Strati by Michele Anoé
An entire car will be printed in September at the International Manufacturing Technology Show. Local Motors, the company behind the project, recently held what was the world’s first 3D Printed Car Design Challenge to choose its final design. Over 200 groups entered the competition, but when the dust settled and the votes were tallied, two designs stood atop the heap. (Pics)
Continue reading… “Winners of the world’s first ‘3D Printed Car Design Challenge’”
Volvo’s Drive Me project
Volvo Car Group’s “Drive Me” project — featuring 100 self-driving Volvos on public roads in everyday driving conditions — is moving forward rapidly, with the first test cars now driving around the Swedish city of Gothenburg.
Continue reading… “Volvo testing self-driving cars on public roads in Sweden”
Atkinson Cycle Engine
Toyota has developed two hyper-fuel-efficient small-displacement gasoline Atkinson cycle engines: a three-cylinder 1.0-liter and four-cylinder 1.3-liter which will be introduced across the range from next year in 14 different variations. The smaller engine will deliver 78 mpg in the Toyota Aygo, an improvement of 30 percent.
Continue reading… “Toyota develops Atkinson Cycle engine that delivers 78 mpg”
Genesis
EDAG, a German auto firm, made a stir at this year’s Geneva Motor Show with a fully 3D printed auto body called Genesis. And why not? Its smooth grey curves and futuristic honeycomb ooze sex appeal. And did we mention 3D printed cars?
Continue reading… “Genesis – futuristic 3D printed car body”
Elio
Ninety-three percent of Americans drive to work alone. So why use a car that’s big enough for four? A new vehicle that’s half-motorcycle and half-car is designed to replace sedans and SUVs on morning commutes and help save money and emissions in the process: The Elio costs $6,800 and gets 84 miles to the gallon. It’s possible to drive 672 miles on a single tank of gas. That’s the distance from New York City to Detroit.
BYD Qin Plug-in Hybrid Electric Car
It’s hard to keep up with the Chinese electric car market — it’s harder to find a good, reliable source for Chinese EV news. But wait, there were hardly any EV sales in China last year — not much has been going on there.
Continue reading… “BYD Qin plug-in hybrid electric car is demolishing the competition in China”
The self-driving car is coming to a showroom near you. It could take a coupe of years or even a couple of decades but few people at the Geneva Motor Show would disagree that one day science fiction will become fact.
Continue reading… “The passengers’ view of driverless cars”
Tesla Model S at a charging station.
When Elon Musk was designing the Tesla Model S he wanted an electric motor that had the same horsepower as the most powerful internal combustion engine but with nearly-instantaneous torque. He also wanted it to be the size of a watermelon. Musk was told this couldn’t be done by engine manufacturers. So the Tesla CEO decided to build his own motor. The earlier versions of this had a hand-wound stator which increased winding density to help eliminate resistance and increase peak torque. Later versions of the stators were built by robots.
Continue reading… “Tesla could have a $35K car that gets 1,000 miles per charge by 2020”
Bringing business class travel to driverless cars.
Countries from the U.S. to Singapore will likely have self-driving cars on roadways by 2020. These road-aware vehicles will theoretically do away with nearly all traffic collisions and reduce traffic congestion. Auto designer Rinspeed, however, has fixed its considerable talent on another aspect of the autonomous car: just what to do with the passengers. (Photos)
Continue reading… “Rinspeed’s driverless car concept brings business class to the road”
Self-driving office
For Regus, which operates close to 2,000 business centers globally, the office of the future it isn’t one where workers stand, walk, or even squat. Regus envisions a world in which people are sitting–in a self-driving office, that is.
Continue reading… “The office of the future will be a self-driving car”
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nSbUddr9QEU[/youtube]
There is just one month left for student innovators around the world to enter the massive global Valeo Innovation Challenge. The contest is a search for a product or system that will make the cars of 2030 more intelligent and intuitive.
Continue reading… “Global innovation challenge for the future of cars”
Curved displays by Sony at CES 2014.
Venture Beat tried to cover all of the 2 million square feet of exhibit space at the 2014 International CES. They saw only a portion of the tens of thousands products on display at the huge tech trade show. They saw fads like 3D glasses for TVs fade away. And it was interesting to see how “phablets,” or phones with huge, tablet-like screens, have caught on in places like Asia even though we’ve ridiculed them in the past.
Continue reading… “Top 10 trends at CES: Venture Beat”
By delving into the futuring techniques of Futurist Thomas Frey, you’ll embark on an enlightening journey.
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