Student Designers Rise to Hyundai Challenge

Students at the Istituto Europeo di Design in Turin have responded with vigor to a challenge posed to them by Hyundai’s European design center.

The partnership will be showing a full-scale model of their PassoCorto sports car at next month’s Geneva auto show. PassoCorto is Italian for short wheelbase, or SWB, a famous acronym often used by Ferrari and other supercar makers in the past.

Using the Alfa Romeo 4C as a benchmark, the students were asked to create the ultimate sports car for Generation Y, putting themselves in the shoes of both the potential car buyer and the designer. They outlined a carbon-fiber monocoque structure, a rear-mounted powertrain with a compact 4-cyl. turbocharged engine rated at 268 hp and above all, low weight.

The PassoCorto sits low to the ground on a relatively short 96.5-ins. (2,450-mm) wheelbase for a total overall length under 173.7 ins. (4,411 mm). Its vertical extension reportedly is 45.7 ins. (1,160 mm).

The mock-up’s bright orange paint matches the color of another show car Hyundai is unveiling in Geneva.

The overall dimensions are accurate, but show visitors they should not expect to see a real carbon-fiber monocoque or a working powertrain. The mock-up is the 10^th produced by IED, which is celebrating the 20th anniversary of its courses in transportation design.