Roewe 550 Electric Sedan?!
Last week China Car Times was sent these interesting photos of a Roewe 550 testing in Australia, Alice Springs to be exact.
Now you maybe wondering why the Roewe 550 would still be under testing, seeing as it’s already on sale in China. We shared the photos with MGUK.org to find out what they think. They seem to think that all of the panels on the ’550′ are slightly bigger than the production model which may indicate that the ’550′ may not be a ’550′ but perhaps something further up in the Roewe food chain, a future ’650′ maybe?
CCT noticed that this ’550′ is missing a gas cap, and exhausts pipes, which usually indicates the car in question is an electric model, like this 2010 MINI E of course it could be that the photo was taken from an awkward angle at the tailpipes are just not visible. Also, if this is an electric vehicle, how does it charge up?
SAIC has mentioned previously that it does have plans to enter the electric car making game:
SHANGHAI, Nov 25 (Reuters) – SAIC Motor Corp (600104.SS), China’s biggest automaker, said on Tuesday it plans to set up a venture with its state-owned parent that will invest 2 billion yuan ($293 million) to develop clean-energy cars.
The SAIC group will hold a 90 percent stake in the venture, which will focus on the development of hybrid and electric vehicles, while its listed unit will hold the remainder.
So could the above ’550′ be an electric version, or a new model/platform under testing or something totally different? Only time will tell!
Special thanks to eagle eyed Dylan from Australia for taking and sending the pictures.
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Take a look at the steering wheel, it’s completely different to the one of the normal 550. Also it looks as if the digital instrumentation has been replaced with a dial.
Perhaps its a diesel? VW’s love to hide or at least bend down the exhaust on a diesel. Also seems to fit well with Roewe/MG’s European market?
Off topic, but this new look is MUCH, MUCH improved from the last version. Nice work!
The proportions and details are all wrong for a 550. This car looks smaller, more so the size of a Civic or focus, rather than the Midsize 550. Look at the car from the b-piller back. It looks much different. Even the side sculpting is much different. Also, the interior is too far different from the 550 to be an “electric” 550.
Is the above car actually this:
http://www.chinacartimes.com/2008/12/12/saic-gm-wuling-making-55000rmb-sedan-that-looks-great/
This is a Melbourne registered vehicle. Which well known automaker has it’s technical centre in Melbourne? GM Holden.
The rear warnings on the bumper are the same as used by Holden for all it’s engineering vehicles. This is typical GM camo.
Holden Melbourne import many competitor vehicles for benchmarking puposes. We see many strange vehicles skulking around the streets of Melbourne. Much of the design work for Buick vehicles in the past was done by the Asia pacific team here in Melbourne. Much of that work is of course now carried out in Shanghai.
Mark, I think that steering wheel is off a Ssangyong Kyron?
This is not a 550, nor is it an electric car.
It is a new vehicle due to go into production this year. There is no officially released name for it as yet, but it has a project code name.
See what you can find out, its too easy to tell you everything you want to know!
Anonymous doesn’t give us a clue whether we’re talking about the right manufacturer, which means it could be from anywhere. However assuming it is Roewe I think this could be the 350. There was talk of a 350 going on sale in 2009, also the dimensions of this car seem to be on the small size.
http://www.autonews.com/article/20081222/ANE02/812220286/1131 If you search the Internet there are also other articles talking about the 350. However, nothing very concrete for information.
http://www.chinacartimes.com/2009/04/03/saic-n1-concept/ ??!
On the interior shot… look at the engraving/writing on the drivers door window… definately looks like a SAIC car…!?