底特律车展上有趣的概念车-英语点津

The North American International Auto Show in Detroit is one part trade fair and one part Barnum & Bailey Circus. Concept cars are the prancing ponies -- or sometimes the pratfalling clowns.

底特律国际车展一方面是场汽车展销会，另一方面却像巴纳姆和贝利马戏团表演。车展上的概念车有时像欢蹦乱跳的小马驹，有时又像哗众取宠的小丑。

Car makers use auto-show concept cars, usually one-of-a-kind prototypes built by hand, to capture the imaginations of the press and public with flashy visions of what might come tomorrow. Some show cars are pure whimsy, confections dreamed up by young designers at play.

汽车生产商们通过车展来展出概念车(通常都是手工打造且独一无二的样车)，将媒体和公众对未来车型所展开的天马行空的想像具象化。展出的车型中有些纯属异想天开，只是年轻设计师们闲来无事的凭空想像。

More and more, as at this year's Detroit show, car makers like General Motors Co. and Toyota Motor Corp. are pursuing concept cars that have serious intent. Some are thinly disguised prototypes of cars in the pipeline. Some present a technology idea that executives want to road-test with the press and public.

正如今年的底特律车展显示，越来越多的汽车生产商，如通用汽车公司和丰田汽车公司正在研发具有严谨意图的概念车。有些属于酝酿之中的车型的样车，只不过稍加伪装而已；有些则展现了某种技术概念，管理层希望就此测试媒体和公众的反应。

Here are some of this year's notable show cars:

以下为展出的几款本年度值得关注的车型：

-- GMC Granite

通用GMC Granite厢式概念车

GMC, one of the four U.S. brands that survived the General Motors bankruptcy, is best known for sturdy commercial trucks, large pickups and beefy Yukon and Suburban sport-utilities. Now GM has decided it wants to expand the GMC brand with some more-petite offerings. Behold the Granite, which GMC describes as an "urban utility vehicle" and "the automotive equivalent of an urban loft apartment."

GMC作为在通用汽车破产中幸免于难的四个美国品牌之一，以其坚固的商用货车，大型皮卡，结实的Yukon和Suburban运动型多功能车（SUV）而著称。现在通用汽车决定生产小型车以拓宽GMC的品牌影响力。看一看这款Granite，GMC将其描述为一款“适合城市用途的汽车”和“汽车式城市阁楼公寓”。

To be sure, a very small urban loft apartment, equipped with a 1.4-liter engine and a six-speed transmission. If the idea of a boxy, four-cylinder urban micro-wagon rings a bell, that's because this is pretty much the idea behind the existing flock of vehicles led by the Toyota Scion xB, and joined more recently by the Nissan Cube and the Kia Soul.

这无疑是一款很小的城市阁楼公寓，配有一个1.4升发动机和一个六档变速箱。如果一辆四四方方的四缸城市微型汽车的设计听来耳熟，那是因为它已存在于现有汽车的设计之中，这一潮流由丰田Scion xB领导，最近尼桑Cube和起亚Soul也加入其中。

-- Toyota FT-CH

丰田FT-CH混合动力概念车

Toyota has struggled for years to figure out what is hip. When the company was enjoying huge financial success and gaining market share, its leaders worried that having a reputation for bulletproof quality and smart technology wasn't enough. Now that the company has stumbled badly on the quality front, and recorded a big loss for the first half of its fiscal year, Toyota's crusade for hipness is taking on more urgency.

丰田公司奋斗多年以期弄清何谓潮流。当公司享受着巨大经济成功并获得市场份额时，其领导人担忧仅在口碑上拥有可以防弹的质量和智能技术是不够的。如今公司在质量方面跌跌撞撞，根据记录显示前半个财政年度损失惨重，丰田向潮流进发的远征任务显得更加紧迫。

The FT-CH, a compact hybrid with a key-lime-green color scheme and a compact, hatchback profile, was designed by one of Toyota's European design teams. According to the company, the team sought to channel the feel of early 1980s 8-bit microprocessor videogames such as Super Mario Brothers and Sonic the Hedgehog.

