So this article just popped up on my guardian feed…wild stuff. I’m not a fan of Musk but you gotta admit this is pretty interesting.
“I’m not sure it’s necessarily legal in all jurisdictions,” Musk said, adding that the prototype was “not necessarily a safety optimised car but it takes the fun meter to 11”.
A EV called the McMurtry Spéirling can do that “drive upside down” trick:
A fan under the body + adaptive curtains suck it to the ground like a vacuum cleaner, for extra grip on tracks. IIRC they have patents on the curtains, so Tesla isn’t doing that.
Doing it with compressed air or whatever is… actually kinda impressive. But it seems like it wouldn’t work for very long, and like a significant safety hazard in a crash.
I dunno where it ejects the air, but I bet that thing looks crazy on a gravel road.
Out the back. Top Gear said it vacuumed the dust off their track:
It is most definitely “pavement only” with those tires, anyway.
Well technically that is what a hover craft does in reverse, so that isn’t new.
Yah I’d like to see the engineering side to it and if the thrust is gimbaled or fixed…hard to tell.