April 30, 2013 • 41 mins
We hear stories about the future of auto technology every day, but how many of these innovations will make it from the drawing board to the cars of the future? Join Scott and Ben to learn more about futuristic auto features that really have a chance.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
Go behind the wheel, under the hood and beyond with
car Stuff from house stuffworks dot com. Welcome to car Stuff.
I'm Scott Benchman, I'm Ben Bullen and Scott I would
like to welcome you to the future. The future, well
maybe the future is this like it feels like I'm
(00:22):
on a Disney ride or something. Yes, yes, it's a
it's a regular Epcot Center inspired podcast. Here is Did
you did you ever go to Epcot Center? I have? Yes,
Did you ever take that future ride? Yes, you know
the one I'm talking about, And you can choose like
which environment you want to leave the ride from through?
(00:42):
I know we're talking about. Man. I love that I
never got to try all of the environments. Lines are
too long for lines are too long, I would have waited. Yeah,
well you know what you may have found in there?
Some automotive advancements as well, right, yeah, And maybe I
would think that there's something had to have been something, right. Um.
And usually when we're talking about advancements like this, we're
(01:03):
talking about like safety issues, information issues, a lot of
times comfort issues. Um. But in this case, I think
we're talking about some technology that may may represent like
completely revolutionary advancements. Things that you know, you just they're
so far out there. It's not like tweaking something that's
already there. It's more like in a lot of these cases, um,
(01:23):
it's it's more like something brand new to us, something
that we've just never even heard of. Yes, and what
are we talking about? We are talking about five future
car technologies wait for it, that truly have a chance.
Now that's uh that that last little qualifier there is
where this is really really important because we talk about
(01:44):
a lot of you know, pie in the sky ideas
that show that have flying cars and things like that.
And I know someone's going to say that they already
have flying cars, but you know, we're not talking about
the terrafugim. We're not talking about one car. We're just
saying it probably not going to be the flying car
traffic jam. I shouldn't have even said it. But you
know other things that you know, like the sun visor
that has a spot that moves around to cover the sunshine,
(02:06):
you know, based on the place where the driver's eyes
are located. It's just it's there's a there's a wide
open world of new technologies out there that we've We've
talked about a lot of different things that just quite
frankly been a lot of them are going to happen. Yeah,
I think a lot of them for a various factors
are going to remain sort of the realm of science fiction.
(02:30):
And wouldn't it be cool just uh for instance, Uh,
what was that one? And it was kind of just
show offie. We did an episode on Luxury Cars of
the Future. Yeah, one of our very first episodes. I
was way way back. Yeah, and one of the cars
had a waterfall or something and a zen garden below
(02:50):
I think it was below, plexic glass in the floor
so that you could you could stand on top of it.
And so some of that stuff is is just not
going to happen. What makes these five techno aologies a
little bit different is that we have evolved our material
science by leaps and bounds. Yeah, these will have a
real practical purpose and uh, and these are ones that
(03:14):
you know, in a way we can see these may
be happening. And we mentioned this in the past, I know,
but we have we've developed a bit of a sniffer
for these type of things, you know, we are we
able to kind of weed out the ones that we
think may happen. The ones we don't think will happen. Um.
We've got an article on our site, on our on
the house stuff works dot com site um titled the
(03:35):
same thing, five future car technologies that truly have a
chance and the writer Christopher Niger Um, he dug out
five really good ones here. And I think this is
what we should go through, is just in descending order
five or three two one, And um, I don't think
there's any kind of weight on these as far as
what we think is gonna happen first or last or
(03:56):
anythink that's a random ortar. But you know you unless
you do it five four three to one. We will
also Yeah, it's more exciting. We will also talk about
some of the other things that relate to these. Uh,
this may these topics may be familiar to some of
our loyal or longtime listeners because we've touched on a
(04:17):
lot of these. Yeah, some of these won't be you
know completely you know in outer space. Some of these
will be that that you know, we have we've mentioned
these and and they're familiar with them, and as a
matter of fact that some of them are already on
their way. I mean even since we've talked about them.
There there they've advanced the point where I'm hearing more
about them and on daily news up. Um, you know
(04:38):
from manufacturers and things like that. So, um, you want
to start with number five, Yes, without any further Ado Scott,
Number five cars that communicate with each other and the road. Yeah,
and some comes from M I T engineers. So it's
not really in a vehicle yet. Um. And if you
if you pay attention to what we're saying, it's not
that there's good communication you know within vehicle, like you know,
(05:01):
the the modules within the vehicle are communicating you know,
among themselves, which they do in almost every new car really,
actually in every new car. We're talking about vehicle to
vehicle communication or V two V communication as they call it. Um.
And even in one case they're we're gonna talk about
V two I, which is vehicle to infrastructure, right. Um.
(05:22):
So there's all kinds of potential here, right. Yeah. So
here is the idea, and we this is an idea
that we've discussed in our what five sixteen podcasts on
self driving vehicle. Seven sounds like a good number. Uh.
The thing that makes autonomous vehicles potentially so interesting, uh,
(05:46):
from a safety perspective, is that it may remove the
possibility of human error. However, you know, of course, does
introduce a larger possibility of computer or technological error, but
it could have. Again, this is a big if. If
everything works out, then we could find parts of the
(06:07):
world functioning on a grid wherein a single system pretty
much or kind of a hive mind system is controlling
the speed at which cars move, the distance that they maintain,
and the safety maneuvers. And there's some pretty cool stuff here.
I gotta tell you, man, the idea still freaks me
(06:30):
out a little. I see this is a slightly different way,
I mean from what they described, and I see you
and I got two different things out of this. Um,
you're saying that it's more autonomous. I'm saying that I
think that it's more Um, drivers in control most of
the time. Only in emergency situations would the autonomous system
kick in, and that you know, um it would. It's
(06:51):
collision avoidance. I guess, yeah, clarification, So I think so,
I mean, maybe maybe you know your interpretation of this
is different than mine, but um, you know, I I
just see it as ways of like warning of potential collisions.
So systems that we already have systems that do that.
Lane variant systems we have that. UM, the safe distance
between cars, we have that with um UM, what's the
(07:12):
advanced uh UM speed control, cruise control. That's the word
I'm looking for. Very good then very good, So um man.
I think that there's there's an awful lot of of
potential in this range, and we've already got a lot
of these technologies they're talking about just now making them
communicate with each other. So you have two cars that
(07:35):
have to operate on the same operating system, on the
same I guess the same os if you're talking about
computer systems, right, and that you know they would somehow
communicate with each other. Like I'm I'm I'm going through
this intersection. I'm I'm traveling at fifty. I can't stop. Um.
The other one is going saying it's green light for me. Um.
