A colour so dark you can hardly see the X6. Don't say you're relieved
If you’re the kind of person who often loses their car in a supermarket car park, this BMW X6 is DEFINITELY not for you. Park it up at night and you literally won’t be able to see it, unless you’ve left the optional kidney grille lights on of course. Look at them there, shining like Jurgen Klopp’s new teeth.
Anyway, we’re getting ahead of ourselves. What you’re looking at above is the BMW X6 Vantablack. It’s a one-off from the folks in Bavaria, who have collaborated with British firm Surrey NanoSystems in order to draw some attention to the premiere of the new X6 at September’s Frankfurt Motor Show.
Surrey NanoSystems are the inventors of Vantablack, the darkest man-made substance in the world, which absorbs all but 0.035% of the light that hits it and means coated objects lose all of their defining features when looked at through the human eye. It makes them either seem 2D, or like a hole in the universe in the process.
Don’t say it. Don’t say it. Don’t say it.
We’re glad they used it on the new X6 then.
Sorry, we couldn’t resist. Actually though, the coating applied to the BMW isn’t the original Vantablack that was invented back in 2014 – that was developed for space-borne components and would genuinely be too dark for a car, not to mention it being extremely difficult to apply and far too expensive.
Duh... this isn't Vantablack – it's a black sheet over the car!
This is a new Vantablack paint finish known as VBx2, which allows a whole one per cent of light to reflect off it and has so far only been used for architectural purposes. BMW and Surrey NanoSystems are the first to ever apply it to a car.
BMW claims that the finish “highlights the expressive design language and confident, dominant and muscular appearance of the new BMW X6 to perfection.”
We can barely see it. Ahh yes, perfection.
STORY Greg Potts
