2007 Chevrolet Beat Review

Specifications

The 2007 auto show season has been a sea of change for General Motors. Insteadof the usual barrage of dream cars worthy of salivation, it’s come out charging with its feet firmly planted on the ground. GM knows that it needs to be investing money in making cars for the real world, so while the world opened its arms to the Volt at Detroit, its stars for New York strike closer to home as they don’t involve any groundbreaking technology that’s yet to be perfected. The cars that GM showed are superminis; city-friendly vehicles that are a size under the B-Segment typified by the likes of the Yaris, Fit, and Chevrolet’s own Aveo.

But GM didn’t just bring out one car, they’re hauling out three for the sole purpose of gauging interest and gathering opinions. In addition to finding out what show-goers think, its marketing wheel launched an online website (vote4chevrolet.com) where net surfers can see pictures, and vote for their favorites. But before you head on over to cast your digital ballot, read on to learn a little bit more about the cars.

Chevrolet Beat

The first thing about the Beat that most people are going to identify with is that it lookslike a fully customized, import tuner car. This ultra-bright Vertigo Green machine is a three-door hatchback, styled in the fashion of the WTCC Ultra racing concept vehicle. It might not be headed for FIA certification, but with an integrated and aggressive body kit, plus a roof-mounted spoiler, it could very well be. Some of our staff liken the Beat to a praying mantis; its face features elongated, narrow headlamps, an angled mouth-like grille, and a jutting chin. Oh, and the acutely angled front fenders have an uncanny resemblance to a mantis’ forelegs.

Besides the one-off vehicles created for shows like SEMA, it’s rare to find a concept with all the style and sound mods that the Beat possesses. Its interior wouldn’t be out of place on the cover ofSport Compact Revolution, featuring a high-contrast black and green interior with green illumination and accent touches; its anthracite headliner also has built-in fiber optic lights that mimic the effect of a starry night. Open that hatch and you won’t so much see a massive cargo hold as a plethora of speakers and a giant, bottom-facing sub. The Beat also has a clever center console that features storage bins and a navigation system.

With a turbocharged 1.2-liter engine, the Beat lives up to its street-machine credit and would undoubtedly be the quickest of the three, even though it’s mated to an automatic. We can’t help but think there’s a typo in the information about the transmission after spotting a clutch pedal in its interior shot; besides, a manual is much better suited to this car’s performance character.

Chevrolet Groove

Looking like a downsized HHR, the Chevrolet Groove blends retro hot-rodstyling with modern design in one of the smallest vehicles to bear the golden bowtie. The main goal of the Groove as a styling exercise was to prove to show audiences that small cars don’t always have to look cute, weak, or vulnerable. This was achieved by giving the Groove a high metal-to-glass ratio, an effect best demonstrated by the likes of the Chrysler 300 or Dodge Magnum. Out of its two other siblings, it looks to be the most practical with its upright body and near vertical tailgate.

It may be painted a stormy shade of matte gray, but the Groove has plenty of presence thanks to a wide stance, and its enormous two-tiered front grille. Style-wise, it has strong visual connections to Chevy’s North American vehicles; we see the new Malibu in itsnose and, strangely enough, a bit of the Uplander minivan. From the size, the Groove has a wedgy profile that ends in a tail inspired by the similarly sized Citroen C1. The Groove’s rear wheel arches are pushed far back, giving the car a non-existent rear overhang; it also has a single-piece glass tailgate like the French microcar, and features afterburner-style vertical taillights as well.

Playing on its high functionality, the Groove is powered by a 1.0-liter turbodiesel engine of undisclosed power or cylinder count. Even for a vehicle as small as this, outright performance would be slow – the slowest of the three – but it would be without a doubt the most efficient, an attribute never overlooked in this category.

Chevrolet Trax

Chevrolet just wouldn’t be Chevrolet if it didn’t dabble on the idea of infusingsome sort of off-roading credentials into one of these little machines. The Trax was designed for people who like the rugged look of an SUV, but want something that’s as easy to park and maneuver in tight spaces as a regular citycar. It’s got a cute nose with large, round headlamps filled with dozens of tiny LEDs that have the effect of an insect’s compound eye. Contrasting the bright chrome grille, funky half-circle side-view mirrors, chunky bumpers and fender flares are painted in Burnt Orange, while the doors and upper bodywork are Blaze Orange, further adding to its fun character. The Trax rides on 16-inch alloy wheels wrapped in Kumho rubber.

The Trax is powered by a 1.0-liter gasoline engine which probably makes in the area of 65 horsepower and drives the front wheels. To bring some justification to its jacked-up height, rear spare tire and butch cladding, Chevrolet speculated the Trax could feature an on-demand four-wheel drive system that consists of an electronic limited-slip differential and an electric motor with a standalone battery pack. The system is similar in concept to the i4WD system featured on the Toyota Highlander Hybrid, only working when the front wheels lose traction.

An Uncertain Future – At Least for North America

Unfortunately, the reality of any of the three vehicles making itto production for North America are slim. Product boss Bob Lutz says that a vehicle bearing the essence of one of these vehicles could be possible, but it would need to be at least a size larger to meet the forthcoming US crash test regulations. Lutz also doesn’t think that the general public would be willing to downsize into a vehicle as small as this, claiming that only something as drastic as fuel prices of $4/gallon – as they are in other parts of the world – would be necessary. Keep in mind that despite having decent sized interiors, these are still a size smaller than the B-Segment vehicles we’re only just adapting to now.

Elsewhere in the world, the light at the end of the tunnel for one of these triplets is much brighter. Currently, Chevrolet in Europe and Asia sells a car called the Matiz or the Spark, which was engineered by Daewoo prior to its purchase by GM. GM invested money into the car with a facelift for original Italdesign body, and it’s been selling acceptably well as a budget alternative to other superminis. In fact, it was the Matiz (Spark) that was the heart of the copyright infringement lawsuit between General Motors and Chery with its QQ. As a side note, sources have suggested that the Chrysler-Chery vehicle headed for North America will be based on the next generation QQ, which could very well cause GM to pull a 180 on the project.

It’s a much different story for the rest of the world. General Motors announcedthat it is streamlining the engineering of its forthcoming subcompact and supermini products to GM Daewoo Auto and Technology (GMDAT) in Korea, much like the Theta architecture that underpins the new Saturn VUE, and the European-market Chevrolet Captiva and Opel Antara. It’s no wonder that all three of these concepts were designed in Korea, and they all ride on the new generation small car platform which will be used on the next Opel Corsa and future Chevrolet Aveo.

Given that Chevrolet is rapidly expanding its borders beyond the North American market, we’re curious as to why it won’t consider putting more than one of these concepts into production. The physical differences between the three cars are varied enough to quell any claims of rebadging, not to mention they target different types of people. For instance, Chrysler Group makes three different versions of GS-platform compact cars (Caliber, Compass, Patriot) sold under different brands. Provided that their character is sufficiently different, with the whole world as its potential buying audience, we believe that GM should green light all of them.