These Freaky Omni-Capable Wheels Would Make Parallel Parking Stupidly Easy
While the surfaces of these prototype rims - built by the uploader himself - seem to be slick and therefore useless for the road, he claims that they “can have the same build characteristics (siping, grooves, rubber compounds etc.) as regular tires”. What’s particularly interesting is the wheels are bolt-on items on a regular Toyota Echo which hasn’t needed to be modified to accept them.
It does seem like a cool concept, but we’d want to know exactly how much they weigh - you’d think the new rims would be on the heavy side, adding a hell of a lot of unsprung mass.
Creator William Liddiard calls these “proof of concept prototypes”, so it’ll be interesting to see how he develops the idea.
Via Reddit Videos
Growing up on a diet of World Rally Championship highlights and lengthy Gran Turismo 2 sessions, a life in cars was as good as inevitable for Matt.
Comments
Reminds me of the Lunar Buggy they used in the space missions by NASA. Interesting concept ahaha!
ooor you could learn how to drive, i mean less and less people who own cars have this skill these days
Someone buying these should not be allowed to drive…i like innovation but this and the autopilot grind my gears
I saw another article about this and thought the same but it also said his plan is for these to be for large trucks with each wheel having a weight capacity of 24,000 lbs
All I can say is, drifting would be interesting.
or you know, you could just learn how to park?
The things people do to Echos….
I know just about nothing, which is admittedly bad, about wheels but wouldn’t the side walls be rather unsupportive? What effect would that have on ride and handling?
Having flat tires instead of grooves isn’t a problem. You actually have more grip unless you hit water (just look at racing slicks). The biggest problem is you won’t have any grip with a round tire if you can’t lean the vehicle over like a motorcycle. Car tires are flat giving them lots of contact with the road. Since bikes can’t have flat tires they turn by leaning; unless he can figure out how to lean a car or square his system it’s useless.
Can it work with 2 cm of ground clearance and negative camber with 315mm wide tire?
this car looks like a yaris with long front and rear ends :O