Bubble car returns as EV

The cute Isetta bubble car from the 1950s is coming back as a new-age electric runabout.

The style and shape of the tiny city-car has been copied by Micro, best known for its popular range of children’s scooters, for its Microlino.

The EV is already past the prototype stage and the company is promising the first production cars before the end of this year, priced at around $19,000.

Micro is touting a range of up to 202km and the company has already taken more than 6000 orders.

The Microlino has two seats, weighs just 450kg, has a top speed of 90km/h and accelerates to 50km/h in around five seconds.

It is only 2.4m long, allowing it to be ‘cross-parked’ (like the original sub-three-metre Mercedes-Benz A-Class) in half the space of a normal street parking spot.

But there is slightly less than zero chance of the Microlino coming to Australia, as it has been certified for Europe using quadricycle regulations.

Even so, Micro’s work on the car has resulted in a great looking micro-machine that captures the essence of the bubble cars of the 1950s.

Then, people were desperate to get driving again after WWII and there were a number of different approaches to minimalist motoring.

The original Isetta (which is not linked to the Micro model; BMW owns the name) was produced by a motorcycle company called Iso, using a two-stroke engine in the rear and a hinged front door to carry four people.

Microlina at the 2016 Geneva show

It was picked up by BMW, which fitted a 250cc four-stroke engine, and sales from 1955 to 1962 eventually topped 161,000 cars.

The Isetta was eventually made in five countries – Italy, France, Germany, Argentina and Brazil.

The idea for a modern revival in the Microlino car began in 2015 when Micro pioneer Wim Ouboter and his two sons hatched a plan to create a city-car that would be eco-friendly in manufacturing and use.

The first Microline prototype was built in China and displayed at the Geneva motor show in 2016, before a collaboration with Tazzari in Italy was established to advance the idea to production.

Micro now says the car has been certified for sale in Europe and production will begin in the final quarter of this year at the Tazzari factory in northern Italy – the heart of a motorcycle-centric region known as the Motor Valley.