1930-40 жылдарғы америкалық «Scarab» микроавтобусы

1930–1940s American minivan

The Stout Scarab is a streamlined 1930–1940s American car, designed by William Bushnell Stout and manufactured by Stout Engineering Laboratories and later by Stout Motor Car Company of Detroit, Michigan. The Stout Scarab is credited by some as the world's first production minivan, and a 1946 experimental prototype of the Scarab became the world's first car with a fiberglass bodyshell and air suspension.

William B. Stout was a motorcar and aviation engineer and journalist. While he was president of the Society of Automotive Engineers, Stout met Buckminster Fuller at a major New York auto show and wrote an article on the Dymaxion Car for the society newsletter. Contemporary production cars commonly had a separate chassis and body with a long hood. The engine compartment and engine were located longitudinally behind the front axle, and ahead of the passenger compartment. The front mounted engine typically drove the rear axle through a connecting drive shaft running underneath the floor of the vehicle. This layout worked well, but limited the passenger space. In contrast, the Scarab design eliminated the chassis and drive shaft to create a low, flat floor for the interior, using a unitized body structure and placing a Ford built V8 engine in the rear of the vehicle. Stout envisioned his traveling machine as an office on wheels. To that end, the Scarab's body, styled by John Tjaarda, a well known Dutch automobile engineer, closely emulated the design of an aluminium aircraft fuselage. The use of lighter materials resulted in a vehicle weighing under
The short, streamlined nose and tapering upper body at the rear foreshadowed contemporary monospace (or one box) MPV or minivan design, featuring a removable table and second row seats that turn 180 degrees to face the rear — a feature that Chrysler marketed over 50 years later as "Swivel ’n Go". Although reminiscent of the Chrysler Airflow, streamliner, and the slightly later (1938) Volkswagen Beetle — other aerodynamically efficient shapes, the Stout Scarab was generally considered ugly at the time.

The Scarab's interior space was maximized by its ponton styling, which dispensed with running boards and expanded the cabin to the full width of the car. A long wheelbase and engine placement directly over the rear axle moved the driver forward, enabling a steering wheel almost directly above the front wheels. Passengers entered through a single, large, common door. A flexible seating system could be easily reconfigured (except for the driver's seat, which was fixed). The designer anticipated the seating in modern minivans, such as the Chrysler Voyager and Renault Espace; a small card table could be fitted with the passenger seats as needed. Interiors were appointed in leather, chrome, and wood. Design elements also worked in a stylized ancient Egyptian scarab motif, including the car's emblem. Visibility to the front and sides was similar to that of an observation car, although rearward vision was negligible and there were no rear view mirrors. The Scarab suspension inspired the later Chapman strut used by Lotus from their Lotus Twelve model of 1957. The second prototype was ready in 1935, with some styling and mechanical changes. The headlamps were set behind a fine, vertical bar grille, and at the rear, narrow chrome bars curved from the back window down to the bumper, giving the car its Art Deco appearance. The body was changed to steel to reduce cost. The vehicles were never produced in volume and were hand made, with no two Scarabs identical.