Inflatable Electric Cars

June 5, 2008 3:17 PM

Inflatable Electric Cars When it arrives (hopefully in 2010) it will apparently be able to 2500 miles per charge.
posted by socalsamba (50 comments total)

starts with v and ends with aporware
posted by p3on at 3:19 PM on June 5

I would love to have one of these. As long as everyone else on the road had one, too.
posted by Pater Aletheias at 3:24 PM on June 5 [3 favorites]

Does it come equipped with an airbag?
posted by Kabanos at 3:26 PM on June 5 [1 favorite]

Inflatable Electric Cars When it arrives (hopefully in 2010) it will apparently be able to 2500 miles per charge.

Which is almost 2500 times more than current inflatable-only models:
http://www.basd.net/staff/kharman/Projects/CarPictures.htm
posted by ...possums at 3:26 PM on June 5

Call me when it flies.
posted by FelliniBlank at 3:28 PM on June 5 [1 favorite]

I have always wondered why they didn't make Nerf cars. Glad to see I was ahead of the curve.
posted by BitterOldPunk at 3:36 PM on June 5

p3on beat me, but I was going to say "It's filled with vapor!"
posted by stevil at 3:40 PM on June 5 [1 favorite]

direct link to the company

i want to believe.
posted by acid freaking on the kitty at 3:41 PM on June 5

Can it pass the NHTSA bumper test? Or any of the other legally-mandated collision test standards? Somehow I bet not.
posted by Class Goat at 3:53 PM on June 5

Why not? You're driving in your very own air bag!
posted by Astro Zombie at 3:56 PM on June 5

The practicality of this is blown all out of proportion.
posted by CynicalKnight at 3:57 PM on June 5 [1 favorite]

So tired of cool cars that are only two years away but you can invest right now step right up monorail the end.
posted by mecran01 at 3:59 PM on June 5

The perfect vehicle in which to take your inflatable doll out for a night on the town.
posted by Joey Michaels at 4:00 PM on June 5 [6 favorites]

Sure. Hit a porcupine and you have a deflatable rocket.
posted by weapons-grade pandemonium at 4:13 PM on June 5 [5 favorites]

I'm betting none of you even so much as glanced at the article. I'll copy, for your edification, the headline:

Inflatable electric car can drive off cliffs

If the idea of driving something you can purposefully and safely drive off a cliff doesn't fill you with glee, well, then I dunno about you.
posted by boo_radley at 4:26 PM on June 5 [2 favorites]

They should green it up a bit more and fill it with hydrogen.

What could possibly go wrong?
posted by Sys Rq at 4:28 PM on June 5

Call me when it flies.

They fly. You just need to inflate them with helium.
posted by ...possums at 4:41 PM on June 5 [1 favorite]

Another article linked the southeast Asia location with flooding: "the car will float in an emergency such as a flood or tsunami and can be assembled by any two people of reasonable competence."

Well, there you go. Given that last sentence, it'll never be released in the US.

I'm with boo that only half the commenters read the article (true, it is a little short on data, but the car is still in R & D).
posted by artifarce at 4:47 PM on June 5

Inflatable electric car can drive off cliffs

I'm calling BS on this. Are they saying this car is a replacement for a parachute? You can't just put someone in a plastic bubble and expect them to live through massive impacts.
posted by burnmp3s at 4:55 PM on June 5

That is one excellent press release.
posted by pompomtom at 5:05 PM on June 5

Whether it´s legal to drive an inflatable car on the road will depend on local ordinances, which dealers or individual buyers will be responsible for knowing. But, as XP Vehicles estimates a $200 billion market for alternative energy vehicles, changes in regulations seem inevitable.

Between that and "exact details won't be released until the official launch" I have to concur that it sounds like someone fishing around and hoping that the response to the press release is so overwhelmingly enthusiastic that they'll get funding to make a real company.

