America hits the small time

America is realising that less is more, if this year's LA Auto Show is anything to go by. SHANE O'DONOGHUEreports

IT’S A SIGN of the seismic shift in the US market that on the list of vehicles displayed at the final major motor show of the year – the annual Los Angeles Auto Show – the cars that stand out are Honda’s P-Nut (Personal-Neo Urban Transport) and the VW Up! Lite concepts.

They’re both stylish and economical for one of the supposedly more eco-friendly states in the US. But above all, they’re small. Small in a country where in motoring parlance the adjective usually means a minibus with just six armchairs pulled along by a tiny 6-litre petrol. Size is relative, but the dramatic drop in the size of some cars is all the more shocking for US motorists.

The VW Up! Lite is the latest in a series of Up! concept cars from the Germans. Each moves closer to production than the one before. This iteration has a more usable four-seat interior, a relatively conventional turbo-diesel engine and (mostly) realistic construction. The remit of the car is to use as little fuel as possible while transporting four people. VW claims that, thanks in part to slippery aerodynamics and low weight, the Lite uses just 2.45 litres per 100km.

Car makers have as yet failed to convince an American audience that diesel power is a good option and here in California the task is even trickier, with stringent exhaust emissions legislation. But that’s not the only convention the Lite challenges.

Both the VW and Honda are remarkably tiny. At a show where Chrysler displayed its new Ram truck brand for the first time, while trumpeting the final year of production of its 8.4-litre V10 Dodge Viper, the appearance of two diminutive concepts could have seemed incongruous.

But the crowds in LA aren’t swarming to marvel at the size of the Ram pick-ups. They are gathering around Ford’s stand to get a closer look at the new Fiesta for the US market. While the Honda and VW may yet enter production, the Fiesta is the diminutive here and now.

The launch of a US-specific version of the Ford Fiesta follows an intense six-month campaign in the States, where 100 Fiestas were given to “agents” – members of the public who then charted their time with the car using the latest social media outlets.

Massive hype surrounds the import of the Fiesta, with observers hailing it as proof Americans are ready to give up their huge V8 saloons and adopt more realistically sized cars.

In the US, the Fiesta has had a minor makeover and comes with the option of a dual-clutch automatic transmission – not yet offered in Europe on the Fiesta – while powerplants are limited to a single 1.6-litre petrol engine. However, fuel economy should be as impressive as 7 litres per 100km.

The Mazda2 also made its North American debut in LA. Like the Ford, it will be offered only as a petrol engine. Neither hatchback will be sold in three-door format, though Ford will offer a four-door saloon version.

Chevrolet also brought one of its European models, the Cruze, to the US but that was all but forgotten amid the latest developments about the Chevy Volt.

The good news is the development team is on target to have the Volt ready for production by the end of 2010. The bad news is just 100 examples will initially be offered to selected fleet customers on a lease basis as part of an initial two-year “research and demonstration programme”. It is as yet unclear when the car will be put on general sale.

If you can’t wait for your range extender, there was a rather more surprising debut in LA in the form of the Capstone CMT-380. Taking the form of a Ford GT40 replica, this build-it-yourself kit car is a similar concept to the Volt, with power to the wheels coming from a lithium-ion battery pack.

The major difference is the range extender part of the equation is taken care of by a bio-diesel fuelled micro-turbine. The CMT-380’s claimed electric-only range of nearly 130km puts the Volt in the shade too, not to mention a top speed in excess of 240km/h.

You’d never have guessed the humble Ford Fiesta and something as innocuously titled as the Capstone kit-car could have stolen all the limelight at the last motorshow of the year. But then again, LA has always been more emotionally attached to European trends than middle America.

A Paulian shift in US consumer tastes will only become apparent next month when the focus shifts to the Detroit auto show, hometown of the US auto industry and a real bellwether of US petrolhead intentions.