(07:56):
I'm not able to stop either, but I'm gonna try. Yeah,
because you're not. I'm going thirty five, you're going sixty.
I'm going to give a shot you keep going. Yeah.
It's a weird way to think about it. That's true, though,
that's that that is a good idea. Though, just to clarify,
I was only referencing our earlier stuff on autonomous cars.
So this I'm glad that you make this point, because
(08:19):
what we're talking about is sort of almost like having
a precision driver, a guardian angel if you will somewhere
in your dashboard who is able to take the wheel
when things get out of hand. That's perfect, that's a
good that's a great explanation of it. And uh, um,
and another way to look at this, um, well, another
angle of this, this whole thing is I mentioned the
(08:41):
V two I, which is vehicle to infrastructure. Instead of
vehicle to vehicle, it's vehical to infrastructure. So, um, the
car will recognize that there's a traffic light approaching, and uh,
you know, it knows that in seven seconds it's gonna
change over to green and you're eight seconds away. I'm sorry,
in seven seconds is gonna turn to read and you're
eight seconds away. So that makes more sense right now.
(09:03):
And and it would also know, for instance, uh, if
there was construction or let's I mean a train is
crossing the tracks, or um, you know, it knows that
the speed limit is forty five and you're going sixty.
It knows all different things like this. I mean it's
going to uh if if they get the system in place. Now,
we've always talked about this. The infrastructure is the hard thing, right, Yeah,
(09:24):
it's that's the expensive place. That's the really difficult part.
Is to build an infrastructure for all the vehicles to
work in the exact same way. And how long will
it take to completely switch over? You know, someone's gonna
drive into town in an old pickup truck that you
know doesn't have all this new technology, and how are
they going to handle that? How is it gonna adapt
around all that? So this one, you know, M I
(09:44):
T engineers are working on it right now. This this
V two V communication and V two I UM, I
don't know. We'll see how it goes, right Yeah, And
the National Highway Transportation Safety Association UM BIRD Administration wheather
UH believe that this could reduce target vehicle crashes by
(10:05):
that number alone. I mean we are talking about human lives.
That number alone does make it I think worth exploring.
We think that this does truly have a chance. UM.
In some of our earlier podcast we talked about how
these this sort of technology would likely begin in a
small area. You know, Ford is testing it, I believe, right,
(10:28):
now with the v t V. But in a in
a dense or urban environment, or in a small locale
where no other cars are allowed in a closed system,
then that's where we would probably see this start out.
But we're not. I will eat my hat if we
(10:48):
see this rolled out across um, the entirety of the
United States or something now Europe, now you can it's different.
I would think, now, what if? But what if they
this in like UM on a smaller scale. What if
they did something like this in like a retirement community
where there's golf cart travel. That's a great great point,
(11:09):
the same type of technology there, and just see how
it works. Just just see, you know, what what goes
on there in in a seal like you're talking about
a sealed off community, you know, somewhere where they're in
complete control of the vehicles that operate there. And it's
relatively small enough that you know, there's a lot of
different situations with a lot of intersections, pedestrian travel, speed
(11:29):
limits and what they're smart ideas are very low. I
don't know it's possibility we should do that. Are we
ready to move on the number four? Yes? Number four,
And I don't think we should spend too much much
time on this is one we were talking about. I
kind of actually spoiled it already. Alright, self driving cars
and uh number four self driving cars, and Google and
Audie have already really been working on this the most.
(11:51):
I think, Um, we've seen, you know the Google cars
that you know famously I kind of appeared out of
nowhere and they said, hey, surprise, We've already got three
thousand miles under our belt on a car with no driver. Yeah.
Now there is a human sitting behind the wheel on
these tests. But the laws in California and Nevada have
changed to allow for testing of this vehicle, and um,
(12:14):
this dates back. We We go back to this concept
a lot because it is so true that so much
technology in civilian and mainstream vehicles comes from either racing,
the military, and DARPA for years had a competition to
the Grand Urban Challenge, I think, to figure out how
(12:35):
to build and operate an autonomous vehicle. Google is going
gangbusters with this thing. I mean, you know the laws
are being changed. Sure, yeah, they're they're they're looking to
develop new laws so that in different states so they
can continue their testing. Right now, they're test in California
in neved I think you mentioned that, and they're looking
for other states as well, you know, in order to uh,
(12:57):
I just well increase the you know, the testing zone,
I guess, so that you know, they have more situations,
more more understanding of what happens in the real world environment.
And uh you know, we talked about in a in
a podcast in detail recently about e s reveal of
(13:18):
the self parking Audie cars. You remember those, yeah, yeah,
which is amazing technology. We don't want to spoil too
much of it so you can check it out. But
the the idea essentially is that this vehicle is smart
enough to go busy itself and find its own parking
space and then come back when you call it. It's
like it's its own valet. It drops you off at
(13:41):
the door, at the at the mall or wherever, and
then it comes and picks you up when you're done,
and and it parks in between. Amazing and it really works,
and it does need some infrastructure to make it work,
but this will be something that people are able to buy.
And of course there's the Audie Autonomous Pike's Peak hill
(14:01):
climb car that you know that that infamously ran up
Pike's Peak without a driver. That was really cool. Um,
so out he's really working on this as well. And uh,
I think you know that's again another thing where they
said they're a decade out from really having anything on this.
So right, a lot of these, like we've mentioned many
times in the past, you know, about ten years out.
That's what they kind of they like to hint that
(14:23):
you know that it's on its way. Yeah, there's another
thing that we should talk about with these. This was
something that really really caught my eye with this article.
What's that platooning? So this would be imagine you have
your self driving cars and you have this option you
can select for them to platoon together. Uh. I can't
(14:45):
help but think of it as a pod of dolphins
or school of fish on the road. And it kind
of reminds me of how bikers will uh congregate on
the road into into a right a riding group. And uh,
with platooning, these self driving cars would act as one
(15:05):
unit when possible. I think it would look really cool
in them. It may I wonder how I wonder, I
just wonder how annoying that would be to other drivers. Yeah,
when you're stuck behind it. Yeah, maybe, And and the
little dashboard pops up with a message that says would
you like to join the platoon? And you're like no, yeah, no, no,
thank you, shortcut alternate rout And that brings us to
(15:28):
number three. Number three, which is a really cool one,
in my opinion, is my favorite one. Augmented reality dashboards.
And uh and BMW is a manufacturer that's already working
on this. In fact, they have a little bit of
this already in their current vehicles. Yes, it is a
true story. But what what are we saying when we
say augmented Well, we're not talking about like a heads
(15:50):
up display, talking about no, no, no, there's a there's
a heads up display that that a lot of people
are already familiar with. It will show like our PM
and maybe um, you know, miles per hour, things like that.
