RTOGUY: Forget the side impact concern I'd like to know how he thinks it is capable of driving in "all weather". Anybody that lives anywhere with four distinct seasons has to look at that and wonder how it is going to handle any amount of snow. It doesn't tip over? Gee that's great! Can it handle a 3' snowdrift? Because that is my reality for at least half of the year.

Not every car is going to be ideal for every climate.

It'd be like buying a mustang or crossfire if you live up north and thinking it will work as a daily commuter all year. This is for people that are in cities where parking is tight, commutes are short, and roads are cleared on the rare chance they do get snow.

Unimpressed:

starlost: hipster motorcycle dealership

I think that's next to the store that sells pink unicorn feed.

So it's a shiatty motorcycle for one and a potentially unsafe car for the price of a decent small car.

Definitely a winner.

Disruptive technology is something that disrupts the market. If you release something like this and it causes a mass exodus from cars such that automakers must start imitating your product to survive, that's disruptive technology.

This is a prototype.

You haven't disrupted anything.

And this is nothing near what the Tesla Roadster is. What chimp thinks his little toy car is up to par with one of the best sports cars of all time? The Roadster is up there with the Audi S5 or the Chevrolet Camaro; this is a nice piece of tech, but it's not in that space at all.

Aren't they kind of limiting their market by making it a motorcycle? I don't have a motorcycle license, and I wouldn't go get one just to spend sixteen thousand on that thing. Fleets won't want to use them for that same reason I'd think.

SuperChuck: I wanna know where subby shops that has carts that look like that.

Maybe they have carts for the kids.

 

No thanks.

$16K... really?

For a motorcycle with a gyro and fairings?
Nah.

Next!

A gyroscope that prevents its tipping, eh?

I wonder, how will that affect its ability to negotiate curves?

Around town, maybe. Interstate, HELL no.

/Dragon's tail, fun fun

Put me on the list of people who had to stop at "automotive space". Ugh.

""Right now, electric cars are not sustainable," he says. "The average electric car battery pack is four times larger than ours, with one-third the range. If every car in the U.S. had that battery pack, we would need to produce four times more energy to compensate for that. Where is all that energy going to come from?""

Gasoline-fired power plants.

Duh!

I think I'd rather buy a Corolla...

pastorkius: The type of revolutionary design that will turn the world upside down!
[i.imgur.com image 468x286] 

Couldn't link to an upside down Robin pic... all the sites hosting them were websensed.

Yeah, Dyson did it right. He put a tadpole design in... two wheels up front, single rear wheel, rear steering. The problem with a single wheel up front is your cornering force leans more on the front wheel, since it's leading and the act of turning is technically braking in the forward direction and accelerating in a tangential direction. Braking shifts load forward, and now your forward-shifted load is leaning to one side... where there is no wheel.

Was it "Don't build a car that no one will buy"?

According to Kim, it's a concept whose time has come. Today's youths are less interested in buying cars than they are in buying iPhones and other gadgets: Car ownership among people between ages 18 and 34 is down by 30 percent in the last five years.

It's cute when urban people, particularly those who live in high density mass transit areas, try to apply urban sensibilities to things going on outside the city limits.

All my younger nieces and nephews want a CAR when they get a bit older. They may also want an iPhone, but they want their own means of transportation and they don't want one that is a glorified Vespa. If car ownership is down, it is because so are employment rate among teens, while insurance rates continue ever upward.

If it can't tow 20,000 lbs. up a 7% grade on gravel during a blizzard, then fat chance ever selling a single one, amirite?

/[ohlookitsthisthreadagain.png]

If only there were some other explanation for this, something other than marketing trends, like an economic cause ...


Like a generation realizing that it makes no sense to spend 22K on a two ton fashion accessory, and that it's best to figure out how to get from A to B in the most economical way instead?

Even if you get an iPhone out of vanity, that's $600 of vanity. But a car? Who's the frivolous one here? The youngsters with their fancy phones or the old fartes?

sp86: I wonder how it handles in the snow.

I'm sure its fine for around your gated community in Florida or Arizona where you're driving between home, the pool, and the club house.

I wonder how it handles on the highway between 2 18-Wheelers going 80mph.

Nabb1: hillbillypharmacist: "Safety of a car"?
I'm gonna need to see some test results on that.

Yeah, that looks like a deathtrap, especially in a side-impact collision.

Well, deathtrap is a bit extreme. It's no more a deathtrap than a motorcycle or a scooter, at first glance. The "safety of a car" quote is mind boggling. That just seems unpossible.

Lit, huh? Looks like someone was lit when they designed it.

Slaves2Darkness: Spanky_McFarksalot: FTFA:"but that cost will go down significantly--to around $16,000--once the product gains sufficient market share to enable bulk manufacturing."

Sooo, I have $16k to spend on a car....why would I pick that one?

Hell if I know you could buy dam near any sub-compact in the market for $16k and probably get better gas mileage, certainly more range.

For awhile Kia had an actual buy-one-get-one-free promotion, where if you bought a Kia Sorento at full price (something like $18,000) they would give you a Kia Rio for free.

So for $18,000, you could get a new SUV AND a car that got roughly 35 mpg.

Pair-o-Dice: /Dragon's tail

live near it in Maryville....yes, it is :-)

ph0rk: starlost: hipster motorcycle dealership

I think that's next to the store that sells pink unicorn feed.

