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The Dymaxion car: Buckminster Fuller’s failed automobile
- jackmott42 4y agoAptera is a modern attempt at a similar approach. It makes me a little sad because the Aptera really makes so much sense but I think it will not make inroads in the market, just because it is weird.
- robga 4y agoIn modern times, the Volkswagen XL1 approached the aesthetic. It had an equally low coefficient of drag as the aptera. Not many sold - but it was a production car. https://www.autocar.co.uk/car-review/volkswagen/xl1/first-drives/volkswagen-xl1-first-drive-review-0 https://www.autocar.co.uk/car-review/volkswagen/xl1/first-dr...
- theluketaylor 4y agoXL1 was limited production as there was only ever going to be 200 offered to the public. VW almost certainly lost money on every single one, and probably not a small amount. XL1 was part of the Ferdinand Piëch era of money-losing halo cars to demonstrate VW group's engineering excellence. Bugatti Veyron and VW Phaeton were other cars to come out of this obsession. XL1 is an interesting 'what-if' of cars. If VW doesn't get caught cheating on emissions we would likely have gotten some kind of successor to the XL1 that was actually truly a production car. Certainly VW would have at least tried a few production diesel hybrids. Instead they became the first large established automaker to fully commit to a battery-electric future.
- _ea1k 4y agoTBH, I'm less worried about demand than about supply. It will be very difficult to build that machine profitably.
- jackmott42 4y agoThese concerns are intertwined!
- Animats 4y agoCar Talk drove a replica.[1] "You’ve pushed shopping carts with broken casters that handle better. ... No one in his or her right mind would ever venture above 45 miles per hour because of the lousy handling." [1] https://www.cartalk.com/blogs/jamie-lincoln-kitman/test-drives-dymaxion-car https://www.cartalk.com/blogs/jamie-lincoln-kitman/test-driv...
- westurner 4y agoGood old Car Talk. What about with biopolymer superstructure at least, batteries in the surfboard floor, an elegant teardrop airfoil, regenerative braking with natural branching carbon anodes, and an awning?
- sbierwagen 4y agoThose are all solutions to problems the Dymaxion car didn't have? The main complaints of the Car Talk article are the awful handling resulting from rear wheel steering (giving a bad caster angle resulting in no self-centering-- all modern tricycle motor vehicles put the steer tires at the front, even if it complicates the linkages) and the aerodynamic shape that resulted in a large car with surprisingly little usable interior room. (a classic Buckminster problem, as this is still the big downside of geodesic domes) All the big compromises of the Dymaxion car came from the shape, which let it hit a drag coefficient of 0.25. But modern car engineering has simply passed it by: a Prius is 0.24 and a Model S is 0.208. There's no reason to accept the downsides of a Dymaxion car today, which is why nobody ever copied the design.
- westurner 4y agoWhere was the center of gravity - the mass centroid - in terms of handling?
- pcrh 4y ago>Don't drive like my brother!
- evolve2k 4y ago
- coderintherye 4y ago"In fact, the project had been undermined by interpersonal conflicts, funding shortfalls, and persistent design issues that he was unwilling to acknowledge." That's the real true story of most failed startups.
- balentio 4y agoI somewhat suspect that most of what is a "failure", to the extent it enters the collective conscious, especially in fields like engineering, is a later triumph.
- asoneth 4y agoI was most surprised the degree to which Buckminster Fuller lied throughout the development of the car and afterwards. Of course it's heartbreaking that bad engineering killed two people, but that is not unheard of in automobile design. An honest and forthright engineering team can learn from failures. According to this article Fuller publicly lied about the testing, safety, maximum speed, stability, production capacity, funding sources, crash details, and more. I recall that he also implied that he was the original inventor of the geodesic dome. These kinds of things put his credibility on other claims into question as well.
- gambiting 4y agoSounds like Elizabeth Holmes of his time. Lies everywhere from top to bottom just to get his company off the ground.
- srgpqt 4y agoSo just like every other successful entrepreneur!
- api 4y agoNeither of these were particularly successful.
- asoneth 4y agoIf you or your team believe the lies that you tell external stakeholders then failure is inevitable since your decisions are not based on an accurate model of reality. Assuming you are ruthlessly honest within the team, chronic lying to external stakeholders still eventually results in people not trusting you. Once you develop this kind of reputation then investment generally comes with worse terms and more strings attached and you have to pay more and/or look further afield for talent than a team without such a reputation.
- kapilvt 4y ago“ According to this article Fuller publicly lied about the testing, safety, maximum speed, stability, production capacity, funding sources, crash details, and more.” Sounds like Elon musk, well minus the max speed
- PopAlongKid 4y agoI recall reading somewhere that the 3-wheel design meant that the vehicle was inherently hard to steer due to typical roadway camber (the crown of the road, which means the slope designed to route water from the center of the road to the edges). Makes sense to me; if the rear wheel is constantly being pulled to the edge of the road because that is down hill from the middle of the lane. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Camber_angle#Road_camber https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Camber_angle#Road_camber
- thebigspacefuck 4y agoA periscope? Now that’s an interesting idea