Smart Car

ZAP has been immersed in legal procedures that will make such sales possible. Before any vehicle can be officially imported, it must be "Americanized" to meet federal standards for safety and emissions. Vehicles also have to pass the government's 30-mph crash-testing requirements.

61 HP, 60 MPG
Shaped like a tilted egg with clever protrusions along its surface, the Smart coupe has a rear-mounted three-cylinder, turbocharged engine that produces 61 horsepower. ZAP claims gas mileage as high as 60 miles per gallon. Considering the concern about escalating fuel prices early in 2004, the timing could hardly be better for a new fuel-sipping automobile.


Body panels are exchangeable in case of damage—or if the owner simply wants to change the car's two-tone coloring. Only 98.5 inches long overall, the two-door Smart is 60 inches tall and weighs a modest 1,588 pounds.


Driving a Smart coupe is a delightful experience, hampered only by operation of its sequential manual gearbox (SMG). Working without a clutch pedal, the unit functions like a manual transmission with six forward speeds.


"It's that gearbox that actually gives it that high fuel efficiency," said ZAP's CEO Steve Schneider. In both automatic and manual mode, though, you can expect sluggishness between gears, followed by a jerky shift into the next ratio. This happens whether the car is motoring around town or out on the highway. SMG units are normally found in high-performance cars, where some drivers are presumed to welcome the hazy, jolting shifts.