"Even if we capture just 1% of the market, that's two billion dollars. How can we lose? Give us some money. Look, here's an inflatable I.O.U."
posted by XMLicious at 5:05 PM on June 5 [1 favorite]

I love this idea. I too wondered why they never made lightweight foam (or Nerf) cars and took an elaborate (but inexpensive) bumper-car concept and applied it to daily travel.

There's no logical reason to continue to use extremely thin, expensive, painted sheet metal as the skin or shells for cars. Frankly, you drivers and car owners really need to get over having shiny, curvy cars where the styling is the main selling point. It's a sick, destructive fetish at this point, particularly in the US.

In essence, the whole world is paying for you to express your individual style through the purchase of a mass produced, non-unique item. The world pays for it in reduced gas mileage, in wasted resources (processing, production and recycling) and in personal safety and more.

Or how about all that wasted water from washing that shiny, pretty thing?

And the driver/owner pays for it with insurance premiums. Cars and repairing them wouldn't be so expensive if parts were more universal, and people didn't buy shiny, fragile crap where a something like a simple headlight cluster wasn't twenty useless chrome-plated plastic bits that did nothing functionally except pretend to be a finely crafted piece of machinery.

People who scoff a the idea of inflatable cars - or any car made non-traditionally - probably have no idea how their currnet car is actually made, and what it contains. That metal shell or cage that people put so much faith in? "Feels solid. I like how the doors close", right? Kick the tires, yeah? It's all an illusion. Car designers often put way more work into making the car "feel" solid where you'll touch it and interface with it,

But that metal skin is basically just a couple of gauges thicker than foil. It's like paper. You can puncture it with a decent pocket knife and even saw holes in some of it if you want to ruin a good knife.

Why are you so confident that in a wreck it won't do anything other than splinter into deadly, jagged pieces of metal just right for fucking you all up?

You want to express yourself with your car? Build your own, damnit. Or get over it. Or learn that your purchase do not define or express you - they own you.



Meanwhile inflatable structures are very diverse, interesting things. Look at a good Zodiac inflatable boat. Those things are fairly ridgid, and not very complicated or designed to be all that rigid.

With CAD/CAM and good envelope materials very complicted and structurally sound objects can be designed and built. It's easy to rapid-prototype - you just tell your computer to laser or plot-cut your flat envelope fabric into cut pieces. Sewing, fusing or welding can be automated.


This company may not be the solution. Inflatable cars might not be the solution, either.

But if you think that we, as a species, can keep on keeping on with cars the way we have for almost a hundred years without dramatically rethinking the issue and seeking new technology and not suffer drastic consequences you're naive and helping take all of us to a world that's probably going to suck a whole lot.
posted by loquacious at 5:20 PM on June 5 [53 favorites]

I want to favorite loquacious' comment twice.
posted by artifarce at 5:29 PM on June 5 [3 favorites]

I'm calling BS on this. Are they saying this car is a replacement for a parachute? You can't just put someone in a plastic bubble and expect them to live through massive impacts.

See: Zorbing.

I can't find any good videos, but I've seen some where people roll off some pretty steep hills and cliffs.
posted by loquacious at 5:31 PM on June 5

Did anyone look at the "backpack car" on their website? It is pretty hard to tell, but it looks to be an off-the-shelf tent with a seat in it and bike wheels attached.
posted by ssg at 5:40 PM on June 5

NASA inflatable moon base (has QT movie).
posted by stbalbach at 5:46 PM on June 5

How does a car light enough to enable its passengers to survive a fall from a cliff create the downforce necessary to generate movement? If it's that buoyant, won't it need like 10 spoilers?
posted by Eideteker at 5:49 PM on June 5

Did anyone look at the "backpack car" on their website? It is pretty hard to tell, but it looks to be an off-the-shelf tent with a seat in it and bike wheels attached.

Holy shit; that's hilarious. That picture makes me think that this must be a prank. I mean, seriously?
posted by mr_roboto at 6:04 PM on June 5

I'm starting to think the whole thing may have something to do with Burning Man, given that tent/bike.
posted by ssg at 6:12 PM on June 5

I favorited loquacious' comment so hard I actually grunted when I hit the mouse button.
posted by sourwookie at 6:24 PM on June 5 [5 favorites]

Re Loquacious, sounds like someone needs a hug.

