Infiniti Q50 Eau Rouge to Move from Concept to Prototype

The Infiniti Q50 Eau Rouge made its first official debut earlier this year at the 2014 Detroit Motor Show. No one could argue that it was a great looking car, and yet Infiniti promised more… The concept originally debuted without powertrain specifications, but Infiniti pledged that would change sometime soon.

Well, ‘soon’ came last week at the 2014 Geneva Motor Show where Infiniti premiered a revised version of their Q50 Eau Rouge, this time with an insanely powerful engine. In fact, it wasn’t just any engine – it was the very same engine as we’ve seen in the Nissan GT-R, a twin-turbo 3.8L V6. Except, in the Infiniti Q50 Eau Rouge the engine gets a 15hp boost up to 560hp and 442 lb-ft of torque. Of course, this is still dwarfed by the 600hp GT-R NISMO, but you can’t expect Nissan to let any car outshine their newly launched crown jewel.

In addition to the amped up engine, the Infiniti Q50 Eau Rouge also gets the GT-R’s AWD platform with a static 50-50 torque distribution. All of this gives us a monstrous sedan that can allegedly sprint from 0 to 60 in under 4 seconds, with a top speed of 180mph. And you’ll make your way up to that top speed with a 7-speed gearbox.

According to Johan de Nysschen, Infiniti’s president, the high-performance concept is the natural progression of the Q50 Eau Rouge. He explained that, “A car with such pronounced styling treatments demands the very best in terms of high-performance powertrains, which is why we installed the V6 twin-turbocharged, seven-speed combination as an example of what a potential powertrain for the Q50 Eau Rouge may look and sound like.”

Speaking of sound, go ahead and indulge yourself with the video below. It’s a little bit of ear candy that we know you’ll enjoy:

Unfortunately, when the super sedan was shown at the Geneva Motor Show, we were disappointed to learn that Infiniti was explicitly NOT confirming the Eau Rouge for production. However, just one week later, de Nysschen has given us reason to breathe a sigh of relief.

In an interview with Autocar, he put it simply: “This is now an official project.”

Infiniti is now moving the car one step closer to production by expressing their intention to build a prototype model. De Nysschan elaborated, saying, “There are many things to look at, details like the different vibration harmonics that result when you take an engine designed for one application and fit it in another.”

If the super Q50 did eventually make it to production, it would be the most powerful Infiniti model by far, and we’re certainly hoping that will come to pass. In the meantime, Infiniti did confirm that they’ll unleash a not-quite-as-exciting 2.0L 4-cylinder engine with 211 hp into their normal Q50 models later this year. Honestly, we’re hoping that we see this Q50 Eau Rouge prototype by then too.