The Urban EV concept Honda has revealed at the Frankfurt Motor Show was great, but the follow-up is even better. While Honda has confirmed that a production version of the Urban EV will indeed be here by 2019, the Sports EV is just a concept for now. Presumably, it’ll be more difficult to make a business case for the pint-sized sports car. Cross your fingers, folks…
As well as borrowing heavily from the aesthetic of the Urban EV, Sports EV designer Makoto Harado also looked to Hondas of yesteryear. “The S600/800 we produced 50 years ago - we took the spirit of it, a compact sports car spirit,” he told us. There’s maybe a hint of Toyota 2000GT in there, too. Would a production version have to be toned down a reasonable degree? Sadly yes, and it’s partly down to packaging. “The hardest thing is the height - because of the battery. [On the concept] we can exaggerate,” Harado noted.
Honda has neglected to reveal anything in the way of technical details, although the powertrain would presumably be much the same as the Urban’s. It also has the same cool digital display in the front ‘grille’, plus the charge indicators just in front of the rear wheels. So in conclusion, we don’t know if it’ll be made into a production car, and we don’t know anything about what lies under its futuristic skin. But we know that we want one, and we know that it’s our car of the show at Tokyo 2017.