Re cars in different form factors, Mike Jittlov made a car the size and shape of a briefcase, that actually worked. It's featured in his movie.
posted by Class Goat at 6:48 PM on June 5

Let's Build a Car
posted by ornate insect at 8:18 PM on June 5

Well, hell, that's not so impressive; my non-inflatable gas-powered car can drive off cliffs too. It just needs a little maintenance work afterward.
posted by ook at 9:00 PM on June 5 [1 favorite]

i see a problem with this - windy days - it seems to me that a car that light could be quite dangerous in that sort of weather
posted by pyramid termite at 10:14 PM on June 5

Does it come equipped with an airbag?

A metalbag. It pops out when another car runs into you, so you have something to reach out from under the wreckage and pound your fist on as you shout "Why, dammit, why?" with your dying breath.
posted by davejay at 10:59 PM on June 5 [2 favorites]

But if you think that we, as a species, can keep on keeping on with cars the way we have for almost a hundred years without dramatically rethinking the issue and seeking new technology and not suffer drastic consequences you're naive and helping take all of us to a world that's probably going to suck a whole lot.

Agreed, but unless everyone transitions at roughly the same time, any alternative is going to need to coexist with the old technology for quite some time. Would I love to ride my bike to work every day? Hell yes, and I'd love to tow my toddlers behind me in one of those toddler-carrying bike attachments*. Would I dare to do it on public roads in Los Angeles? Hell no, because I don't want my children or myself injured or killed by a tinfoil-wrapped two-ton brick on wheels. So I buy the most inexpensive, economical yet safe-in-crash-tests car I can find, and hope that eventually everyone else does the same so that I can go smaller and lighter at some point in the future.

But hey, if we can get everyone to do it in lock-step, I'll be among the most excited to tow my kids behind my bike, or on a very small scooter for those long/time-sensitive trips.

*I'm sure there's a name for these, but I have no idea what it is.
posted by davejay at 11:03 PM on June 5

Do they blow themselves up?
posted by Blazecock Pileon at 11:12 PM on June 5

HA Ha!! do you really think we'll be needing airbags with these?
posted by bingodude at 2:34 AM on June 6

Initially I suspected that this might be a hoax - but then I read Loquacious' comment about Zodiacs and considered that I am on a crew of in inshore lifeboat: a 7.5 metre inflatable RIB that can happily be relied upon to bash through storm swells with a couple of large outboards powering its way or tow a vessel many times its weight. Like the proposed XP vehicle it uses a compartmentalised structure. In this case the technology to produce something like this goes back to the 1960s. So I have no problem with the notion that a vehicle which was partially comprised of an inflatable structure might have the potential to be strong enough.

My questions would be about what the non-inflatable parts of the car might be made up from. At that point we are talking about tyres and chassis and motor and power source. All tricky elements which are likely to comprise most the the car's weight. If XP really have a design which can travel 2500 miles per charge then it is the revolution in these other elements of design - rather than the inflatable infrastructure - that are the subject of remarkable claims.
posted by rongorongo at 3:14 AM on June 6

It's hard to compare since boats don't tend to have much need for impact resistance. They're usually made of fiberglass, but when they hit a dock at low speed, it usually rips a nasty gash and costs a fortune to fix. And imagine two zodiacs T-boning at speed!
posted by smackfu at 5:45 AM on June 6

If XP really have a design which can travel 2500 miles per charge ...

They don't, of course. In their FAQ it explains that it's expected to go about 300 miles per charge, which is pretty good. The idea is that you can easily swap batteries, so presumably this means the cargo capacity is sufficient that you could carry several spare batteries for long-distance travel, assuming you have no other cargo in there.

