Terrafugia Transition Flying Car

Flying cars aren’t exactly science fiction, but they certainly aren’t something you see every day either.  While there have been many attempts, and many failures, some concepts have had rudimentary success at least in function if not in sales (Moller SkyCar as an example).  A start-up company called Terrafugia is determined to create a flying car that is street legal, flyable as a light sport craft, has practical value, and is marketable to a wide audience.  Known as the Transition, the car currently only exists on paper and in the minds of it’s designers, but is slated to be available in prototype form by 2008.  With heavy backing from MIT, Terrafugia appears to be aware of the pitfalls associated with the concept of flying cars, and plans on marketing the Transition by telling prospective buyers both the pros and cons.

With the need for a sport pilot license and an estimated street price of $148,000 the Transition won’t be for everyone, but may open the doors to future concepts that are.

2008 Green Car

 

The Morgan LifeCar is a concept car due to be launched at the Geneva Show in March 2008.

The LifeCar’s purpose is to demonstrate that a zero emission vehicle can also be fun to drive.

The combination of performance, range and fuel economy will allow a sporting driver of the future to demonstrate a concern for the environment.

Going far beyond the incremental adaptation of traditional car designs as seen in current hybrid vehicles, it will demonstrate that a new step in vehicle architecture is enabled by the use of a fuel cell hybrid power train.

The approach is one of whole system design in which the architecture is generated from the characteristics of the fuel cell, in a light-weight vehicle coupled with a high hybridization level.

This combination will minimise the fuel cell cost and provide the fuel economy for a 200 mile range.

An objective of the project is to lower the entry barriers for a vehicle powered by a hydrogen fuel cell.

Core to the success of the project will be collaboration between partners to achieve system-level innovation in the design.

The collaborators are RiverSimple, Cranfield University, QinetiQ, Oxford University, Linde AG and Morgan Motor Company.

New Watch Phone

A model displays a Turtle Wireless TWP800 watch in Beverly Hills,
California, February 22, 2008. This watch is also a GSM tri-band phone,
MP3/MP4 player, touch screen, come with a stereo bluetooth headset
and is WAP/GPRS compatibility. The TWP800 is now available to the
Latin American market for USD 225.