What we're talking about is um objects that appear highlighted
on your windshield with maybe a box around them that
that either clarifies what they are, describes what they are,
(16:11):
show's movement something like that. Um, this is to me,
this is almost like you know, when the you know,
and a lot of the action films like the Helicopter
pilot will flip down the lens and then there's you know,
like there's all this information provided for the pilot on
his on his flip down lens, and it shows him, um,
(16:31):
you know, the approaching rates, and you know, like what's
over here, what's moving his direction, and there's exactly altitude.
Terrible way for me to describe it, but that's what
I feel. It's like almost and that it's a it's
an overlapping display that clarifies what the driver sees, right,
So the function of this So I know a lot
(16:52):
of people will hear something like this and react diversely
and say, the number one valid concerned with this kind
of technology, is this too distracting for the driver? I
would argue for that, I would argue, there's definitely a
learning curve that's gonna that's gonna be inevitable when this
comes out. However, too emphasize your point, Scott, this technology
(17:18):
is meant to clarify, not buffuddle, the driving situation. It
won't it won't appear like you're driving a video game
or in a video game or something like that. It's
going to uh, it's just going to let's say that
it's really foggy night, and far in the distance, the
vehicle via radar or whatever picks up that there's a
deer ready to cross the road and you don't see
(17:40):
it yet because it's you know, one hundred yards out
or a hundred meters or whatever out. Um, it may
quickly throw up a small box on the screen in
relation to where that deer would be in your field
of vision and indicate to you that there's something that's
moving out there. It's a person, it's a deer, it's
a it's a stalled vehicle, whatever it happens to be. Uh,
And just to larry that there's something on the side
(18:01):
of the road that you should be watching for in
the next five seconds or however long it takes you
to get there. I a should correct myself. How's that
I said? The fuddle? Um? I should have said obscute Kate,
very good, very good. Oh. One one thing before we
move on from this, because I'm then a BMW does
have a little bit of a uh oh yeah, as
you said, a version of this in production already, but
(18:24):
it's real basic, it's not anything like what they're talking
about creating because um, they haven't fully got you know,
gotten to the point where they're they're capable of showing
you everything and describing everything. And right, there's a there's
a sensor issue for some of that too, exactly. But um,
they do have, as you said, a windshield that shows
some basic stuff. True. True, But when you're talking about
(18:46):
the other thing, I want to tell you talk about
something different, because there's a hint here that, Um, they're
talking about augmented reality for service technicians. Yeah, and this
is so cool. It would be in the form of
glasses that the service technicians where And this is more
like the helicopter pilot thing that I mentioned. Yeah, or
Google glass even Okay, Google glass. I don't know what
(19:06):
that is, Ben, but I have to look at Google glass.
No I don't. It's basically this, it's a it's a
it's something that looks kind of like a pair of spectacles,
and there's a small lens I believe on the right side.
Maybe it's customers, a little left side that gives the
user additional information. You can search the internet, you can
(19:30):
see people. That's amazing. It's it's weird. I am not
sure how to feel about it. I have some legitimate
privacy concerns because you see every pair of Google glasses
also as a camera. And BMW is researching, as you said,
the use of these augmented reality glasses so that they
can look at an engine, right Scott, and look at
(19:51):
an engine instead of seeing it in the regular Joe
Schmo people eye way, they see it without my plain
old ordinary eyes for sucker, Yeah, my bottom of the
line organic guys. They they they'll be able to see
through these spectacles that will show them, uh, which parts
are having trouble. And here's the really cool part. It
(20:15):
will give them step by step instructions on how to
fix it. Yeah, here's what I see. You open the
hood and you know, a small box appears at the
at the first first step and it says, you know,
loosen this bowlt do not remove whatever. Then then then
step and once you do that, step two appears and
and it's it's almost walking you through this thing, showing
you it's it's it's tough to imagine it completely what
(20:37):
maybe or describe what I'm imagining, but um, this could
be a really cool thing for service technicians. Really could
could quickly like it could speed up the process quite
a bit, I think, Yeah, And it could Also, I'm
sure there's some curmudgeons who will point out that this
could also lead us to a future where no one
actually knows how to do anything. That's true. But but
(20:59):
let's to this. How about this. What if they sold
these at after auto market after market auto parts stores
and uh, here's a pair of lenses for basic engine
repair on a on a Chevy Camaro. Okay, and uh,
and these glasses are one hundred dollars or whatever they
happen to be, right, and you buy them and you
take them home, and let's say that, you know, after
(21:21):
you purchase your new Camaro or Corvette or whatever I
just said, Camaro, you said you want to change the oil,
and you put the glasses on you had out of
the garage, and it shows you, step by step how
to change the oil. You know, it says, now move
under the car and red pull and okay, what if
you know then like the next weekend, you have a
break job that you want to do on the thing,
(21:43):
and same thing, you just simply program it in or
tell them you know what to do, tell them what
you want to do, and the glasses show you how
to do it. And by doing that, next time you
know how to do it. It's like it's teaching you
without without the physical manual. I like that. I like
that idea. That's much more optimist. Stick look and I'll
see I'll see you on that and raise you this
(22:04):
interesting little business proposition. So you buy your glasses to
fix your Camaro, and you next year you get an
F one fifty and instead of having to buy a
new set of classes, you could pay to download the
F one fifty instruction. Very cool. It's just a software update. Yeah,
it's just a software And I mean I would say,
(22:25):
I would, you know, wager that people after the first
or maybe even the second time, they don't need to
wear the glasses anymore and they do know how to
do that, and that you're right, especially for basic automats,
and a lot of that stuff is applicable for other
models as well. So like once you know how to
change your oil on on a Camaro, you know how
to change the oil on you know the one. Yeah,
that's a point, but that's not Although that is my
(22:46):
favorite thing. The a R dashboard is my favorite thing
on the list. It is not really the craziest thing
because what we're about to talk, what we're about to
hit on next belongs in a James Bond car. Yeah,
this seems like a high tech gadget that Yeah, I could.
I could picture this in a Bob movie for sure.
It's air bags that helps stop cars. So they don't
(23:08):
stop people in cars, they stop the whole car. They
stop the whole car. This is really, this is weird.
