Today, we take a deep dive into China’s obsession with long-wheelbase variants of existing cars. Get some beer and chips because this will be a long (L) story. To be clear, his story is about LWB versions of existing cars developed for the Chinese car market. It is impossible to include every L car, for example, Audi has made 3 generations of the A6 L. So I have tried to limit myself to the most important vehicles. It is not about other China-only cars that happen to have a long wheelbase too and happen to have an L in their name, like the Audi A7L or the Ford Edge L. Chinese manufacturers sometimes use L-naming for luxury variants of cars, without any changes to the wheelbase. These cars are excluded from this article as well.
Author: Tycho de Feijter
China Concept Cars: the 2007 GAC AHEV Hybrid MPV
Today in China Concept Cars: the 2007 GAC AHEV, a concept of a hybrid MPV. The AHEV debuted at the Guangzhou Auto Show. It was a great-looking machine, with a streamlined body and a luxurious interior.
Continue reading “China Concept Cars: the 2007 GAC AHEV Hybrid MPV”
China Concept Cars: The 2007 Geely Meirenbao II
In the 2000s, Geely was concept car crazy. On most auto shows, the brand would launch up to ten (10) concept cars, packed into the booth, next to the production cars. One of the most interesting cars from Geely’s golden concept era was the Geely Meirenbao II (美人豹II), a concept for a successor of the Meirenbao sports car.
Continue reading “China Concept Cars: The 2007 Geely Meirenbao II”
Crazy Car Production Days of Guangdong: Beijing Zhonglian
Today in Crazy Car Production Days of Guangdong (CCPDoG™): Beijing Zhonglian. Earlier, we saw their normal cars.
CCCPDoG was a ‘creative’ scheme to get around China’s extremely high import tariffs for foreign-made cars in the late 1990s. Several companies would collaborate to ‘produce’ cars in China, piggybacking on an existing Chinese car maker with a valid car-making license.
Continue reading “Crazy Car Production Days of Guangdong: Beijing Zhonglian”
Chinese Car Brands That Time Forgot: Beijing Zhonglian
Today in Chinese Car Brands That Time Forgot (CCBTTF™): Beijing Zhonglian. In the 1990s and early 2000s, this brand made a bus, a series of SUVs, and a couple of minicars.
Continue reading “Chinese Car Brands That Time Forgot: Beijing Zhonglian”
China Concept Cars: The Haima Fstar Me & Haima MPe Electric Minicars
Today in China Concept Cars (CCC): the Haima Me and MPe electric minicars. The Me debuted at the 2008 Beijing Auto Show and the MPe debuted one year later at the 2009 Shanghai Auto Show.
Continue reading “China Concept Cars: The Haima Fstar Me & Haima MPe Electric Minicars”
China Concept Cars: The Story Of The Hongqi C601 Sedan
Today in China Concept Cars: the Hongqi C601 sedan. In the early 2000s, Hongqi was looking for a new mid-size luxury sedan. To get there, they developed four concept cars under the C601 code name. These were:
Continue reading “China Concept Cars: The Story Of The Hongqi C601 Sedan”
Chinese Hummers Part 1: The Dongfeng Warrior & The Shenfei Falcon
Today we take a deep dive into the Chinese Hummer program. Like so many other countries, China got interested in an HMMWV-like vehicle after the first Gulf War. We take a look at four Chinese Hummer programs. China being China, each of these programs has a base model + dozens and dozens of derivative military and civilian variants.
Continue reading “Chinese Hummers Part 1: The Dongfeng Warrior & The Shenfei Falcon”
China Concept Cars: The 2006 Fulwin 2 Coupe
Today in China Concept Cars (CCC): the Chery Fulwin II Coupe, a sporty two-door concept car that debuted at the 2006 Beijing Auto Show. It was an important car for Chery as it marked the debut of a new design language and the debut of the new Fulwin 2 series.
Continue reading “China Concept Cars: The 2006 Fulwin 2 Coupe”
China Concept Cars: The Hongqi HQ3/Shengshi Extended Limousines & Inspection Car
Today in China China Concept Cars: three concepts based on the Hongqi HQ3 and Hongqi Shengshi sedan: a bulletproof extended limousine, an extended version, and an open-top inspection car.
Continue reading “China Concept Cars: The Hongqi HQ3/Shengshi Extended Limousines & Inspection Car”