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Minicar RSV
The Minicar RSV was a concept automobile created in the United States and funded by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) to find ways to decrease highway fatalities. A contract was awarded in 1975 to independent firms Calspan & Minicars, after rejecting unsuitable concepts presented by much larger automakers, including Ford and Volkswagen. The car itself was completed sometime between 1976 & 1980: at least 10 were produced & demonstrated on television & at county fairs. The program was terminated in January 1981, at the start of the Reagan Administration, and most of the test vehicles were destroyed by 1991. In the late 2000s, two vehicles were found, and NHTSA paid to bring one to semi-usable status for further study. Specifications * Doors: 2 gull wing * Features: airbags; run-flat tires; did NOT have seat belts in the front * Frame: plastic-composite and steel mix * Mileage: 32mpg est. * Powerplant: Honda EF * Seating: 4 passengers References Ext ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Concept Automobile
A concept car (also known as a concept vehicle, show vehicle or prototype) is a car made to showcase new styling and/or new technology. They are often exhibited at motor shows to gauge customer reaction to new and radical designs which may or may not be mass-produced. General Motors designer Harley Earl is generally credited with inventing the concept car, and did much to popularize it through its traveling Motorama shows of the 1950s. Concept cars never go into production directly. In modern times all would have to undergo many changes before the design is finalized for the sake of practicality, safety, regulatory compliance, and cost. A "production-intent" prototype, as opposed to a concept vehicle, serves this purpose. Design Concept cars are often radical in engine or design. Some use non-traditional, exotic, or expensive materials, ranging from paper to carbon fiber to refined alloys. Others have unique layouts, such as gullwing doors, 3 or 5 (or more) wheels, or specia ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
National Highway Traffic Safety Administration
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA ) is an agency of the U.S. federal government, part of the Department of Transportation. It describes its mission as "Save lives, prevent injuries, reduce vehicle-related crashes" related to transportation safety in the United States. NHTSA is charged with writing and enforcing Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards as well as regulations for motor vehicle theft resistance and fuel economy, as part of the Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) system. FMVSS 209 was the first standard to become effective on March 1, 1967. NHTSA cannot licenses vehicle manufacturers and importers, allows or blocks the import of vehicles and safety-regulated vehicle parts, administers the vehicle identification number (VIN) system, develops the anthropomorphic dummies used in U.S. safety testing as well as the test protocols themselves, and provides vehicle insurance cost information. The agency has asserted preemptive regulatory authori ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Calspan
Calspan Corporation is a science and technology company founded in 1943 as part of the Research Laboratory of the Curtiss-Wright Airplane Division at Buffalo, New York. Calspan consists of four primary operating units: Flight Research, Transportation Research, Aerospace Sciences Transonic Wind Tunnel, and Crash Investigations. The company's main facility is in Cheektowaga, New York, while it has other facilities such as the Flight Research Center in Niagara Falls, New York, and remote flight test operations at Edwards Air Force Base, California, and Patuxent River, Maryland. Calspan also has thirteen field offices throughout the Eastern United States which perform accident investigations on behalf of the United States Department of Transportation. History The facility was started as a private defense contractor in the home front of World War II. As a part of its tax planning in the wake of the war effort, Curtiss-Wright donated the facility to Cornell University to operate "as a pu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ford Motor Company
Ford Motor Company (commonly known as Ford) is an American multinational automobile manufacturer headquartered in Dearborn, Michigan, United States. It was founded by Henry Ford and incorporated on June 16, 1903. The company sells automobiles and commercial vehicles under the Ford brand, and luxury cars under its Lincoln luxury brand. Ford also owns Brazilian SUV manufacturer Troller, an 8% stake in Aston Martin of the United Kingdom and a 32% stake in China's Jiangling Motors. It also has joint ventures in China (Changan Ford), Taiwan (Ford Lio Ho), Thailand ( AutoAlliance Thailand), and Turkey ( Ford Otosan). The company is listed on the New York Stock Exchange and is controlled by the Ford family; they have minority ownership but the majority of the voting power. Ford introduced methods for large-scale manufacturing of cars and large-scale management of an industrial workforce using elaborately engineered manufacturing sequences typified by moving assembly lines; by ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Volkswagen
Volkswagen (),English: , . abbreviated as VW (), is a German Automotive industry, motor vehicle manufacturer headquartered in Wolfsburg, Lower Saxony, Germany. Founded in 1937 by the German Labour Front under the Nazi Party and revived into a global brand post-World War II by the British Army Officer Ivan Hirst, it is known for the iconic Volkswagen Beetle, Beetle and serves as the flagship brand of the Volkswagen Group, the largest automotive manufacturer by worldwide sales in 2016 and 2017. The group's biggest market is in Automotive industry in China, China, which delivers 40 percent of its sales and profits. Its name is derived from the German-language terms and , translating to "people's car" when combined. History 1932–1940: People's Car project Volkswagen was established in 1937 by the German Labour Front (''Deutsche Arbeitsfront'') in Berlin. In the early 1930s, cars were a luxury – most Germans could afford nothing more elaborate than a motorcycle and only one ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Reagan Administration