This is a in addition to breaks, of course, in
any system that would help slow the car using the
vehicle brake systems. Now now Mercedes Benz is working on
this already, so this is something that they're really looking
at for production. Um. It's a it's an air bag
(23:30):
with a a friction material on the on the bag
that deploys beneath the vehicle if a crash is eminent,
if its senses that it crashes eminent, which you know,
we know that they can do that, um with their
you know, applied breaking and all that. Um. It will
deploy below below the car to slow and then stop
the car, stop the vehicle. Which is amazing. And this
(23:53):
isn't just some wouldn't it be? Neat engineer had the
afternoon off and came up with the idea on a
cocktail napkin type type of things. Scott, this is on
the s UH the s F two thousand nine. That's
a S four D hybrid. Sorry and it uh this
is sort of Mercedes benz Is traveling safety showcase they
(24:17):
like to call it. And um they're calling this bizarre
air bag the breaking bag. It uh will inflate about
a D two hundred milliseconds before your collision, and the
idea behind the bag, according to the project manager, is
to decelerate the car faster than you can. This bag
(24:39):
is coated with steel and rubber, which is how it
can hit the road and still you know, inflate. So
it's adding to the friction that your vehicle's tires already
have on the road. It's just like it's another way
to throw down more friction material in order to slow
yourself down. It just makes sense. It's like if you're
dragging your feet feet on a skateboard or something, right,
(25:00):
it would be great if you could drag both, but
then you would be off the board, right, So you
need you need to be able to have more friction.
So it's almost like dragging a bigger shoe. Really, that's
I guess the way to think of it. And it go,
and it takes it from being a passive system the
air bags inside it inside right to an active system.
This is an active safety system, and that it deploys
without any driver input other than other than you know,
(25:24):
waiting too long to break or whatever happened, you know,
to lead to that imminent collision. Right. Yes, And before
we go on to more, I've got just a couple
more things about the air bag, and then we've also
got number one, which I'm really interested to see what
you think about this one. Number one is energy storing
(25:48):
body panels. Ben, Now this isn't you gotta really think
about what I just said. Energy storing body panels. We're
not talking about energy dissipating body panels, not like crumple
zones or anything like that, not like heat seeing No, no, no,
We're talking about energy storing like if you have a
hybrid vehicle you would store. This is almost like the
body is the battery really right, because as we know,
(26:11):
the current albatross around the neck of the hybrid industry
is the weight man. Just the batteries, the ones we
have that are the type of that supply the type
of energy we need are just heavy. Well, sure, lead
acid batteries are way way heavy and uh the uh
the lithium ion batteries also, I mean they're still heavy,
(26:34):
they're not I mean they're they're lighter, not as heavy.
But imagine if you could create a body panel that
was able to store that energy and you know, provide
the shell for the vehicle. You know, it doesn't have
to be every panel, It could be you know, the
back end or whatever. Um. But if you were able
to create a panel out of a material and a
lightweight material as well. But I mean these are made
(26:56):
out of poly fiber and carbon resin um, so you
know they're they're lightweight to begin with. But if they
were able to store that energy, um, you could do
away with a lot of that battery way yeah, and
that could reduce the car's weight by up to Now
why is this a big deal? There's another statistic that
(27:16):
you need to know to understand why energy storing panels
or basically battery panels for lack of a better word, Uh,
why are these are so important? Well, according to a
couple of predictions, most notably one by x On Mobile,
uh is going to be the year when half of
all new cars coming out of production will be hybrids.
(27:39):
I don't know if I believe it either. I a
long time away, Scott, that is a long long time away.
So I think it's kind of tough. There's got to
be some intervening variables there maybe. But there's two companies
that really firmly believe this, I bet ye. And those
companies are are both Volvo and Toyota, who are both
(28:00):
with working on they're currently working on these panels, these
energy storing body panels. Um. So you've got two major
automobile automobile manufacturers that are really buying into the fact
that you know, we're gonna need a way to store
battery power in the future that is a lot more lightweight, um,
a lot more I guess, a feasible way of carrying around, um,
(28:22):
all the stored energy. Right. And of course, uh, this
is where we this is where we sort of went
out of our way to say the writer's number one pick,
which again, uh doesn't that these are not put in
any value order, right. So the energy storing body panels
(28:42):
are a fascinating thing, but they're part of a larger
initiative to figure out how best to carry this stored energy.
There are other technologies that would also be working in
conjunction with this, like regenative breaking, which is really cool. Um.
And even you know, you saw that part where Toyota
is attempting to make the body panels also capture solar
(29:03):
and yeah, that's really cool too. So Toyota is kind
of up the game a little bit and saying that
they want to add solar capture capability. Now the regenerative
breaking that you mentioned, that energy would be stored in
a panel, um, so that you know, just like it
would in a battery now, but with less weight. Um.
Also there's um, well, any any electricity that you know,
you've you've gathered from you know, being if it's a
(29:25):
plug in hybrid, if you store maybe if you could,
you know, any energy, it would be stored the battery
overnight would be stored in the panels. That's maybe the
easiest way to say that. Um. You'd be able to
reduce the size of the current battery packs, which are enormous, right,
I mean they're really big. In fact, a lot of
times they occupy the entire area below the cabin a
(29:45):
lot of these cars. So that just gives the idea
of some of the space savings that these things will provide. Um,
and we mentioned Wade a few times, but um, I
really do think that, you know, that's that's probably the
biggest thing for these things. If they can redu some
of that weight. Um, We've we've talked about hyper cars,
We've talked about weight savings and how important it is
and and all that, you know, fuel conservation. It'll make
(30:08):
these things just that much more efficient, right, And we
should also we should also give some verdicts on this guy.
I think we should give some verdicts. You well, okay,
so let's let's go at number one. What do you
think future body panels gonna happen? I think that in
limited runs they will. I don't think that it's going
to be uh, you know, completely across the board. If
(30:31):
I don't think everybody will be doing this, Yeah, I don't.
I agree. I think that Toyota involved are definitely gonna
do it. They've already got sort of a sunk cost
in terms of time and R and D. But they
don't have uh, they don't have the code cracked yet.
And I'm not sure if this is gonna be something,
(30:53):
it's it's gonna take a while for the technology to
become affordable enough to go into a bunch of cars,
because like remember, and carbon fiber first came out, I do,
and it was fantastically expensive race car stuff and that
was it. Only only that And now you know, just
a few years later, we're living in a world where
(31:13):
carbon fiber body or carbon fiber car bodies are becoming
increasingly affordable. It's a reality now. I mean, look at
the Volkswagen one leader car, the or whatever they call
it now, the the Xcel XL one I think is
what they call it. All right, then number number two
on our list, the air bags that helps to have cars. Now,
Mercedes Benz is already doing it. You think that you
think that they're gonna actually see production or maybe other automakers,
(31:37):
that's a great question. I think they I think we could.
