cars still used steel, so that’s what Infiniti used on the Prototype 9.
8. The gauge cluster floats within the center of the steering wheel. The car actually has two wheels: a ordinary wood-rimmed, era-correct wheel for taller drivers like Albaisa, and the unit we photographed, which carries the car’s gauges in a round, engine-turned pod in the center of the wheel.
9. Those steampunk brake drums aren’t drums at all. The Prototype 9, like the latest Nissan Leaf, is capable of single-pedal operation. But when stopping power beyond the car’s regenerative braking is required, there are modern discs hidden under the retro-modern finned brake drum housings.
Ten. It was, at most, supposed to be a foam model. Little did Albaisa or Witherspoon know what a hit the project would be within Nissan. And while the best concept cars are often whimsical by nature, Witherspoon’s caprice, Albaisa’s discovery of that old document, and the enthusiasm of the craftsmen at the Oppama plant conspired to bring a functional machine of unspoiled joy and beauty to the world. We stumbled around the thing for an hour or so, and there’s not a bad line on the car. Who wouldn’t want to drive it? We’re awfully glad that doing just that is a possibility.
Ten Things About Infiniti s Amazing Prototype nine Concept, News, Car and Driver, Car and Driver Blog
Ten Things to Know about Infiniti’s Amazing Prototype nine Retro Racer
When Infiniti released pics of the Prototype nine concept last week, the automotive internet wigged out a little. Nissan’s luxury unit had gone back in time and brought forward an electrically powered vision of a Grand Prix past that never existed, which could have been a terrible idea. But in the creative palms of Nissan’s senior vice president of global design, Alfonso Albaisa, the result turned out to be a bold, tasteful exercise in what-iffery that we’re more than a little bit in love with. Prior to its debut this week at the Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance, we caught up with Albaisa and the Prototype nine on a windy runway in Alameda, California, to gather a few more details about the magnificent machine.
1. It commenced with a text. “There was no memo,” explained Albaisa. “Amelia Island was coming up, and Allyson Witherspoon [former Infiniti Americas marketing director] was like, ‘Why don’t we do a barn-find type of thing? Just keep it in the back of your mind.’
“I said, ‘Oh, okay, I’m indeed busy, right now isn’t the best time.’ Then, just by chance, I stumbled on a document that demonstrated the very first Japanese Grand Prix from one thousand nine hundred thirty six or something. I didn’t know! I always thought [Japanese Grand Prix racing began] in the 1960s! So then we thought: Oh! Ideal! Now we have generally an era.”
Two. That grille is even more intense than you realized. The outermost bars of the grille are actually the leading edges of that gorgeous side blade/spandex hood vent. The fetish mask ornament was designed to look like what Albaisa described as “maybe the very first one that they did.”
Three. It cribs parts from an actual Infiniti. Albeit it makes use of the Nissan Leaf’s motor, the battery system consists of a pair of Infiniti battery packs, which fit within the long, narrow nose of the car better than the Leaf’s pack.
Four. The influence is 1940s, not 1930s. While prewar and instantaneous postwar Grand Prix cars collective an aesthetic, Albaisa claimed the car was indeed influenced by what was happening in manufacturer race shops after the 2nd World War. The driving position was exaggerated a bit, pulling influence from planes such as Howard Hughes’s H-1 Racer. In spirit, it also draws from the Tama, an EV produced by Fuji Precision Industries, the predecessor organization to the Prince Motor Company, which was absorbed into Nissan in 1966.
Five. It has to be one of the very few machines of its aesthetic to have an ethernet port. The yellow Cat6 cord coiled around the polished shifter looks like an abject anachronism, but it serves to connect the electrical powertrain to outer computers.
6. The body’s construction was a combination of manual labor and modern machinery. The car was designed in CAD. And while the fetish mask was formed by a seven-axis dieless forming machine, the rest was shaped by forearm, with the aid of a CNC laser cutter. The laser cut out plane lumps of sheetmetal based on the CAD wireframe grid, which were then welded together and hammered into form by Nissan craftsmen at the Oppama factory, which, fittingly, is the company’s oldest plant.
7. The wheels are steel. In the 1950s, most racing machines were rolling on aluminum Borrani wire wheels, but postwar GP cars still used steel, so that’s what Infiniti used on the Prototype 9.
8. The gauge cluster floats within the center of the steering wheel. The car actually has two wheels: a plain wood-rimmed, era-correct wheel for taller drivers like Albaisa, and the unit we photographed, which carries the car’s gauges in a round, engine-turned pod in the center of the wheel.
9. Those steampunk brake drums aren’t drums at all. The Prototype 9, like the latest Nissan Leaf, is capable of single-pedal operation. But when stopping power beyond the car’s regenerative braking is required, there are modern discs hidden under the retro-modern finned brake drum housings.
