🚞 🍊 🏝️ Funny patents from the automotive industry ⛹🏿 🥘 🙀

The wind turbine, telescopic tail, tear gas chamber

Vanarama published an interesting list of patents from car manufacturers. Some of them are a little strange and are unlikely to bring much fame or fortune to their inventors - both vertical parking and a urinal in a car fall into this category. But among this list there are ideas that are not so crazy. For example, adaptive body panels that lengthen the tail to reduce drag at cruising speed.

Resistance is the enemy of fuel economy, and every little thing is important when trying to reduce the drag coefficient of a vehicle - a simple change in the shape of the wheels of an electric car can have a significant impact on its battery. The way the air exits the car from the rear is critical to the amount of resistance, and the longer rear end is the most effective form.

Built-in electric bike and conveyor for shopping.

Simply put, when you are an airplane, not a car that should fit into ordinary parking spaces, then Toyota's patent for a telescopic tail appears. I definitely saw how this idea was tested by people struggling to improve cars and reduce fuel consumption in the past, and I don’t know about you, but I think that such changes in cars are the key to a bright future.

A sticky hood, a laser windshield wiper, an asymmetric

Tesla body appear on the list thanks to a 2019 patent for using lasers to keep the windshield clean instead of wipers. Advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS), such as Tesla's lane departure assistance system, rely on optical sensors to detect road markings, so it’s important that nothing bothers them.

Waymo patented an adhesive hood. If an autonomous vehicle hit a pedestrian, glue would fix them on the hood instead of letting people fall under the wheels. This may seem implausible, but in Europe, where pedestrian safety is determined not only in words, active pedestrian safety functions have been present on the market for some time. As far as I know, only the late Buick Regal Tour X provided this feature in the United States.

Drone for washing a car

Another idea that may well get into production was included in the list thanks to a patent from the Uber advanced technology group for a light output system for an unmanned vehicle. Although much attention is paid to how an autonomous vehicle can interpret and understand the intentions of pedestrians or other road users, people also face a problem from the other side: how should an autonomous vehicle communicate its intentions to people?

Meeting room in the car and pedestrian lighting

One of the ideas presented in the Uber patent was to project a pedestrian crossing on the ground in front of a stopped car to show that it is safe to cross the road. We've seen similar ideas at CES in the last few years, especially from Texas Instruments, the Volvo 360c concept also offered smart ideas for communicating with people, both visually and with sounds.

Swivel body and vertical parking

"Hugs" - seat belts and a partition for children.

Other ideas did not convince me so. Car scent diffusers have long been on the market in several cars, but they still seem like a pointless trick. One of the dark sides in Toyota includes a patent with the function of releasing the tear gas component inside the car in the event that the immobilizer detects an illegal engine start. I can understand why his age was short-lived.

Built-in coffee shop and toilet

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