It depends on two things. It depends on how much
of a difference it makes in an accident, not in
a test, but in an accident, right, and and then
that will influence government safety standards. So you know, air
(31:59):
bad became ubiquitous. And yeah, I see this going into
Mercedes Benz for sure. For sure, I think they're definitely
gonna do it. And I think that that's going to
trickle down to other manufacturers, like you know, the high
end manufacturers like Infinity and Jaguar and you know those
(32:20):
maybe even Rolls and Bugatti and those guys. Um. You know,
one thing that we didn't mention is that, you know,
it also lifts the front end of the car up
to eight centimeters so when you're breaking really hard, Um,
you know how the tendency is for the nose to
dive down. What what this will counter counteract that in
that it lifts the front of the car back up
to where it likely well where it really should be
(32:42):
in an accident, so that it's more online with most
bumpers on the road or you know other you know,
the higher the better, I guess. So I see this
as being a safety feature that you know, Mercedes is
definitely I think going to roll this out. I just
have a good feeling about that one. You know, what
about number number three in our list, which was augmented
reality dashboards. So it's gonna happen, you think, So, yeah,
(33:02):
it's gonna happen, because that is that kind of approach
to technology is already occurring in so many other places
and with BMW already having uh, you know, a mild
version of this already out there. I see BMW having
their more advanced version on let's say, their flagship cars,
like their seven series cars and uh, and then who knows,
(33:23):
maybe it'll trickle down to their other vehicles, and then
other manufacturers again the high end ones first like Mercedes
Infinity land Rover, whoever gonna pick that up. This is
just something that I see as so um imminent that
if a car manufacturer doesn't make augmented reality dashboards and
(33:45):
for some reason these don't come into fruition from the manufacturers,
then with the emergence of flexible displays, people are going
to make their own. And I think the ground swell
support for this, and I just hope that what we
talked about before, you know, our our dream maybe of
you know, the augmented reality glasses for for private use
(34:07):
at home, not not just service technicians, but you know,
at home, and if we can download programs for let's
say that I could go out and change, you know,
the head gasket on my car and on a weekend
and it shows me step by step how to do it.
I'm gonna love that. Yeah, I would love that. I
think I think that, uh, you and I can agree
that everybody wants these, But what about what about number four?
(34:27):
What about our old buddy concept self driving cars? Absolutely,
these are these are happening. But um, as we mentioned,
you know, I I don't see any kind of you know,
major infrastructure changing. I see that, you know, like Audi's
idea where the self parking I can see that happening
in small pockets here and there, you know, some of
the some of the malls in major cities. I don't
(34:49):
think it'll be as far reaching is everywhere all the time.
But I mean, like Google's got their car that uh,
you know, drives itself without any kind of infrastructure. You
don't have to have um, metallic pucks buried in the
circus of every road on every interstate you know, of
every state. Um, I think that, you know, things like
the Google car and the auty self parking car, I
(35:11):
think those two are going to happen. Okay, I I agree,
if only because I think the benefit for autonomous vehicles
in military applications does make it inevitable. But I don't
know if it will. You know, I don't know if
we'll live in a in a world where the entirety
of I seventy five now is filled with solver no no,
(35:34):
no no, because that would be the infrastructure change that
we're talking about. If every vehicle can you know, conform
to that and the infrastructure was changed, that's like the
science fiction world, you know, the I robot world where
reports exactly where you're just your your passenger in the
vehicle and you just you just ride, You're you're along
for the ride. Really yeah, and if that happens, it's, uh,
(35:55):
it's gonna take a while. What's our go to ten
years and ten years everybody will be gonna happen, all right,
and then the last one ben vehicles that communicate with
each other and the road. So this V two V
communication or the V two I what do you think totally?
It's I think it's going to happen in some form. Yeah,
I think that the primary reason's going to happen in
(36:16):
some form is that it's a great safety idea. So this, uh,
this concept, it's sort of a it's sort of a
question of why why wouldn't you do this if it's
possible and it's already happening, already happening, and you know,
in small doses, I guess here and there, so um,
you know, just this the change would be from one
(36:38):
vehicle to the next. Now, vehicles are already communicating with infrastructure,
and they're seeing, and they're they're they're they're doing collision
avoidance system things and you know, they're they're able to
maintain lanes and all that. So it's not too much
of a leap to say that, yeah, they're gonna start communicating,
even if it's within Like let's say that all general
motors cars can communicate with other on motors cars to
(37:00):
begin with, and then suddenly, you know, Ford may say, like,
we're going to do the same thing, but you know,
it would be really cool if we could also communicate
with general motors cars that you know, just make it
even that much better, man much safer. And then so
exactly I have instead of listener, mail, I actually have
one more thing. Have you got? So here's something that
(37:25):
did not make it on our five future car technologies
that truly have a chance, And it's because it's wild speculation.
It's a little question, all right, ready, I think so okay,
three D printers and car parts. Imagine being able to
uh fabricate a part that you need now. I think
(37:46):
Jay Leno has done this. He used three D printers
to fabricate apart from metal printers, right, yeah, his steam
powered car was And um, I think that the question
here is one of you know, material science composites that
could withstand the rigors of an engine. But but what
(38:08):
do you think Do you think that there's a future
for three D printed car parts? I absolutely do, Yeah,
especially as some of these older makes and models start
to get older and older and the parts go away,
and you know they're not making you know, um, original
equipment parts anymore. You know, you have to go you
have to rely on at autumn aftermarket rather And um,
(38:28):
I think that a lot of people are going to
find that, you know, just suddenly there isn't a bumper
from my car anymore that they just I cannot find.
I can't find a used one. I can't find a
you know, one that was left on a shelf and
some dealership somewhere, right, I can't find anybody that's willing
to sell me a parts car. There are literally no
unbroken headlights for my vehicle in the world. What do
I do? So? I think that I think that in
(38:50):
a lot of cases. Um, you know, something like this
would be advantageous, you know, to be able to print
your own part. Of course, uh, time consuming, and you'd
have to know what type of metal you know to
use for each situation, because that's important in uh in
engine you know engine parts and um, you know, suspension
parts whatever. You can't use a metal that's too soft
or too hard. Um. So I think there's there's a
(39:14):
lot of angles that have to be thought of here,
but I think that it's possible. Yeah, would it be
Would it affect uh, brick and mortar auto shops, auto
parts shops the way that Amazon has affected booksellers? You know, Well,
only if the technology is affordable enough, right. Oh? Yeah,
that's that's the key, isn't Yeah, I think it is.
I think it comes down to cost, because if I
(39:36):
could afford a printer that would just print my own parts,
why would I ever have to go to you know,
a big box store in order to get you know, um,
spark plugs or whatever. I can make my own. Oh
holy smokes, that reminds me. I forgot. Does our audience
know that we have a three D printer in our office? Yeah?
We do have one? Knowing Yeah, it's it doesn't print
(39:56):
anything in metal, uses this uh bright plastic composite. But
but it makes some cool stuff. You guys. You can
also check out um Let's see stuff to blow your
minds YouTube series has a really cool piece on there
on our three D printer. Uh, technically it's part of
my department. We press my shoulders off. Here you can
(40:17):
see the actual three D printer that Ben has in
his department. I'm probably not allowed to touch probably expensive toy.