丰田FT-CH小型混合动力车由公司中的欧洲设计团队设计，采用醒目的浅绿配色方案，体型小巧，车体为掀背式。丰田公司称该设计团队致力于从上世纪80年代早期的八位微处理电脑游戏，诸如超级玛丽和刺猬索尼克中寻找灵感。

-- Hyundai Blue-Will

现代Blue-Will概念车

The Chevrolet Volt hasn't even hit the market, but already GM can claim that it has changed the conventional wisdom in the auto industry about so-called plug-in hybrids -- cars that derive some of their power from gasoline engines, and some from plugging into the electric grid. Not so long ago, the industry wisdom on plug-ins was that they represented a fringe technology, too expensive for mass production. The Hyundai Blue-Will concept is an acknowledgment that in the future every major player in the U.S. market will have to have either a plug-in model or an all-electric model to be taken seriously.

尽管通用雪佛兰Volt尚未上市，通用汽车已然可以说它已经改变了汽车行业对插电式混合动力车的传统观念。这种类型车辆的动力部分来自汽油发动机，部分通过插电获取动力。不久前汽车产业还认为插电式混合动力车仅代表着一种边缘技术，对于量产而言则过于昂贵。现代Blue-Will概念车令美国市场各大厂商承认，未来他们必须精心推出一款能让市场认同的插电式混合动力车或者全电动车型。

-- Audi e-tron and BMW Concept ActiveE

奥迪e-tron与宝马ActiveE概念车

On the floor of the Detroit Auto Show, the Audi e-tron show car sits across the aisle from the display of electric sports cars from Tesla Motors Inc. The juxtaposition is apt. The e-tron -- a variant of a concept Audi started showing last year -- represents the next step in the evolution of electric luxury cars from politically correct green technology to a more hedonistic, high-performance appeal, an evolution that is a foundation of Tesla's business. The Audi e-tron's styling borrows the aggressive stance and high-performance promise of the brand's $114,200 R8 super sports car. Not far from the Audi show vehicle is BMW AG's latest iteration of electric drive, the Concept ActiveE -- more easily described as an electric 1-series coupe.

在展厅里特斯拉汽车公司电动跑车展台和奥迪e-tron概念车展台就隔着一条路。这样的并列布局十分恰当。本次车展上的奥迪e-tron概念车是对去年发布款型的改良版，体现了豪华电动汽车产业从追随政治潮流大打环保节能牌向强调享乐与高性能并重的下一步演变，这也正是特斯拉汽车的发展之本。e-tron的外观设计借鉴了奥迪R8──这款以前卫设计和高性能著称的超级跑车售价为11.42万美元。奥迪e-tron展台不远处便是宝马公司最新推出的ActiveE电动概念车，简单来说，它就是宝马1系列的电动版。

-- Mini Beachcomber

宝马Mini Beachcomber

BMW has said from Day One in its relaunch of the Mini franchise that it intended to create a family of Minis, reviving more than just the iconic Mini Cooper two-door. The Mini Beachcomber concept represents a tricked-out version of a real fourth model Mini to launch later this year: a Mini crossover. The Beachcomber's open-sided body and beach-buggy vibe is designed to recall the Mini Moke -- a tiny Jeep-like dune buggy Mini produced in the mid-1960s to the delight of beach bums everywhere in the British Commonwealth.

在Mini系列车型重新面世的第一天，宝马汽车便表示要打造Mini车家族而不仅仅是将重振Mini Cooper双座车。Mini Beachcomber概念车大胆前卫的设计为今年晚些时候发布的Mini家族第四代：Mini Crossover奠定了基础。这款车的敞开式车身以及沙滩越野车风范都让人回想起Mini Moke──这款有着吉普外形的迷你沙滩车诞生于上世纪60年代中期的英国，以迎合当时遍布英联邦各地的沙滩爱好者们。