Ten. It was, at most, supposed to be a foam model. Little did Albaisa or Witherspoon know what a hit the project would be within Nissan. And while the best concept cars are often whimsical by nature, Witherspoon’s fad, Albaisa’s discovery of that old document, and the enthusiasm of the craftsmen at the Oppama plant conspired to bring a functional machine of unspoiled joy and beauty to the world. We stumbled around the thing for an hour or so, and there’s not a bad line on the car. Who wouldn’t want to drive it? We’re awfully glad that doing just that is a possibility.
Ten Things About Infiniti s Amazing Prototype nine Concept, News, Car and Driver, Car and Driver Blog
Ten Things to Know about Infiniti’s Amazing Prototype nine Retro Racer
When Infiniti released pics of the Prototype nine concept last week, the automotive internet wigged out a little. Nissan’s luxury unit had gone back in time and brought forward an electrically powered vision of a Grand Prix past that never existed, which could have been a terrible idea. But in the creative forearms of Nissan’s senior vice president of global design, Alfonso Albaisa, the result turned out to be a bold, tasteful exercise in what-iffery that we’re more than a little bit in love with. Prior to its debut this week at the Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance, we caught up with Albaisa and the Prototype nine on a windy runway in Alameda, California, to gather a few more details about the magnificent machine.
1. It began with a text. “There was no memo,” explained Albaisa. “Amelia Island was coming up, and Allyson Witherspoon [former Infiniti Americas marketing director] was like, ‘Why don’t we do a barn-find type of thing? Just keep it in the back of your mind.’
“I said, ‘Oh, okay, I’m truly busy, right now isn’t the best time.’ Then, just by chance, I stumbled on a document that displayed the very first Japanese Grand Prix from one thousand nine hundred thirty six or something. I didn’t know! I always thought [Japanese Grand Prix racing began] in the 1960s! So then we thought: Oh! Ideal! Now we have generally an era.”
Two. That grille is even more intense than you realized. The outermost bars of the grille are actually the leading edges of that gorgeous side blade/rubber hood vent. The rubber hood ornament was designed to look like what Albaisa described as “maybe the very first one that they did.”
Trio. It cribs parts from an actual Infiniti. Albeit it makes use of the Nissan Leaf’s motor, the battery system consists of a pair of Infiniti battery packs, which fit within the long, narrow nose of the car better than the Leaf’s pack.
Four. The influence is 1940s, not 1930s. While prewar and instant postwar Grand Prix cars collective an aesthetic, Albaisa claimed the car was indeed influenced by what was happening in manufacturer race shops after the 2nd World War. The driving position was exaggerated a bit, pulling influence from planes such as Howard Hughes’s H-1 Racer. In spirit, it also draws from the Tama, an EV produced by Fuji Precision Industries, the predecessor organization to the Prince Motor Company, which was absorbed into Nissan in 1966.
Five. It has to be one of the very few machines of its aesthetic to have an ethernet port. The yellow Cat6 cord coiled around the polished shifter looks like an abject anachronism, but it serves to connect the electrical powertrain to outer computers.
6. The body’s construction was a combination of manual labor and modern machinery. The car was designed in CAD. And while the spandex hood was formed by a seven-axis dieless forming machine, the rest was shaped by palm, with the aid of a CNC laser cutter. The laser cut out vapid lumps of sheetmetal based on the CAD wireframe grid, which were then welded together and hammered into form by Nissan craftsmen at the Oppama factory, which, fittingly, is the company’s oldest plant.
7. The wheels are steel. In the 1950s, most racing machines were rolling on aluminum Borrani wire wheels, but postwar GP cars still used steel, so that’s what Infiniti used on the Prototype 9.
8. The gauge cluster floats within the center of the steering wheel. The car actually has two wheels: a plain wood-rimmed, era-correct wheel for taller drivers like Albaisa, and the unit we photographed, which carries the car’s gauges in a round, engine-turned pod in the center of the wheel.
9. Those steampunk brake drums aren’t drums at all. The Prototype 9, like the latest Nissan Leaf, is capable of single-pedal operation. But when stopping power beyond the car’s regenerative braking is required, there are modern discs hidden under the retro-modern finned brake drum housings.
Ten. It was, at most, supposed to be a foam model. Little did Albaisa or Witherspoon know what a hit the project would be within Nissan. And while the best concept cars are often whimsical by nature, Witherspoon’s fad, Albaisa’s discovery of that old document, and the enthusiasm of the craftsmen at the Oppama plant conspired to bring a functional machine of unspoiled joy and beauty to the world. We stumbled around the thing for an hour or so, and there’s not a bad line on the car. Who wouldn’t want to drive it? We’re awfully glad that doing just that is a possibility.