But yeah, maybe maybe we can um print some cool
stuff out with that. Maybe we can print out some
model cars, put them on the Facebook or something, some
tiny cars. They we can't print out life size, working
(40:40):
replica of a vehicle yet. Um, but we're on it.
And while you and I go to figure that out,
let's go ahead and ask our listeners what they think
about future car technologies. Do you think, uh? Do you
think that these will spell doom for the American driver
or the global driver? Man? That's dramatic. Will it just
(41:00):
be too much stuff going on? Yeah? I know what,
because what we just painted if all this stuff happens,
we just painted a world where somebody's basically along for
the ride in their car playing angry birds on their
windshield more or less. And you know when they get
in the wreck, they bump up eight centimeters in the
(41:20):
air and they wait for the robo at least. Then
they just go home and print their own parts. Then
they go home and they print out their new bumper um.
So do you guys think this is likely? Do you
think it's a good idea? You can let us know
on Facebook, and you can drop us line on Twitter.
And if you don't do either of those, but you
still want to talk to us, you can send us
an email at car stuff at Discovery dot com. For
(41:43):
more on this and thousands of other topics, this is
how stuff works dot com. Let us know what you think.
Send an email to podcast at how stuff works dot com.
Go behind the wheel, under the hood and beyond with
car Stuff from house stuffworks dot com. Welcome to car Stuff.
I'm Scott Benchman, I'm Ben Bullen and Scott I would
like to welcome you to the future. The future, well
maybe the future is this like it feels like I'm
(00:22):
on a Disney ride or something. Yes, yes, it's a
it's a regular Epcot Center inspired podcast. Here is Did
you did you ever go to Epcot Center? I have? Yes,
Did you ever take that future ride? Yes, you know
the one I'm talking about, And you can choose like
which environment you want to leave the ride from through?
(00:42):
I know we're talking about. Man. I love that I
never got to try all of the environments. Lines are
too long for lines are too long, I would have waited. Yeah,
well you know what you may have found in there?
Some automotive advancements as well, right, yeah, And maybe I
would think that there's something had to have been something, right. Um.
And usually when we're talking about advancements like this, we're
(01:03):
talking about like safety issues, information issues, a lot of
times comfort issues. Um. But in this case, I think
we're talking about some technology that may may represent like
completely revolutionary advancements. Things that you know, you just they're
so far out there. It's not like tweaking something that's
already there. It's more like in a lot of these cases, um,
(01:23):
it's it's more like something brand new to us, something
that we've just never even heard of. Yes, and what
are we talking about? We are talking about five future
car technologies wait for it, that truly have a chance.
Now that's uh that that last little qualifier there is
where this is really really important because we talk about
(01:44):
a lot of you know, pie in the sky ideas
that show that have flying cars and things like that.
And I know someone's going to say that they already
have flying cars, but you know, we're not talking about
the terrafugim. We're not talking about one car. We're just
saying it probably not going to be the flying car
traffic jam. I shouldn't have even said it. But you
know other things that you know, like the sun visor
that has a spot that moves around to cover the sunshine,
(02:06):
you know, based on the place where the driver's eyes
are located. It's just it's there's a there's a wide
open world of new technologies out there that we've We've
talked about a lot of different things that just quite
frankly been a lot of them are going to happen. Yeah,
I think a lot of them for a various factors
are going to remain sort of the realm of science fiction.
(02:30):
And wouldn't it be cool just uh for instance, Uh,
what was that one? And it was kind of just
show offie. We did an episode on Luxury Cars of
the Future. Yeah, one of our very first episodes. I
was way way back. Yeah, and one of the cars
had a waterfall or something and a zen garden below
(02:50):
I think it was below, plexic glass in the floor
so that you could you could stand on top of it.
And so some of that stuff is is just not
going to happen. What makes these five techno aologies a
little bit different is that we have evolved our material
science by leaps and bounds. Yeah, these will have a
real practical purpose and uh, and these are ones that
(03:14):
you know, in a way we can see these may
be happening. And we mentioned this in the past, I know,
but we have we've developed a bit of a sniffer
for these type of things, you know, we are we
able to kind of weed out the ones that we
think may happen. The ones we don't think will happen. Um.
We've got an article on our site, on our on
the house stuff works dot com site um titled the
(03:35):
same thing, five future car technologies that truly have a
chance and the writer Christopher Niger Um, he dug out
five really good ones here. And I think this is
what we should go through, is just in descending order
five or three two one, And um, I don't think
there's any kind of weight on these as far as
what we think is gonna happen first or last or
(03:56):
anythink that's a random ortar. But you know you unless
you do it five four three to one. We will
also Yeah, it's more exciting. We will also talk about
some of the other things that relate to these. Uh,
this may these topics may be familiar to some of
our loyal or longtime listeners because we've touched on a
(04:17):
lot of these. Yeah, some of these won't be you
know completely you know in outer space. Some of these
will be that that you know, we have we've mentioned
these and and they're familiar with them, and as a
matter of fact that some of them are already on
their way. I mean even since we've talked about them.
There there they've advanced the point where I'm hearing more
about them and on daily news up. Um, you know
(04:38):
from manufacturers and things like that. So, um, you want
to start with number five, Yes, without any further Ado Scott,
Number five cars that communicate with each other and the road. Yeah,
and some comes from M I T engineers. So it's
not really in a vehicle yet. Um. And if you
if you pay attention to what we're saying, it's not
that there's good communication you know within vehicle, like you know,
(05:01):
the the modules within the vehicle are communicating you know,
among themselves, which they do in almost every new car really,
actually in every new car. We're talking about vehicle to
vehicle communication or V two V communication as they call it. Um.
And even in one case they're we're gonna talk about
V two I, which is vehicle to infrastructure, right. Um.
(05:22):
So there's all kinds of potential here, right. Yeah. So
here is the idea, and we this is an idea
that we've discussed in our what five sixteen podcasts on
self driving vehicle. Seven sounds like a good number. Uh.
The thing that makes autonomous vehicles potentially so interesting, uh,
(05:46):
from a safety perspective, is that it may remove the
possibility of human error. However, you know, of course, does
introduce a larger possibility of computer or technological error, but
it could have. Again, this is a big if. If
everything works out, then we could find parts of the
(06:07):
world functioning on a grid wherein a single system pretty
much or kind of a hive mind system is controlling
the speed at which cars move, the distance that they maintain,
and the safety maneuvers. And there's some pretty cool stuff here.
