At the 2019 Shanghai Auto Show, NIO's first pure electric sedan "eT Preview" concept car was unveiled, and it was announced that the car would be officially released on NIO Day that year.
One year later, everyone already knows the answer. The new car released at the end of last year is the fastback SUV "EC6" that competes with the Tesla Model Y. NIO officially announced it to the public shortly after the auto show. , eT sedan and NIO’s second-generation platform NP2 will be postponed to 2022, and the mass-produced car “ET7” will obviously not be seen in the short term.
However, when Weidian browsed the website of the National Patent Office, it seemed that NIO had not stopped and released two appearance patents for suspected ET7 mass-produced cars.
The appearance of the new car is basically the same as that of the eT concept car. The front face still adopts the X-Bar family-style design, but the front and rear headlights have been modified to some extent. The sides of the headlights are not as sleek as the concept car. Instead, a crease is added to the shape, and the taillights are more concave and convex. Generally speaking, the car highly restores the preview concept car of that year.
What’s interesting is that we cannot easily conclude that this appearance is the final mass-produced version. At about the same time, another set of appearance patents from NIO was also announced. At first glance, the two models look similar. But there are still differences in details:
Since the two declarations are of different types, there will be differences in the details, but this does not affect our comparison of the two sets of figures. The front and rear taillights of both sets of new cars adopt different shapes from the eT concept car, and the front and rear bumpers have also been optimized to a certain extent. However, upon closer inspection, you will find that there are also differences between the two sets of application pictures: the second set of application pictures, X-Bar, are more Obviously, the positions of the front bumper and charging port below are also different.
At the end of last year, a set of patent pictures of a suspected NIO pure electric car were exposed. The appearance of the vehicle is exactly the same as the eT preview concept car. Weidian believes that there is a high probability that it is just a simple declaration of the appearance of the concept car. Patent, just in case Zotye, does not mean it will be mass produced.
So far, we have been able to learn about three sets of appearance declaration pictures of Weilai pure electric cars that are not completely consistent. So which version is the mass-produced version?
WeiDian has summarized three sets of versions. The third set is the earliest published patent drawing and is exactly the same as the eT preview concept car unveiled at the Shanghai Auto Show. The first and second sets are the latest published patents. Pictures, and the details have been changed, because they were also reported by many media. The first two sets of versions are the final mass-produced versions of eT.
But judging from the filing dates, the three sets of pictures are that the earliest one was announced the latest, and the latest one was announced the earliest. The first two models that are suspected of being mass-produced versions were even earlier declared. Regarding the eT concept car on display, this also shows that Weilai still has enough time to modify the mass-produced version, and it cannot be concluded that it is the latest final version based on the latest exposure.
In 2022, domestic electric cars such as Xpeng P7 and BYD Han EV have already been launched. Will Weilai, which is still in the stage of discussing appearance patent drawings, still have a chance?
This article comes from the author of Autohome Chejiahao and does not represent the views and positions of Autohome.