(Tue 20 Apr 10)

A concept car showing Mercedes-Benz's idea of how coupés might look in the near future is making its world debut at the Auto China show.

With some features familiar from the current CLS coupé (for which a production version of the concept might turn out to be the replacement) and the SLS AMG supercar, the Shooting Break is described by Mercedes in terms like this: "The vocabulary of the design idiom includes the contrasting play between lines and exaggerated areas, which combine to create an animated area of interaction." And that sort of thing.

In simpler language, the Shooting Break is partly an indication of how Mercedes design is developing, and partly a way of combining a coupé and an estate car. No luggage capacity figures have been announced, but we imagine the car should be able to carry quite a lot of stuff.

The concept car's engine is a 306bhp 3.5-litre V6 petrol unit. Mercedes describes this as the forerunner to a new generation of direct injection engines, and says that attention has been paid to the efficiency of the ancillary units (presumably the alternator, among other things), and that there is also a start/stop system.

A word about the name. Estate cars used to be known in the US as shooting brakes, a term derived from carriages used to train wild horses in the 19th century. We have never come across the identical-sounding "shooting break" before, but Mercedes says it was also used.

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