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The seductive sports coupe pops its top and embraces the open air.
Slicing the roof off a slinky coupe such as the 10Best-winning Infiniti G37 is fraught with danger. A graceful corner eater can be wrecked by the added weight of structural reinforcements and pulled like taffy to package the folding roof. But as long ago as last August, when Nissan design chief Shiro Nakamura showed the first alluring pictures of the Infiniti G37 convertible, we suspected Infiniti had preserved its best looker.
Nakamura’s accomplishment has been to throw out the roof while keeping the rest of the hot bod. In the G37, the muscular shoulders, the short overhangs, and the flat, athletic beltline are all still there. Infiniti proudly proclaims that the convertible is just 0.2 inch longer than the coupe, even though all the sheetmetal behind the seats is unique to the convertible. So far, we’re cheering.
Ready, Set, Compromise
Then the roof goes down with a button push, and we see why coupes tend to balloon in the top-cutting process. In a seamless, 30-second ballet of pirouetting panels and tumbling glass, the G37’s steel roof, engineered and supplied by Germany’s Karmann Group, efficiently fractures into three sections and stacks in the trunk. And then the trunk is full, stuffed like a steel egg roll. There’s barely enough room for a Subway foot-long once the G37’s top is stowed. The BMW 328i convertible, its base price right where the G37 convertible’s should land at about $45,000, leaves behind more usable space.
Full Story: Car and Driver - 2009 Infiniti G37 Convertible - First Drive Review
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