Ronald Reagan's tenure as the 40th president of the United States began with his first inauguration on January 20, 1981, and ended on January 20, 1989. Reagan, a Republican from California, took office following a landslide victory over Democratic incumbent President Jimmy Carter in the 1980 presidential election. Four years later, in the 1984 election, he defeated Democrat former vice president Walter Mondale to win re-election in a larger landslide. Reagan was succeeded by his vice president, George H. W. Bush. Reagan's 1980 election resulted from a dramatic conservative shift to the right in American politics, including a loss of confidence in liberal, New Deal, and Great Society programs and priorities that had dominated the national agenda since the 1930s. Domestically, the Reagan administration enacted a major tax cut, sought to cut non-military spending, and eliminated federal regulations. The administration's economic policies, known as "Reaganomics", were insp ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Gull Wing Door
In the automotive industry, a gull-wing door, also known as a falcon-wing door or an up-door, is a car door that is hinged at the roof rather than the side, as pioneered by Mercedes-Benz 300 SL, first as a race car in 1952 ( W194), and then as a production sports car in 1954. Opening upwards, the doors evoke the image of a seagull's wings. In French, they are (butterfly doors). The papillon door was designed by Jean Bugatti for the 1939 Type 64, 14 years before Mercedes-Benz produced its similar, famous 300 SL gullwing door. The papillon door is a precursor to the gullwing door, and is slightly different in its architecture, but is often overlooked when discussing gull-wing design. Conventional car doors are typically hinged at the front-facing edge of the door, with the door swinging outward horizontally. Apart from the Mercedes-Benz 300 SL of the mid-1950s, Mercedes-Benz SLS and the experimental Mercedes-Benz C111 of the early 1970s, the best-known examples of road-cars w ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Airbags
An airbag is a vehicle occupant-restraint system using a bag designed to inflate extremely quickly, then quickly deflate during a collision. It consists of the airbag cushion, a flexible fabric bag, an inflation module, and an impact sensor. The purpose of the airbag is to provide a vehicle occupant with soft cushioning and restraint during a collision. It can reduce injuries between the flailing occupant and the interior of the vehicle. The airbag provides an energy-absorbing surface between the vehicle's occupants and a steering wheel, instrument panel, body pillar, headliner, and windshield. Modern vehicles may contain up to 10 airbag modules in various configurations, including: driver, passenger, side-curtain, seat-mounted, door-mounted, B and C-pillar mounted side-impact, knee bolster, inflatable seat belt, and pedestrian airbag modules. During a crash, the vehicle's crash sensors provide crucial information to the airbag electronic controller unit (ECU), including coll ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Run-flat Tire
A run-flat tire/tyre is a pneumatic vehicle tire that is designed to resist the effects of deflation when punctured, and to allow the vehicle to continue to be driven at reduced speeds - under – and for limited distances – usually , depending on the type of tire. Technologies There are three basic technologies currently available, described below. Self-supporting The origins of the commercial ''self-supporting'' run-flat tire started in 1935 with a tire that had a fabric inner tire. The tire was advertised as a protection against blowouts, a common and dangerous occurrence in the 1930s. In 1934, Michelin introduced a tire that was based on technology developed for local commuter trains and trolleys. It had a safety rim inside the tire which if punctured would run on a special foam lining. The tire was sold for military use and for specialized vehicles like bank armoured cars. It was advertised as "semi-bulletproof". While the tire performed as advertised it was far too ex ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Seat Belt
A seat belt (also known as a safety belt, or spelled seatbelt) is a vehicle safety device designed to secure the driver or a passenger of a vehicle against harmful movement that may result during a collision or a sudden stop. A seat belt reduces the likelihood of death or serious injury in a traffic collision by reducing the force of secondary impacts with interior strike hazards, by keeping occupants positioned correctly for maximum effectiveness of the airbag (if equipped), and by preventing occupants being ejected from the vehicle in a crash or if the vehicle rolls over. When in motion, the driver and passengers are traveling at the same speed as the vehicle. If the vehicle suddenly stops or crashes, the occupants continue at the same speed the vehicle was going before it stopped. A seatbelt applies an opposing force to the driver and passengers to prevent them from falling out or making contact with the interior of the car (especially preventing contact with, or going t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Steel
Steel is an alloy made up of iron with added carbon to improve its strength and fracture resistance compared to other forms of iron. Many other elements may be present or added. Stainless steels that are corrosion- and oxidation-resistant typically need an additional 11% chromium. Because of its high tensile strength and low cost, steel is used in buildings, infrastructure, tools, ships, trains, cars, machines, electrical appliances, weapons, and rockets. Iron is the base metal of steel. Depending on the temperature, it can take two crystalline forms (allotropic forms): body-centred cubic and face-centred cubic. The interaction of the allotropes of iron with the alloying elements, primarily carbon, gives steel and cast iron their range of unique properties. In pure iron, the crystal structure has relatively little resistance to the iron atoms slipping past one another, and so pure iron is quite ductile, or soft and easily formed. In steel, small amounts of carbon, other ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
