Niels van Roij explains technical terms
Together with car designer Niels van Roij, we help you better interpret certain choices in design. Niels explains the complete designer alphabet for us, we have now arrived at the letters T, V and W. You may have heard of the Three-box design that characterizes sedans and coupés, but did you know that there is also such a thing as Two box design? It is discussed in this episode, but Niels van Roij also explains why the brutal Porsche 911 GT3 RS has so little tuck under and the Fiat Multipla has so little tumble home.
T
Three box design:
The first separate volume of the three-box design extends to the A-pillar, the second block contains the passenger volume and a third box can be found behind it, as a separate luggage compartment. We see this shape in, among other things, sedans and coupe bodies.
tuck under:
The tuck under is an addition to tumble home. With tuck under, the body is pushed in at the bottom of the nose, at the side at the sill and at the rear. Seen from behind, it exposes the wheel and part of the tire. Here the design becomes more dynamic and when viewed from the side, the car looks visually lighter than if the side were to run straight down. Cars without tuck under often look heavy and less dynamic. Today’s car designers often want to use more tuck under, but are constrained by aerodynamic requirements, where it is important to create as smooth and flat sides as possible to optimize airflow along them and reduce drag.
A pretty sporty beast that Porsche 911 GT3 RS and therefore little tuck under seen from behind, because of the aero!
With the Ferrari Omologata below, the looks are much more important and therefore more tuck under: we see a lot of tire from behind and therefore a nice stance!
The current generation A8 is flat on the side, almost without tuck under. The car looks like a heavy, quite stiff and even clumsy whole. It makes the A8 unpleasant from the car designer’s perspective.
Its perfectly proportioned predecessor did that many times better:
tumble home:
This is the term that describes the inward angle of the glass surface. Pickups, vans and many SUVs have little or no tumble home to optimize interior space. Sometimes designers are not even concerned with generating space with little tumble home, but purely with the tough, blocky appearance that is popular with consumers in the latter category of cars. A unique example of cars with little tumble home is the Multipla, which has virtually no tumble home for optimal head and shoulder room.
Tumblehome is also a fundamental ingredient in creating a good car stance. The more tumblehome, the sportier the car.
Two box design
A two-box design is the layout of a body, viewed in terms of rectangular volumes. Two-box designs are, for example, station wagons, hatchbacks, shooting brakes or other cars with “loose” nose box up to the A-pillar and then a second, continuous volume.
v
volumes:
The volume of a car is its basic shape – the outline of the body when viewed from the side. Individual elements (cabin, bonnet and trunk) must be in balance with each other, without one dominating the other. Volumes make, with the proportions, the character of the car.
W
Wheel arch gap:
The space between the wheel and the body. It turns out to be a special obsession for many car fans, with a very enthusiastic community dedicated to lowering or even ‘slammed’ cars that no longer have a wheel arch gap at all. Off-road cars and SUVs need more wheelarch gap, but even in those types of vehicles, designers work to ensure that the body still provides an aesthetically pleasing space.
– Thanks for information from Autoweek.nl