There are several in Portland. Seriously. They sell a lot of scooters and ironic old bikes.

pastorkius: The type of revolutionary design that will turn the world upside down!
[i.imgur.com image 468x286] 

Couldn't link to an upside down Robin pic... all the sites hosting them were websensed.



/wanted for questioning

error 303: Slaves2Darkness: Spanky_McFarksalot: FTFA:"but that cost will go down significantly--to around $16,000--once the product gains sufficient market share to enable bulk manufacturing."

Sooo, I have $16k to spend on a car....why would I pick that one?

Hell if I know you could buy dam near any sub-compact in the market for $16k and probably get better gas mileage, certainly more range.

For awhile Kia had an actual buy-one-get-one-free promotion, where if you bought a Kia Sorento at full price (something like $18,000) they would give you a Kia Rio for free.

So for $18,000, you could get a new SUV AND a car that got roughly 35 mpg.

If you're referring to the first generation Kia Rio, that's not really true. The car got 26 mpg in mixed driving.

/Used to have one, it was a piece of crap
//I kind of miss it though

tricycleracer: If it can't tow 20,000 lbs. up a 7% grade on gravel during a blizzard, then fat chance ever selling a single one, amirite?

bluefoxicy: And this is nothing near what the Tesla Roadster is. What chimp thinks his little toy car is up to par with one of the best sports cars of all time? The Roadster is up there with the Audi S5 or the Chevrolet Camaro

The Tesla Roadster isn't one of the best sports cars of all time, especially according to Top Gear.

Also, the S5 isn't really a sports car, it's more of a grand tourer.

Arcanum: This is vaporware like the last few electric car startups.

That's fine with me so long as the Obama administration doesn't invest our money in other failure.

What, like the $17 Billion+ bail out (investment) G.W. Bush got for the big 3?

"We're at the same place that Tesla was at after $7 million in investment after only $780,000. We've been incredibly resourceful," says Kim.

A++++, would chortle again!

Eeeevaaa!

Conflagrations, you built and electric Vespa with a Tupperware shell. Let me know how it does when some drunken soccer mom in a Escalade blows a stop sign and run in to you. On the bright side maybe some of your internal organs will remain inside the only vehicle after the crash.

That makes a Prius look like a Hummer.

I'm not getting why some of you think this thing has three wheels. Did you read the article or even bother looking at the photograph? IT ONLY HAS TWO WHEELS.

Sticky Hands: maybe it's just me... but where would the average apartment dwelling city slicker charge an electric vehicle?
hell I have to leave my place to just vacuum my car.

The grand idea is to turn every parking meter into a charging station.

St_Francis_P: In fact, the C-1 isn't really a car at all: It's officially classified as a motorcycle, but CEO Daniel Kim says that the vehicle resists classification.

"It's disrupting the automotive space," says Kim.

That kind of marketing-speak would scare me, even if I wanted one.

Sounds hipster

ocschwar: If only there were some other explanation for this, something other than marketing trends, like an economic cause ...


Like a generation realizing that it makes no sense to spend 22K on a two ton fashion accessory, and that it's best to figure out how to get from A to B in the most economical way instead?

Even if you get an iPhone out of vanity, that's $600 of vanity. But a car? Who's the frivolous one here? The youngsters with their fancy phones or the old fartes?

You do realize that even if you choose not to drive a two ton fashion accessory, a lot of people still will. And they'll be talking on their cell phone while doing it. And you probably don't want to be in this thing when they hit you.

ani23: So it's a shiatty motorcycle for one and a potentially unsafe car for the price of a decent small car.

Definitely a winner.

But..but...green...something something...

bluefoxicy: And this is nothing near what the Tesla Roadster is. What chimp thinks his little toy car is up to par with one of the best sports cars of all time? The Roadster is up there with the Audi S5 or the Chevrolet Camaro; this is a nice piece of tech, but it's not in that space at all.

I have a hard time taking you seriously when you mention the Tesla, an Audi S5 and the farking Camaro and you're talking about the best sports cars of all time.

impaler: hdhale: According to Kim, it's a concept whose time has come. Today's youths are less interested in buying cars than they are in buying iPhones and other gadgets: Car ownership among people between ages 18 and 34 is down by 30 percent in the last five years.

It's cute when urban people, particularly those who live in high density mass transit areas, try to apply urban sensibilities to things going on outside the city limits.

All my younger nieces and nephews want a CAR when they get a bit older. They may also want an iPhone, but they want their own means of transportation and they don't want one that is a glorified Vespa. If car ownership is down, it is because so are employment rate among teens, while insurance rates continue ever upward.

It's cute when people ignore hard statistical facts with limited personal anecdotes.

It's even cuter when you nitpick out one part of someone's comments while ignoring others simply so you can bring insult to bear.

200 miles on one charge? How can you get those kind of results without massive government funding???

tricycleracer: Sticky Hands: maybe it's just me... but where would the average apartment dwelling city slicker charge an electric vehicle?
hell I have to leave my place to just vacuum my car.

The grand idea is to turn every parking meter into a charging station.

That would require a shiatton more meters than a lot of cities have. Hell, I'd have to park three miles from my place to find an existing paid parking spot.

This thing looks exactly like a design I came up with in high school 20 years ago.

Also: