When Volkswagen launched its "People’s Car" project, soliciting ideas for futuristic visions and concepts that could be made into reality, more than 119,000 ideas were posted, including the Hover Car, the Music Car, and the Smart Key. All were highlighted at the 2012 Beijing Auto Show.
The Music Car concept involves an LED-covered Volkswagen Beetle that changes color to match the music selections of the driver, while the zero-emission, two-seated Hover Car levitates above the road and propels itself forward using electromagnetic road networks.
The Smart Key concept caters to the uber-attached, providing them with a 9mm HD touchscreen on the ignition key that monitors the status of the car throughout the day and keeps tabs on it via satellite transmission.
OK Sylvie-- Fact or fiction? I this some very very cleaver computer-aided video or the real thing? If the real thing, I have to handed it to VW. They have certainly one great imagination. I really like the "crash-avoidance" feature. Very interesting. Great post.
This time you only missed the April 1 date by a few days. This is a good example of what computer animation and graphics processing can do, but it is far away less believeable than Roadrunner and Coyote.
This would be appropriate for an April 1 issue, but not really any other time. Of course it could be sort of entertaining to see just how it was produced. But really, even over an active magnetic track it would not ride that far up. And once again, it simply could not carry enough energy to deliver that kind of power.
Also, at one point we saw the blue glow underneath the vehicle. is this really a car using warp drive? Don't tell us it is magnetic levitation if it was really a warp drive system, using the dilithium crystals.
Why Does Design News continue to post this article over and over as if it is a legitimate product announcement when you are well aware that it is a hoax?
You are rapidly losing your credibility. Please stop doing this.
Many years ago I designed the controls for a mag-lev hover train that did work. But the power source was on the track side because there was simply no way that thyhe train car could carry enough power to lift itself for any amount of time.
Another thing is certain is that the car is not working with the "minerals in the ground" to produce a useable amount of lift.Just assume 100% efficiency and do the math.
I was impressed until the mag-lev concept was explained by minerals underground. Mag lev, without going into details, is much more complicated. :-) Great video, though.
I like the visibility their prototype affords, however.
I remember Moller's skycar designs since from when I was a kid reading Popular Science in the early 1970s. To my knowledge, not one of them ever managed to carry a human being on board.
I've seen many engineers shake their heads in disgust over two decades at the ridiculous claims he made. These things were never able to fly. They preyed upon hapless, ignorant investors with all sorts of idiotic claims for engines that are thermodynamically unlikely.
The noise from the engines was the least of his problems.
If any engineer believed that this concept video was real for more than a milisecond, he doesn't deserve to be an engineer. I'm not even going to start listing the technical problems with this concept. All the explainations in the video are bogus.
I thoroughly enjoyed the video for what it is - a concept, one that's been around for years, one that we as engineers should work towards bringing about but one that practically is many years out.
I agree with the people who are upset about Design News posting something like this, whether it's in a blog or not. Design News is a technical magazine, read by professionals. It's not some college student's web site where he wants to impress his friends and have fun. As an engineer, I expect Design News to keep me up to date with new equipment, new technologgy, things that might be useful in my applications at work.
This blog article has really detracted from the credibility and reliability of Design News. As a result, I will not be paying much attention to the stuff that comes across my computer screen from this source. I'll stick to the magazine, where childish foolishness likely will not occur.
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