FRANKFURT MOTOR SHOW: Overgrown rollerskates run on hyperbole, while reality is a lot more orthodox

SOME of the weirdest ideas at the Frankfurt show shone a light on the small car class.

110917 Audi A2

SOME of the weirdest ideas at the Frankfurt show shone a light on the small car class, where car-makers across the price spectrum are exploring the limits of what may be acceptable in cities of the future.

Small they may be, but they run on 98 RON hyperbole. I've lost count of how many times some overgrown rollerskate is going to open a new era in urban mobility.

In fact, they do nothing of the sort. They are tentative probing into formats and strategies that tear up traditional notions of what a car means and have no chance of becoming mainstream.

To work, they invariably rely on some reciprocal non-motoring initiatives, such as a radical reshaping of public transport that's unlikely outside of a Star Trek script.

Or they assume an idea such as vehicle sharing requires a radical vehicle when it already operates in many cities with traditional cars.

At the extreme end, they are little more than enclosed motorcycles with room for only one, or perhaps two, in staggered seats. Access to the cockpit is by hinged canopy and the wheels are often outboard, so they have the visual appeal of little open-wheel racers. Power? From batteries, of course.

The Opel Rak e, Volkswagen Nils and Audi Urban Concept were among Frankfurt's offerings. In effect it's the carmakers saying to authorities: we're ready, if you have the political will. These cars are chips in an eco-poker game.

Real small cars are orthodox and the few that deviate have struggled to gain traction.

This has been the fate of the two-seater Smart, which Mercedes has persevered with despite slow sales and red ink. Smart jumped the gun on the city-car idea. But if it had been abandoned, Mercedes would have to invent something similar to show it's getting with the program.

Smart has been its testbed for battery-powered small cars and the third-generation Smart EV, unveiled at the show, moves it from experimental status to actual sales next year in 30 countries.

Mercedes itself debuted its next generation of small cars in the new B-Class, a mini people-mover.

The previous model had a sandwich floor that was radical but inflexible. The new one has been engineered so more variants are possible. The B-Class will eventually head up a minor constellation of five three-pointed stars, including the next A-Class and a small four-door coupe.

Making the most of one platform is a preoccupation of Mini, which is rapidly spawning variants that depart further and further from the original retro revival.

Its show car is the Mini Coupe, the fifth model in the family. It trades its signature flat-cap roof for a sort of backward-peaked yarmulke. It's odd, and although Mini says it was inspired by traditional British sports cars, it looks nothing like them. But it has found precedents for the idea in kit cars based on Minis of the era. The Coupe can sprint to 100km/h quicker than its siblings and is the first Mini with two seats.

It will be rapidly followed by the Mini Roadster, which is the same car with a fabric roof.

Due in 12 months is something called the Paceman, which is a performance version of the four-door Countryman, which is a sort of Mini SUV. Eventually, this will be a 10-car family.

The Mini shows the future isn't radical, it's retro. Its formula for making money out of small cars is being endlessly copied, not least by wannabe luxury leader Audi.

The A1 mimicks Mini's clever options strategy, which lures buyers into spending more. However, it's a flop in Europe, where it is seen as too expensive.

So Audi used the Frankfurt show to double down on its bet with a revival of the A2, its eco-champion discontinued in the mid-noughties. The original A2 was cheap to run but expensive to buy because it was made of lightweight aluminium.

The reborn A2 will raise the eco-flag again with a super-light target weight of 1150kg and an electric drivetrain, although petrol will also be available, just in case. Or it may be a hybrid.

Audi is ruling out nothing except prevarication.

When radical small car ideas do make it into production, they generally have all the interesting bits workshopped out of them so the eventual car is crushingly dull.

A few years ago Volkswagen rolled out an exciting little concept called Up!, complete with exclamation mark. With an engine mounted at the rear and plans for budget versions for BRICs buyers, the concept had the makings of a modern-day Beetle. The people's car reborn!.

Showroom ready for Frankfurt, the Up has lost its radical layout to become just another small Volkswagen, a replacement for the Fox, except this time, unlike previous tiny Volkswagens, it will come to Australia. It will probably be good, too, in an utterly conventional Volkswagen way. What it's not any longer is radical, and for that reason it must lose that exclamation mark.

And that's the reality for unorthodox small cars. If Volkswagen can't do it, then nobody can. Crazy concepts have got their punctuation wrong. Any car that bucks the trend should terminate with a question mark.