Auto design: from the chassis to the tires

Automotive-designAutomotive design, also known as auto design, is the profession involved in creating the appearance of a car, the exterior part of it. This term usually refers both to cars, motorbikes, trucks, vans and buses.

The importance of auto design is very high in the industry, for several reason. The first one is commercial: a nice car sell more than a ugly one. Simple.

The second one is about the performance: a good designed car is able to consume less fuel as is more aerodynamics and well balanced among all of its parts.

Usually when we talk about auto design we take into consideration several parts of the car: exterior, interior, color and trim.

The stylist responsible for the exterior design study the best combination among proportions, surface of the car and shape. It is the first of a series of digital drawing of the future car. Once done, the digital model is first designed into a computer and then carved using a specific machine and clay. Even today the clay model is very important before sending all the digital stuff to the industry.

Interior design involved all the decisions to be taken for the internal part of a car: instrument panel, seats, door trim panels, pillar trims, etc. For this specific design the path to follow is the same as seen above.

Color and trim design, which can be considered at once, involves all the color and materials used on a vehicle, such as plastics, fabric, leather, wood, and so on.

Before every single design is made is important to imagine how the car will perform on the road. Indeed, is quite useless and effort-spending design the car in the specific just to realize, after, that is too heavy, too fuel-consuming or too instable. That’s why every single aspect of the future car must be taken into consideration, including the engine, the purpose of the car (sedan, limousine, 4×4, SUV and so on), the tires (high performance ones, grand touring one, 4×4 tires and so on).

Auto design is quote time spending job, lots of people involved and, sometimes, is needed to reset the work and start over. Anyhow, is one the most important part in creating a car, which can make the difference between success and failure.