Tokyo 2015: Yamaha Sports Ride concept car - first look

So you thought Yamaha only makes two-wheelers? And, okay, musical instruments and electronics? Okay, add outboard motors and jet skis to that list too. Wait, now you can also add cars to that list. At least show cars, for now, but still. For the world’s second-largest two-wheeler manufacturer has just unveiled the Sports Ride concept car at the ongoing 2015 Tokyo Motor Show. 

If you delve deep into Yamaha’s history, the company isn’t exactly unfamiliar to the world of four-wheelers even though it hasn’t exactly made one bearing its badge so far. The company, thanks in part to its musical heritage, has been responsible for tuning and/or developing engines for various established manufacturers like Volvo, Toyota, Lexus, and Ford. It even supplied engines for Formula 1 cars and had showcased the MOTIV.e two years ago at this very same venue.

 The Yamaha Sports Ride is the follow-up to that, but in a whole different mould. While the predecessor was a compact electric city runabout with a 160+ kilometre range, this one is a two-seater sports concept designed to “offer a driver-machine relationship similar to a motorcycle.” 

They both have one common thread going for them though; both the MOTIV.e and this Sports Ride concept were created with the help of legendary F1 mastermind Gordon Murray, also the man almost single-handedly responsible for the peerless McLaren F1. Although Murray is not behind the car's design, which was led by ex-Toyota designer Dezi Nagaya, the Sports Ride employs a new manufacturing system derived from Gordon Murray Design’s iStream manufacturing process, but replacing the glassfibre content with carbon-fibre. It has been developed in conjunction with Japanese firm Toray, for whom Murray designed the Teewave sports car in 2011, and sandwiches a honeycomb paper core with two carbonfibre skins.

And as you’d expect of any car with Murray’s name attached to it, the Yamaha Sports Ride goes to new extremes in terms of weight savings, pushing the adage, “Think Light” to its limits. The whole shebang, measuring 3,900 mm long, 1,720 mm wide and 1,170 mm tall, weighs in at a paltry 780kgs. That is less than even a comparable Lotus Elise. 

Aside from the extreme weight loss regimen, Yamaha is cagey about divulging details on the Sports Ride’s powertrain. It is speculated that the concept could be powered by an uprated version of the 1.0-litre three-cylinder engine that was mooted for the Motiv.e. That engine was tipped to produce 70-80 PS, but uprated beyond 100 PSin an entry-level form, that would be likely to give the car a power-to-weight ratio in excess of 140 PS per tonne, which, again, is around that of an Elise.

What makes the Sports Ride more exciting than the usual outlandish concepts that manufacturers usually trot out at such shows is that it, at the very least, suggests that Yamaha is experimenting with the idea of re-entering the car industry in the near future. Whether the concept remains a demonstrator of Yamaha’s technology, or could it, in fact, be the preview of a future model remains to be seen.