Citroen Cactus Concept revealed

The Citroen Cactus Concept has been revealed as a new simplistic take on Citroen’s ‘C’ range of cars. Debuts at Frankfurt & heading for production.

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When the Citroen Cactus Concept was teased a week or so ago, we reckoned it looked like the first look at a simpler ‘C’ range of cars from Citroen with a touch of the urban warrior thrown in. And that seems to be exactly what it is.

At 4210mm long, the Citroen Cactus is a bit shorter than the C4, but gets a rufty-tufty stance and looks like a crossover made for the urban jungle.

All the surfaces are rounded and simplistic, there’s a set of slim headlights, novel looking roof rails, floating C-Pillars and something Citroen are calling ‘AirBump’. We thought that would be bumpers that pop back after car park dings, but it’s a bit more than that.

AirBump is a set of grey inserts at the front, back and sides of the Cactus which are small bumps filled with air that are designed to bounce back from small dings like shopping trolley accidents. It’s not pretty, but it could be effective.

Inside is very minimalistic with a 7″ screen replacing the instrument cluster and an 8″ screen for the infotainment, the seats are similarly simple with a designer feel (with leather on the Concept) and a full length panoramic roof. Citroen say it creates a ‘relaxed atmosphere’.

Under the bonnet lurks a hybrid air drivetrain using a compressed air and hydraulics system with a PureTech engine for economy, with Citroen claiming fuel economy in the region of 94mpg.

But with the Citroen Cactus heading for production in 2014 it’s highly unlikely the hybrid air drivetrain will make it in to production so soon, so expect a more familiar range of diesel and petrol engines instead.

The Citron Cactus Concept will debut at Frankfurt next week.