It’s a busy time of year for Honda. The Japanese automaker is hard at work unveiling many of its new concept cars for the Tokyo Motor Show currently underway. The latest concept to bear the familiar square H is the EV-STER, a rear-wheel drive electric roadster.
Featuring a pure electric drivetrain, the EV-STER is a flashy and sporty little number that boasts a 160-kilometer range (that’s just a sliver less than 100 miles), a 0-37 mph sprint time of 5.0 seconds and a top speed of 99 mph. It might not be a car you’ll be racing through the streets or highways, but one that would be plenty enjoyable around the city and suburbs.
Of course, the EV-STER is simply a concept at the moment, but we really like its design and form. The lights are aggressively edgy, and the contours of the chassis give us hope that Honda will deliver a sporty successor in the vein of S2000 sooner rather than later.
Nothing that looks like this will make it to production.
First, look at the rear deck. Try to imagine how a convertible top would work.
Second, look at the front end. I really doubt that would pass pedestrian impact standards, particularly at the corners.
Third, look at those gorgeous LED string headlights. No production car in the world has headlights like that, which tells me there is some reason – perhaps the light beam is too narrowly focused, I don’t know, but there has to be a reason that headlamps are still universal.
And a range of a hundred miles? Are you kidding me? You can get away with that if the price is really low (under $20K, and more like under $16K) so that its a second car – grocery runs. But that’s hard to do with electrics, and even more so when you add the cost of making a convertible. This looks like a $30K car, and with that range, there’s too small a market.
I love the look of this, it looks like a really fun car. Can’t wait to see the final production version.