The Alfa Romeo 4C was born from a clean slate and an idea or, rather, the clean state was the prerequisite for conceiving, developing and producing a new concept in the domain of sportscars, the "affordable supercar." The 4C was designed not only to be an exclusive car both for contents and performance, but also to become an achievable dream for Alfa Romeo fans all over the world. As a consequence, it was necessary to think in terms of limited production volumes, but still in the order of some thousands vehicles per year and, therefore, decidedly higher than those of the practically handcrafted production characterising this class.
The clean slate, which was initially free of design and manufacturing constraints, was soon assigned new parameters and presented with new challenges the first of which was a fundamental reference data point: a supercar weight/power ratio must be less than 4 kg/HP.
To achieve the right ratio, Alfa Romeo designers could have focused on horsepower (i.e.: increasing power and performance), but this would have impacted the purchase and maintenance costs, thus making the car significantly less affordable. They decided to go a different way; they reduced the car weight by using materials where lightness is combined with efficiency and by perfecting, sometimes even creating, manufacturing processes where high technology is joined to craftsmanship. In this way they were able to obtain a total dry weight of just 895 kg, a true record that makes the 4C one of the lightest cars in the world. The 4C is lighter than a city car and its weight/power ratio is less than 4 kg/HP.
In order to achieve this ambitious goal a lot of attention was devoted to the materials, each of which was chosen on the basis of its specific weight as well as on the chemical-physical, mechanical and technological properties that best fulfil the performance requirements and dynamic behaviour needs of a sports car. The 895 kg of vehicle weight mainly consist of aluminium, steel, lightened SMC and carbon fibre.
Alfa Romeo unveils the technical contents and manufacturing secrets of the new compact supercar which embodies the sportiness intrinsic to the 'Alfa Romeo DNA': performance and engineering excellence offering maximum driving satisfaction in total safety in addition to breathtaking style. The Alfa Romeo 4C developers have combined the best technical and manufacturing competencies of two brands: Alfa Romeo and Maserati. Thanks to the internal synergies of the Fiat -- Chrysler Group, the two carmakers were able to collaborate from the perspective of integrating Alfa Romeo's design roles and Maserati's manufacturing functions.
樓主: 多膠魚2013
在線雷達
發表於 2013-6-16 00:42:15
發表於 2013-6-16 01:42:00