Motoring around in a Zodiac is among my favourite pastimes, and the idea of an inflatable road vehicle sounds pretty good to me. But on the other hand, a car, which can pull a whole lot more lateral g-force, needs somewhat more structural rigidity. I expect there will have to be a fairly substantial frame of carbon fibre or whatever lower-cost rigid polymer material they choose. Given that requirement, it's not so obvious how much advantage there is in using inflatable parts instead of rigid plastic body panels, except of course for crash safety. I suppose the main idea is the low cost.
posted by sfenders at 5:57 AM on June 6

2010? Just in time to trade in my Velorex.
posted by Floydd at 6:33 AM on June 6

Remember that part in Demolition Man, where all the future cars are getting tossed out of the way by the old gas powered 442?

That was a great scene.

*idly wonders how an inflatable car would hold up to an impact with a 1965 Mustang*
posted by quin at 8:19 AM on June 6

Sounds cool but several problems would have to be ironed out before this car could go mainstream. The most obvious of course is a way to clarify yourself when poking your head into a rest stop washroom and yelling, “Hey can someone blow me out in the parking lot?”

I would suggest an easy to identify non-verbal signal, for example an exaggerated up and down tire-pump like motion if you really need help with a flat car, or a rapid wiggling of the eyebrows if you’re looking for something a bit more amorous.
posted by BostonJake at 10:52 AM on June 6

It's just a bunch of hot air.
posted by joelf at 11:19 AM on June 6 [1 favorite]

loquacious: people are starting to think of ways to make cars without the heavy steel frame, it just seems that the major car makers don't want anything to do with them.

Nova recently did a program on "the car of the future" with the car talk guys, and one of the people they talked to was Amory Lovins of the Rocky Mountain Institute, who developed a prototype of a 14-piece carbon fiber framed car that would be half the weight of a steel frame (video here, it's in chapter 4). They couldn't get any car company interested in it because they're all heavily invested in their steel frame assembly lines.

Here in Portland, we can get lightweight electric plugins at the ecomotion car dealership, but not many have a spare $17-30K sitting around to buy one. i guess you could get one of those Zaps for ten grand, but i'm kind of partial to 4 wheels, myself.
posted by acid freaking on the kitty at 2:03 PM on June 6 [1 favorite]

There's no logical reason to continue to use extremely thin, expensive, painted sheet metal as the skin or shells for cars.

there's a perfectly good reason: it's called the u.s. steel industry

The U.S. steel industry is a more than $50 billion enterprise, and additional downstream processing pushes the value closer to $75 billion.

and

The U.S. steel industry is vital to both economic competitiveness and national security.

i wish i could find a good link, but back in the 50s (i think) congress debated bills pushing massive amounts of money to either the rail industry or the automotive industry. based on purely economic reasons, they choose the auto industry, which would support the steel, petroleum, construction (think: interstate highways) and other industries, which would spur the economy to tremendous growth.

the economic spurt certainly worked. at least for a while. and now our petrol-based economy is never going to change until some brain trust word used semi facetiously can figure out entire industries to replace the ones that support our sagging dollar. and yes; i mean our sagging dollar: the u.s. doesn't really give a damn about the rest of the world except as it bouys our own place in it. which naturally, is the top of the heap.
posted by msconduct at 5:18 AM on June 7 [1 favorite]

political discussions aside, i think it's a very, very cool idea. the logistics are daunting: my inflatable against your escalade.

back in the day, national lampoon ran a fake ad showing a volkswagon floating in the middle of a lake. the caption read something like, 'If Ted Kennedy drove a Volkswagen, he'd be President today!' i think but i'm not really sure that they actually had to print some sort of retraction. the retraction that comes to mind but again i'm not really sure was an ad showing a busy interstate with cloverleaf on/off ramps completely populated, bumper-to-bumper, with volkswagens. that caption read something like, 'imagine if everyone drove a volkswagen.'

so. imagine if everyone drove an inflatable.
posted by msconduct at 5:27 AM on June 7

Inflatables with the strength of Zodiac boats are not exactly made out of Greenpeace(tm) brand corn husks, hippy.
posted by felix at 9:37 AM on June 9

I favorited loquacious's comment twice.
posted by tehloki at 10:46 PM on June 9