‘Light Cocoon’, A Concept Car with 3D Printed Skeleton Expected Soon

German engineering firm EDAG has a knack of coming up with some bizarre and wacky looking concept cars and this time around they have conjured up a car based on a bionically inspired body structure, dubbed as the “Light Cocoon”. The car does not feature your typical automobile body structure. In this case, it has a 3D printed skeleton wrapped under a tough weatherproof fabric known as the Texapore Softshell, which is apparently four times lighter than copy paper.

EDAG calls it the “ultimate lightweight construction”, as this whacked out concept car was inspired by leaves. As we know leaves have veins supporting layers of epidermis which forms an ideal structure with a lightweight outer skin stretched over it. Put simply, the car is wrapped under an ultra-light textile skin.

That’s not all, there’s back-lighting included which shows off the car’s “bones” covered in its skin. The car is expected to be showcased next year in Geneva.

Meanwhile, BMW had a stint with something similar with their BMW GINA Light Visionary Model from 2008, which featured an opaque fabric covering wrapped over metal and carbon fibers. The goal was to not only create a light weight car, but to have an entire new take on new manufacturing processes.

This new lightweight concept car with optimised ideal structure may be the concept car to look out for in the future.