Buick 2-2 Bengal Roadster Concept

Buick 2-2 Bengal Roadster Concept

The inside, Bengal's leather seating gives driver and passengers the feel of comfortable club chairs, said Lyon. Also, leather inserts grace the wood steering wheel.

Powerful V6 with Six-Speed Auto Transmission
Bengal owes some of its exceptional handling and sculptural exterior appearance to an innovative powertrain. Its supercharged, 3.4-liter V6 engine, which generates 250 horsepower, is transverse-mounted with the six-speed automatic transmission in front of it, rather than behind. This new drivetrain creates a shorter front overhang and a more rearward center of gravity that gives Bengal great handling on curves.


Voice Activated Controls, Head-Up Display
Quiet Servant, first shown on Buick's LaCrosse and Cielo concepts, is back -- featuring voice- activated controls from Visteon Corporation and a reconfigurable, color head-up display that shows gauges on demand. This enables the driver to control the car and its systems with voice commands or a four-position joystick on the steering wheel. As a result, the dashboard is simple and elegant and the driver operates the car with both hands on the wheel and eyes on the road.

Freed of the usual gauges and knobs, the entire dashboard is in fact one large flat-panel speaker from NXT Audio, anchoring Bengal's premium audio system. Altogether, there are five of these unobtrusive speakers which envelop the interior in audiophile-quality sound.

Buick Blackhawk Concept

Buick Blackhawk Concept

The Blackhawk is the ultimate expression of Buick. It has classic styling combined with contemporary proportions.

Retractable convertible with styling from the '30s
The Blackhawk is basically a 2-plus-2 convertible with a retractable top, and a body that looks like it came out of the late 1930s or '40s - because it did. Its face is a classic 1939 Buick grille, which has a pattern of fine vertical bars, and its major sheet metal combines the sleek bodies of 1941 and 1948 Buick Roadmasters.

The except the grille has been modified, and the final appearance - featuring black cherry paint, doors without handles and hidden headlamps - is of a streamlined yet retro head-turner that looks like it was created specifically for the Woodward Dream Cruise.

The blackhawk power: 463-hp V-8; 0-60 in under 5 seconds
The Blackhawk's performance goal is 0-60 miles per hour in under 5 seconds. Its powertrain is a 1970-vintage 455-cubic-inch Buick GS Stage III V-8 engine, heavily detailed and mated to the latest electronically controlled four-speed automatic transmission. The naturally aspirated, overhead valve, fuel-injected engine generates 463 horsepower at 4600 rpm and 510 lb-ft of torque at 4200 rpm.

Hand-made components
Many of the Blackhawk's major components are hand made, such as the frame, the unique carbon-fiber top and the retractable system that lowers the top into the trunk (leaving a small luggage area).

Another features include a fully independent suspension, remote keyless entry (so you can open the doors, which don't have exterior handles) and dual exhaust with three-inch pipes. The Blackhawk is equipped with 18-inch five-spoke alloy wheels (a style similar to those on uplevel Rivieras, Wildcats and Skylarks of '65) with high speed, Z-rated tires -- P295/35R18 on the front and P295/45R18 on the rear.

As an accent complementing the exterior design, a slightly different shade of dark cherry is used to create a "sweepspear" along the sides of the body. The sweepspear is a decoration that first showed up on some '49 Roadmasters and later became a shape sculpted into the sides of '50s Buicks. It's basically a horizontal line that sweeps in a downward curve along the doors toward the base of the leading edge of the rear fender, then kicks up over the rear wheel openings.

Emphasizes industry first for Buick: Lighted turn signals

While the Blackhawk looks to be from somewhere in time, it's hard to pin down where. Borrowed from the same 1939 Buick that donated the grille, a lighted logo device in the middle of the trunk exterior incorporates turn signals - a reminder that this particular '39 Buick feature was the industry's first production turn signal. Borrowed from contemporary technology, the Blackhawk is equipped with Global Positioning System navigation tied to a liquid crystal display screen.


Borrowed from a 1996 Buick Riviera - one of the most luxurious of all Buicks -- is the heavily modified Blackhawk interior. That includes buff color leather for the door trim and seats, plus design of the instrument panel and center console (though the wood-rimmed steering wheel is unique).
Even the name is borrowed. Buick introduced a subcompact Skyhawk for 1975 and the hawk symbol became an icon for the entire Buick line through the 1980s.

Buick Riviera Concept Coupe

Buick Riviera Concept Coupe

The Riviera has been engineered to accommodate a new hybrid system.
The fuel-efficient car, which will feature several technological and manufacturing advances.

Exterior Design - A Sense Of Existence, Not Anonymity
The Riviera design is structured around the Buick tri-shield logo, sitting proudly on a trihedral waterfall grille. This takes the traditional Buick treatment to a new level of sophisticated boldness.

The gullwing doors, selected for their exotic appeal, achieve an expansive entrance to the two-plus-two seating configuration. Measuring 1938 millimeters at their widest point, they add to the coupe's sleek sideline. At night, fully opened doors gently shine the "Buick" name on the ground.

The use of carbon fiber in all body panels allowed the designers greater flexibility through reduced mass and added strength. This made the gullwing engineering demands easier to realize and sharp, tight radius curves possible across the body surface.

The Riviera sits on 21-inch 10-spoke forged aluminum wheels, combining polished and satin finishes, with low-profile tires. Taking their cue from Formula One cars, the side mirrors are sweeping yet unobtrusive.

Interior Design : All About Relaxation

In a word - sanctuary. The use of rich blue and subtle creams, representing earth and water themes, are conveyed through high-quality leather bucket seats, plush carpet and a luxurious padded steering wheel. Completing the organic feel, the roof comprises two shaded glass windows offering increased headroom and a celestial connection for occupants.

The interior has no discernable start and finish point for the front and sides, creating a comfortable lounge feel. It is immediately futuristic yet somehow familiar.
The three-dimensional speedometer, inspired by past classics but utterly modern in design, compliments the touchpad styled central console loosely modeled on a computer mouse. An LCD display screen crowns the central console.

Interior designers were encouraged to consider people's personal belongings to enhance their feeling of familiarity and comfort in the vehicle. Continuing the theme of calm simplicity, electronic shifter pads replace the traditional transmission shifter. Controls are kept to a minimum to avoid driver distraction.
Ambient light strips are applied from across the console and inserted on the door liner, stretching to the front seats. Deliberately imitating precious Chinese jade stone, the lights are tinted a subtle icy green, which also offers tribute to a favored color of Buicks in days gone by.

Interior trim treatments befitting the Buick prestige abound - miniature aluminum tri-shields in the front seat headrests, a wooden floor mat in the rear and a rear central armrest which can move sideways left and right to accommodate passengers of different sizes.