If you do not like shooting brakes and you claim to have any love for cars, you are lying. If you do not love V12s and claim to have any loves of cars, you are also lying. Hence meaning that you if do truly love cars, you should be going weak at the knees for the Vinson Devotion Sportback Concept.
Hardly a snappy name, but it is a snappy car. Boasting a 0-60 time of 2.6 seconds, an 835 hp 7.0l V12 and Carbon Fibre everything, itâs a vision of what a super-wagon style thing could look like and drive like. However, Iâm not getting giddy for the looks. Vinson like their black plastic at the moment and this is no exception, with is gawking great front grille surrounded by a thousand yards of the stuff. The styling doesnât really have any flow, with tapered, edgy shapes at the top of the front and blockier, rectangular ones at the bottom. The lights at the back seem too high and the door handles feel very out of place. An oddly styled beast then.
Stranger still, this is a 2 seater, meaning you get acres of cabin space, but it doesnât seem quite appropriately used. That does keep weight down though, and itâs a classic sporty interior, so Iâm not complaining. And what an array of equipment; itâs nice being able to see what kind of tech companies stuff into their concepts when there are no cost restrictions.
Whatâs it like to drive? Fast. Biblically fast. Every time you accelerate, you almost feel like youâre parting the Red Sea. The size of the car and the force of its V12 being sent through its AWD system is just epic. Itâs one of those cars where you donât so much get up to speed, but rather simply start travelling at a higher rate. Overtaking need never be a worry in a car where 70-100mph takes less time than it does to say it. The gearing is nice too, and the smoothness of the DCT is welcome. For such a powerful machine, it is very stately and unfussy.
Despite this reserved feel to its power, the car isnât the most comfortable thing in the world. Even with that active suspension, itâs hardly getting to the levels of GT comfort that you might have expected in such a car. It is, however, incredibly sharp, and theyâve managed to achieve such precise handling and an almost total lack of body roll without having to fit it with ultra stiff sway bars that restrict any movement whatsoever. Itâs a very rounded feel, yet when you want it to be, itâs razor sharp.
Sadly however, the chassis is less than impressive. Itâs remarkable how such a large car weighs little more than 1.6 tons, but all of that weight is put over the front wheels. A 58/42 split; you donât even get such splits with FF cars, let alone wagons. The result is that understeer becomes your biggest bane, seemingly unable to stop itself from putting all its mass on those front wheels. Donât expect to be to any kind of drifting or powersliding, and you at least you wonât be disappointed.
This isnât really a car for the corners then, despite its ultra sharp yet supple suspension. As a cruiser, it needs to be more comfortable, though theyâve certainly got the power train right. One canât help but feel too that some extra seats in the back might not only make it more practical but also resolve that weight balancing issue a little.
And no matter how much I tried, I just couldnât get the styling. Some of it works, other parts do not. Thereâs just no flow or consistency to it, though the top half of the front of the car did warm to me in the end.
Then again, this is a concept car. Things are never quite perfect with such cars because they donât need to be. And to be honest, its weak points seem to be just issues to be resolved if this is to become a proper road car. I see great promise for a big, V12 shooting brake, and I think that it needs to go down the line of a GT car to succeed in this. The interior, despite the lack of extra seats, was absolute stunning, and to even see a bit of this incredible technology reach the public would be incredible. And the power train is perfect; a really well tuned V12, a great AWD system and very well set up gearing. You canât fault it in this regard.
Thereâs work to do here then for Vinson, but after all, it is just a concept, and it wonât take much to achieve a stunning road car built around this idea.
- Gavin Anderson