Mercedes-Benz Silver Lightning

The Mercedes-Benz Silver Lightning, also called the Silver Arrow, is a concept car created for the 2011 Los Angeles Auto Show Design Challenge, a competition whose theme asked entrants for Hollywood's hottest new movie car. It was conceived by the Mercedes-Benz Advanced Design Studio in Carlsbad, California, the same studio that had earlier created the Mercedes-Benz Biome. Its styling draws heavily on the Silver Arrow racing cars of the 1930s, above all the Mercedes-Benz W125 that Rudolf Caracciola drove to the 1937 Grand Prix win, and on the 1955 Mercedes-Benz 300 SLR, with some influence from science fiction films. The roof is built from small lightweight magnetic squares that either join into a hardtop or retract to turn the car into a roadster, and its omni-directional wheels sit inside rings integrated into the body so that the car can steer freely in any direction. It was presented with a short film of the same name, which won the best animation award, and the car later appeared in the Asphalt racing video games.