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Toyota Patents Cloaking Device To Make Car Pillars Appear Transparent (thedrive.com)

Posted by BeauHD on from the objects-in-mirror-are-closer-than-they-appear dept.

Toyota has patented a cloaking device that aims to make big, chunky car pillars transparent. The "apparatuses and methods for making an object appear transparent" which Toyota just patented uses cleverly placed mirrors to bend light around an object making it visible from the other side. The Drive reports: So you're not really seeing through the pillars, you're seeing around them. This is a much cheaper option than adding more cameras and screens all over the place and much more realistic than Harry Potter's invisibility cloak. The patent was filed with the U.S. patent office by Toyota North America, so if Toyota does go forward with this technology, we can probably expect to see it in cars in the U.S.

3 of 105 comments (clear)

  1. I'm not surprised its Toyota by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I don't know what it is—maybe a difference between the size of American roads and the size of Japanese roads—but every Toyota I've ever been in is built in such a way as to make it very likely that you'll run over a pedestrian who has just entered the crosswalk.

    Every time I approach a 4-way stop or some other intersection in a Toyota, I've got wiggle my head wildly this way and that to make sure I get a good view behind the "pillars". Surely, Toyota has received complaints, and thus Toyota has come up with a solution.

  2. it's gotten ridiculous by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    my 2017 car has 12 airbags with 6 in the pillars and all the pillars are as thick as coffee cups and i cant see shit out of any other window but the windshield

    1. Re:it's gotten ridiculous by Z00L00K · · Score: 4, Interesting

      The reason is that the A-pillar has to be stronger today to cope with crash test requirements. The more sloping windscreens initiated by the hunt for lower aerodynamic drag also contributes to put the A-pillar closer to your eyes.

      At the same time many vehicle manufacturers now work on replacing the exterior mirrors with cameras. It's not necessarily a good thing from all perspectives though as it's one more thing that can fail and something that makes the vehicles even more expensive.

      --
      If builders built buildings the way programmers wrote programs, then the first woodpecker would destroy civilization.