SPECIALIST CITY CARS FOR COMMUTING, SHOPPING, SCHOOL-RUN AND LEISURE

This feature describes how considerable environmental gains can be made by intelligent redesign of a commuting car, and reviews work on hybrid drives, fuel cells, city and leisure vehicle trends, and body, chassis, and powertrain systems. The manufacturer Alan Ridge became convinced that people in the 21st century will insist on one-person vehicles (OPVs) for their main travel needs, moving from one place to another, even though people today seem to be slow to understand this need. OPVs would have the advantage of much lower emissions, so that they would pollute the air much less. Hitherto, every electric/hybrid concept car, predicting future motoring trends, seems to be similar to conventional passenger cars. Ridge's team concluded that the best way to make people aware of the OPV's advantages and benefits would be to design a good OPV and an almost identical two-seater car. Frank Costin's original design for a Mono OPV was modified into Simon Ogle's design for the new Duo car, which will probably be cheaper to produce than any two-seater now on the market. In both cars, standard Reliant components are rearranged intelligently in an advanced chassis concept, to provide advanced performance and high driver appeal at modest cost.

  • Availability:
  • Corporate Authors:

    Institution of Mechanical Engineers

    1 Birdcage Walk
    London SW1H 9JJ,   England 
  • Publication Date: 1995-12

Language

  • English

Media Info

  • Pagination: p. 34-7,39-40,43-4
  • Serial:
    • AUTOMOTIVE ENGINEER
    • Volume: 20
    • Issue Number: 6
    • Publisher: Institution of Mechanical Engineers
    • ISSN: 0307-6490

Subject/Index Terms

Filing Info

  • Accession Number: 00720793
  • Record Type: Publication
  • Source Agency: Transport Research Laboratory
  • Files: ITRD
  • Created Date: May 24 1996 12:00AM