SHANGHAI MOTOR SHOW: Volkswagen unveils ID. Crozz

After years of goading the world’s major car-makers as slow-footed dullards, Tesla should be getting the sinking feeling that they're finally starting to put the tiny company in their crosshairs.

For the latest evidence of that, Volkswagen came to Shanghai with the ID.Crozz, its third zero-emission battery-electric concept car, aiming directly at Tesla’s Model X.

The SUV concept is already being pushed by Volkswagen brand CEO Herbert Diess as a production probability for 2020, with the timing of its market launch set to coincide with the EU’s new emissions rules (which will demand a 95g/km corporate fleet CO2 average).

Part of Diess’s strategic plan to deliver at least a million BEV cars by 2025, the ID.Cross crossover SUV will punch out 225kW of power from its 83kWh battery, with Volkswagen insisting it will punch to 100km/h in less than six seconds.

It is also set to do all that with a 500km range from its lithium-ion battery pack as it sits on the same modular electric-car architecture Volkswagen will also use for production versions of last year’s ID. hatchback and I.D. Buzz concepts.

The new chassis, dubbed MEB inside Volkswagen, is the third pure battery-electric car architecture inside the Volkswagen Group, with Porsche’s Mission E and an electric SUV to sit on the J1 architecture, while Audi is using another stand-alone layout called C-BEV.

While the C-BEV was a hurried exercise to deliver the Volkswagen Group’s first electric production cars, it took more time developing the MEB system. It has a six-link rear axle and a MacPherson strut front suspension, giving what Volkswagen describes as “GTI-like handling”, complete with a 48/52 front/rear weight distribution.

The concept car’s layout also employs variable damping control, while mounting the electric motors centrally leaves Volkswagen with the ability to fiddle the suspension enough to deliver a 10.5-metre turning circle.

The four-seat I.D. Crozz also delivers a glimpse into the production future of Volkswagen’s self-driving technologies, with a laser scanner at each of its roof’s four corners as part of the car’s ID. Pilot autonomous mode.

Due to start appearing in the more upmarket Volkswagens like the Passat, the Arteon and the Touareg before the end of the decade, the I.D. Pilot is slated to deliver full Level 3 autonomy, giving drivers the choice of doing the job themselves or relaxing while the car takes over for extended periods.

“If it was ever possible to make a one hundred per cent certain prediction of what the future will look like, it is achieved here,” Diess insisted.

“We are showing with the ID.Crozz how Volkswagen will be transforming the roadscape from 2020.”

It will use a pair of electric motors, siting one on each axle to make it a fully on-demand, active all-wheel drive. The front motor will deliver up to 75kW of power, while the rear one has twice that output, at 150kW, to make the car feel rear-drive as much as possible and delivering 225kW of total system power.

By comparison, that’s a full 100kW in front of the ID. concept hatchback from the Paris motor show last year but 50kW less than Volkswagen claims for the ID.Buzz.

It runs to an 180km/h top speed, all while its 500km range figure adds up to 200km more range than the existing e-Golf can manage.

An 83kWh lithium-ion battery sits in a solid metal cage beneath the passenger compartment’s floor. Similar in its design to the battery packs in the ID.Buzz and the rear-drive ID. hatch, the battery can be reloaded to 80 per cent charge within 30 minutes, assuming it’s attached to a 150kW charging system.

Volkswagen drives the concept car by adding single-speed, fixed-ratio gearboxes between each electric motor and its respective axle, which it dubs an “electric propshaft”.

The crossover body style takes hints of the current wave of “coupe” sports SUVs but has been designed to deliver genuine off-road ability.

The 4625mm-long ID.Crozz delivers interior space roughly in line with the new extended-wheelbase Tiguan Allspace, though it lacks the internal-combustion production car’s third row of seating.

It’s 1891mm wide and 1609mm high, riding on a 2773mm wheelbase. While it shares the architecture with the I.D. Buzz, it’s a sign of the platform’s flexibility that the ID.Crozz is 316mm shorter, 85mm narrower, 354mm lower and rides on a wheelbase that’s 527mm shorter than the retro-looking people mover concept.

A key part of its autonomous-driving package, and a common trait with both earlier I.D. concepts, is the way the car communicates which mode it’s in. When it’s driven manually, the car’s roof and grille LED shows in light blue, while they switch to purple when it’s in autonomous mode.

The other giveway is the four laser scanners popping up from the roof to detect cars, bikes, pedestrians and anything else that might stray into the ID.Crozz’s way, and it also uses radar and ultrasonic sensors in concert with its stereo camera facing forward and cameras on each side of the car.