I gotta tell you, man, the idea still freaks me
(06:30):
out a little. I see this is a slightly different way,
I mean from what they described, and I see you
and I got two different things out of this. Um,
you're saying that it's more autonomous. I'm saying that I
think that it's more Um, drivers in control most of
the time. Only in emergency situations would the autonomous system
kick in, and that you know, um it would. It's
(06:51):
collision avoidance. I guess, yeah, clarification, So I think so,
I mean, maybe maybe you know your interpretation of this
is different than mine, but um, you know, I I
just see it as ways of like warning of potential collisions.
So systems that we already have systems that do that.
Lane variant systems we have that. UM, the safe distance
between cars, we have that with um UM, what's the
(07:12):
advanced uh UM speed control, cruise control. That's the word
I'm looking for. Very good then very good, So um man.
I think that there's there's an awful lot of of
potential in this range, and we've already got a lot
of these technologies they're talking about just now making them
communicate with each other. So you have two cars that
(07:35):
have to operate on the same operating system, on the
same I guess the same os if you're talking about
computer systems, right, and that you know they would somehow
communicate with each other. Like I'm I'm I'm going through
this intersection. I'm I'm traveling at fifty. I can't stop. Um.
The other one is going saying it's green light for me. Um.
(07:56):
I'm not able to stop either, but I'm gonna try. Yeah,
because you're not. I'm going thirty five, you're going sixty.
I'm going to give a shot you keep going. Yeah.
It's a weird way to think about it. That's true, though,
that's that that is a good idea. Though, just to clarify,
I was only referencing our earlier stuff on autonomous cars.
So this I'm glad that you make this point, because
(08:19):
what we're talking about is sort of almost like having
a precision driver, a guardian angel if you will somewhere
in your dashboard who is able to take the wheel
when things get out of hand. That's perfect, that's a
good that's a great explanation of it. And uh, um,
and another way to look at this, um, well, another
angle of this, this whole thing is I mentioned the
(08:41):
V two I, which is vehicle to infrastructure. Instead of
vehicle to vehicle, it's vehical to infrastructure. So, um, the
car will recognize that there's a traffic light approaching, and uh,
you know, it knows that in seven seconds it's gonna
change over to green and you're eight seconds away. I'm sorry,
in seven seconds is gonna turn to read and you're
eight seconds away. So that makes more sense right now.
(09:03):
And and it would also know, for instance, uh, if
there was construction or let's I mean a train is
crossing the tracks, or um, you know, it knows that
the speed limit is forty five and you're going sixty.
It knows all different things like this. I mean it's
going to uh if if they get the system in place. Now,
we've always talked about this. The infrastructure is the hard thing, right, Yeah,
(09:24):
it's that's the expensive place. That's the really difficult part.
Is to build an infrastructure for all the vehicles to
work in the exact same way. And how long will
it take to completely switch over? You know, someone's gonna
drive into town in an old pickup truck that you
know doesn't have all this new technology, and how are
they going to handle that? How is it gonna adapt
around all that? So this one, you know, M I
(09:44):
T engineers are working on it right now. This this
V two V communication and V two I UM, I
don't know. We'll see how it goes, right Yeah, And
the National Highway Transportation Safety Association UM BIRD Administration wheather
UH believe that this could reduce target vehicle crashes by
(10:05):
that number alone. I mean we are talking about human lives.
That number alone does make it I think worth exploring.
We think that this does truly have a chance. UM.
In some of our earlier podcast we talked about how
these this sort of technology would likely begin in a
small area. You know, Ford is testing it, I believe, right,
(10:28):
now with the v t V. But in a in
a dense or urban environment, or in a small locale
where no other cars are allowed in a closed system,
then that's where we would probably see this start out.
But we're not. I will eat my hat if we
(10:48):
see this rolled out across um, the entirety of the
United States or something now Europe, now you can it's different.
I would think, now, what if? But what if they
this in like UM on a smaller scale. What if
they did something like this in like a retirement community
where there's golf cart travel. That's a great great point,
(11:09):
the same type of technology there, and just see how
it works. Just just see, you know, what what goes
on there in in a seal like you're talking about
a sealed off community, you know, somewhere where they're in
complete control of the vehicles that operate there. And it's
relatively small enough that you know, there's a lot of
different situations with a lot of intersections, pedestrian travel, speed
(11:29):
limits and what they're smart ideas are very low. I
don't know it's possibility we should do that. Are we
ready to move on the number four? Yes? Number four,
And I don't think we should spend too much much
time on this is one we were talking about. I
kind of actually spoiled it already. Alright, self driving cars
and uh number four self driving cars, and Google and
Audie have already really been working on this the most.
(11:51):
I think, Um, we've seen, you know the Google cars
that you know famously I kind of appeared out of
nowhere and they said, hey, surprise, We've already got three
thousand miles under our belt on a car with no driver. Yeah.
Now there is a human sitting behind the wheel on
these tests. But the laws in California and Nevada have
changed to allow for testing of this vehicle, and um,
(12:14):
this dates back. We We go back to this concept
a lot because it is so true that so much
technology in civilian and mainstream vehicles comes from either racing,
the military, and DARPA for years had a competition to
the Grand Urban Challenge, I think, to figure out how
(12:35):
to build and operate an autonomous vehicle. Google is going
gangbusters with this thing. I mean, you know the laws
are being changed. Sure, yeah, they're they're they're looking to
develop new laws so that in different states so they
can continue their testing. Right now, they're test in California
in neved I think you mentioned that, and they're looking
for other states as well, you know, in order to uh,
(12:57):
I just well increase the you know, the testing zone,
I guess, so that you know, they have more situations,
more more understanding of what happens in the real world environment.
And uh you know, we talked about in a in
a podcast in detail recently about e s reveal of
(13:18):
the self parking Audie cars. You remember those, yeah, yeah,
which is amazing technology. We don't want to spoil too
much of it so you can check it out. But
the the idea essentially is that this vehicle is smart
enough to go busy itself and find its own parking
space and then come back when you call it. It's
like it's its own valet. It drops you off at
(13:41):
the door, at the at the mall or wherever, and
then it comes and picks you up when you're done,
and and it parks in between. Amazing and it really works,
and it does need some infrastructure to make it work,
but this will be something that people are able to buy.
And of course there's the Audie Autonomous Pike's Peak hill
(14:01):
climb car that you know that that infamously ran up
Pike's Peak without a driver. That was really cool. Um,
so out he's really working on this as well. And uh,
I think you know that's again another thing where they
said they're a decade out from really having anything on this.
So right, a lot of these, like we've mentioned many
times in the past, you know, about ten years out.
That's what they kind of they like to hint that
(14:23):
you know that it's on its way. Yeah, there's another
thing that we should talk about with these. This was
something that really really caught my eye with this article.
