Photo: Catalin Garmacea
The plot of the love story between Mercedes and Infiniti thickens once more, with the arrival of more info on the new Q60 coupe, which the Japanese company recently previewed as a concept in Detroit.
According to a report from Australian media, the Q60 will be yet another car to hugely benefit from Daimler engines, as it will be offered with the new 3-liter V6 they’ve developed and the more traditional 4.7-liter twin-turbo V8.
Both ideas seem really controversial to us, especially when you consider that the Q30 compact is rumored to have been developed almost entirely by Mercedes. And where does this leave the value of Japanese engineering? Will they make a GT-R with a C63 AMG engine next?
Regardless, the 3-liter is a good engine, a twin-turbo mill pushing 333 hp (329 bhp) and 479 Nm (353 lb-ft) of torque. Mercedes is using it even on the SL and GL, so its capabilities have been proven. As for the V8, it’s expected to offer a little over 400 hp and we think it’s rather weird for Infiniti to offer it when Mercedes saw a drop in demand and withdrew it from some models.
According to the same report from Motoring, the 3.8-liter V6 from the GT-R and the Q50 Eau Rouge was also considered but dropped on the basis that it would require realignment of front end components to fit.
The Q60 coupe will apparently also have two other engines, one being a naturally aspirated 3-liter and the other a hybrid system with a 3.5-liter setup borrowed from the Q50 sedan.
Our say: We’re finding this report very unrealistic, since Infiniti announced they developed their own in-house V6 3.0L twin-turbo engine which will appear on the next-generation Q60 and Q80 four-door coupe. Sure, they’re going to borrow a couple of engines, but they will be the smaller ones 4-bangers for which agreements have been signed and factories built. Either way you look at this story though, it’s RIP VQ37.
Both ideas seem really controversial to us, especially when you consider that the Q30 compact is rumored to have been developed almost entirely by Mercedes. And where does this leave the value of Japanese engineering? Will they make a GT-R with a C63 AMG engine next?
Regardless, the 3-liter is a good engine, a twin-turbo mill pushing 333 hp (329 bhp) and 479 Nm (353 lb-ft) of torque. Mercedes is using it even on the SL and GL, so its capabilities have been proven. As for the V8, it’s expected to offer a little over 400 hp and we think it’s rather weird for Infiniti to offer it when Mercedes saw a drop in demand and withdrew it from some models.
According to the same report from Motoring, the 3.8-liter V6 from the GT-R and the Q50 Eau Rouge was also considered but dropped on the basis that it would require realignment of front end components to fit.
The Q60 coupe will apparently also have two other engines, one being a naturally aspirated 3-liter and the other a hybrid system with a 3.5-liter setup borrowed from the Q50 sedan.
Our say: We’re finding this report very unrealistic, since Infiniti announced they developed their own in-house V6 3.0L twin-turbo engine which will appear on the next-generation Q60 and Q80 four-door coupe. Sure, they’re going to borrow a couple of engines, but they will be the smaller ones 4-bangers for which agreements have been signed and factories built. Either way you look at this story though, it’s RIP VQ37.
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