Slashdot Mirror
Hungarian Electric Car Splits Into Two Smaller Cars
Lanxon writes to mention that Antro, a Hungarian car manufacturer, is developing a new electric car that can split into two smaller cars. Antro plans to have it on the market by 2012. "The environmentally-conscious company started research back in 2002 and, with backing from various local sponsors, has invested 1.5 million euros in market research and development of a working prototype. The Antro Solo concept is a three-passenger car, with a hybrid drive and solar cells on its roof that the company says could generate enough electricity for up to 20km a day at city speeds. Futuristic looking in itself, the grander plan for the car is much more audacious: Antro intends to allow users to be able to connect two Antro Solos to form a six-passenger Antro Duo. Or perhaps more interesting still, owners of a Duo could split the car into two smaller Solos should Mum have different weekend plans to Dad. Or if they divorce."
People don't like futuristic looking stuff. If they did, we'd all be wearing white or silver jumpsuits.
Great, so now you can separate the saucer section and let the civilians escape while the crew remains on the battle bridge to distract the Romulans.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
"You doing OK back there, kids?"
"Kids?"
"Oh, where have they gone off to now?"
Candid Camera did a prototype of such a vehicle a long, long time ago...
Follow that car!
[car splits in half and goes separate ways]
Which one??
~REZ~ #43301. Who'd fake being me anyway?
No.
It can do up to 20km per day with just the charge it can get from the solar panels. Its internal power source is a "conventional" hybrid.
No gas tank size is specified, so it's not clear just how far it can go without refueling.
"I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
Instead go with length wise connections and "People on the highway for long trips that want to save money on gasoline can connect multiple vehicles into a train."
This would reduce gas/energy consumption by at least 28% (as per Mythbusters 2007 , episode 80, drafting 2 ft behind a big rig reduced gas consumption by 28% Connecting ).
No it won't work in the cities where people get off the the highway often, but out west where people ride for miles, a little bit of comm networking and boom you can easily have people joining up into road trains, saving gas.
excitingthingstodo.blogspot.com
One day while driving, an engineer's wife was nagging the shit out of him...
Table-ized A.I.
1. >129 mpg by design. I'll be interested in seeing whether it can actually reach that.
2. Seats three. Center seat is slightly forward, and it looks like the steering wheel is in the center. Which will make getting in and out a royal pain for the driver.
3. Nominally, it's 3.2 m long. When two of them are mated up, the combination is 4.8 m long. Where's the other 1.6 m going? Is the front of the second car going to fill up the rear of the lead car? Or does the combination look like the two cars are humping?
I'm not seeing any room in that design for crumple zones, roll bars, that sort of thing. Which makes me suspect it could never pass safety standards in the USA.
How in hell do you change the tires on this thing?
If they can get it past safety standards, and the price is reasonable, and it doesn't turn out to have the general quality of the Yugo, it might be a moderately useful vehicle for a family.
"I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
I worked on crime statistics reporting software before. Changing all those reports to use Float instead of Integer is gonna be a pain.
Table-ized A.I.
Let's just say I hope we'll all be able to choose our own vehicles.
I hope there's at least one manufacturer bold enough to actually SELL the cars they are constantly presenting as proof-of-concept, pre-series, prototypes and all that.
There's a ton of incredibly beautiful, modern, futuristic or even plain future cars at major trade shows, but they never ever sell the damn things.
I don't want to *put* kids in the back, they can crawl into the backseat themselves. I don't want to put groceries in the *boot*, I can put them in whatever cargo compartment is aerodynamically perfect. I don't need to sit in the upright grandpa position, I love to lounge or slouch comfortably, thank you.
That said, I would prefer http://www.geekologie.com/2007/12/07/future-car-1.jpg all the time.
Because the other model frankly looks like all the others on the parking lot at the mall, bland, boring, traditional, practical, economical and above all like it was designed for or even by my grandmother.
We need Spice in design. And we need Moar.
The article does not contain a photo. So here it comes.
Any sufficiently advanced intelligence is indistinguishable from stupidity.
But what if you are NOT stupid?
That rule fell for its own error in logic a looong time ago.
The error was, that the ideal is efficiency! Simplifying it to “simplicity” is on oversimplification, causing loss of purpose. Because too simple means harder again. Because in that case, you actually lose efficiency.
Clippy is a perfect example. If one is really dumb (no offense), one will find Clippy useful. But every normal human being will loathe that thing.
The same happens to everything, if you apply KISS long enough. It’s only a matter of time.
Which is why I went back to efficiency a long time ago.
Please stop parroting that old wives tale. It’s deprecated. Thank you. :)
Any sufficiently advanced intelligence is indistinguishable from stupidity.
As a hungarian I believe there will be nothing from this. It is just another firm which goes after free taxpayer money from the government rinding on the "green energy" bandwagon.
Government cannot make man richer, but it can make him poorer. - Ludwig von Mises