What's that platooning? So this would be imagine you have
your self driving cars and you have this option you
can select for them to platoon together. Uh. I can't
(14:45):
help but think of it as a pod of dolphins
or school of fish on the road. And it kind
of reminds me of how bikers will uh congregate on
the road into into a right a riding group. And uh,
with platooning, these self driving cars would act as one
(15:05):
unit when possible. I think it would look really cool
in them. It may I wonder how I wonder, I
just wonder how annoying that would be to other drivers. Yeah,
when you're stuck behind it. Yeah, maybe, And and the
little dashboard pops up with a message that says would
you like to join the platoon? And you're like no, yeah, no, no,
thank you, shortcut alternate rout And that brings us to
(15:28):
number three. Number three, which is a really cool one,
in my opinion, is my favorite one. Augmented reality dashboards.
And uh and BMW is a manufacturer that's already working
on this. In fact, they have a little bit of
this already in their current vehicles. Yes, it is a
true story. But what what are we saying when we
say augmented Well, we're not talking about like a heads
(15:50):
up display, talking about no, no, no, there's a there's
a heads up display that that a lot of people
are already familiar with. It will show like our PM
and maybe um, you know, miles per hour, things like that.
What we're talking about is um objects that appear highlighted
on your windshield with maybe a box around them that
that either clarifies what they are, describes what they are,
(16:11):
show's movement something like that. Um, this is to me,
this is almost like you know, when the you know,
and a lot of the action films like the Helicopter
pilot will flip down the lens and then there's you know,
like there's all this information provided for the pilot on
his on his flip down lens, and it shows him, um,
(16:31):
you know, the approaching rates, and you know, like what's
over here, what's moving his direction, and there's exactly altitude.
Terrible way for me to describe it, but that's what
I feel. It's like almost and that it's a it's
an overlapping display that clarifies what the driver sees, right,
So the function of this So I know a lot
(16:52):
of people will hear something like this and react diversely
and say, the number one valid concerned with this kind
of technology, is this too distracting for the driver? I
would argue for that, I would argue, there's definitely a
learning curve that's gonna that's gonna be inevitable when this
comes out. However, too emphasize your point, Scott, this technology
(17:18):
is meant to clarify, not buffuddle, the driving situation. It
won't it won't appear like you're driving a video game
or in a video game or something like that. It's
going to uh, it's just going to let's say that
it's really foggy night, and far in the distance, the
vehicle via radar or whatever picks up that there's a
deer ready to cross the road and you don't see
(17:40):
it yet because it's you know, one hundred yards out
or a hundred meters or whatever out. Um, it may
quickly throw up a small box on the screen in
relation to where that deer would be in your field
of vision and indicate to you that there's something that's
moving out there. It's a person, it's a deer, it's
a it's a stalled vehicle, whatever it happens to be. Uh,
And just to larry that there's something on the side
(18:01):
of the road that you should be watching for in
the next five seconds or however long it takes you
to get there. I a should correct myself. How's that
I said? The fuddle? Um? I should have said obscute Kate,
very good, very good. Oh. One one thing before we
move on from this, because I'm then a BMW does
have a little bit of a uh oh yeah, as
you said, a version of this in production already, but
(18:24):
it's real basic, it's not anything like what they're talking
about creating because um, they haven't fully got you know,
gotten to the point where they're they're capable of showing
you everything and describing everything. And right, there's a there's
a sensor issue for some of that too, exactly. But um,
they do have, as you said, a windshield that shows
some basic stuff. True. True, But when you're talking about
(18:46):
the other thing, I want to tell you talk about
something different, because there's a hint here that, Um, they're
talking about augmented reality for service technicians. Yeah, and this
is so cool. It would be in the form of
glasses that the service technicians where And this is more
like the helicopter pilot thing that I mentioned. Yeah, or
Google glass even Okay, Google glass. I don't know what
(19:06):
that is, Ben, but I have to look at Google glass.
No I don't. It's basically this, it's a it's a
it's something that looks kind of like a pair of spectacles,
and there's a small lens I believe on the right side.
Maybe it's customers, a little left side that gives the
user additional information. You can search the internet, you can
(19:30):
see people. That's amazing. It's it's weird. I am not
sure how to feel about it. I have some legitimate
privacy concerns because you see every pair of Google glasses
also as a camera. And BMW is researching, as you said,
the use of these augmented reality glasses so that they
can look at an engine, right Scott, and look at
(19:51):
an engine instead of seeing it in the regular Joe
Schmo people eye way, they see it without my plain
old ordinary eyes for sucker, Yeah, my bottom of the
line organic guys. They they they'll be able to see
through these spectacles that will show them, uh, which parts
are having trouble. And here's the really cool part. It
(20:15):
will give them step by step instructions on how to
fix it. Yeah, here's what I see. You open the
hood and you know, a small box appears at the
at the first first step and it says, you know,
loosen this bowlt do not remove whatever. Then then then
step and once you do that, step two appears and
and it's it's almost walking you through this thing, showing
you it's it's it's tough to imagine it completely what
(20:37):
maybe or describe what I'm imagining, but um, this could
be a really cool thing for service technicians. Really could
could quickly like it could speed up the process quite
a bit, I think, Yeah, And it could Also, I'm
sure there's some curmudgeons who will point out that this
could also lead us to a future where no one
actually knows how to do anything. That's true. But but
(20:59):
let's to this. How about this. What if they sold
these at after auto market after market auto parts stores
and uh, here's a pair of lenses for basic engine
repair on a on a Chevy Camaro. Okay, and uh,
and these glasses are one hundred dollars or whatever they
happen to be, right, and you buy them and you
take them home, and let's say that, you know, after
(21:21):
you purchase your new Camaro or Corvette or whatever I
just said, Camaro, you said you want to change the oil,
and you put the glasses on you had out of
the garage, and it shows you, step by step how
to change the oil. You know, it says, now move
under the car and red pull and okay, what if
you know then like the next weekend, you have a
break job that you want to do on the thing,
(21:43):
and same thing, you just simply program it in or
tell them you know what to do, tell them what
you want to do, and the glasses show you how
to do it. And by doing that, next time you
know how to do it. It's like it's teaching you
without without the physical manual. I like that. I like
that idea. That's much more optimist. Stick look and I'll
see I'll see you on that and raise you this
(22:04):
interesting little business proposition. So you buy your glasses to
fix your Camaro, and you next year you get an
F one fifty and instead of having to buy a
new set of classes, you could pay to download the
F one fifty instruction. Very cool. It's just a software update. Yeah,
it's just a software And I mean I would say,
(22:25):
I would, you know, wager that people after the first
or maybe even the second time, they don't need to
wear the glasses anymore and they do know how to
do that, and that you're right, especially for basic automats,
and a lot of that stuff is applicable for other
models as well. So like once you know how to
change your oil on on a Camaro, you know how
to change the oil on you know the one. Yeah,
that's a point, but that's not Although that is my
(22:46):
favorite thing. The a R dashboard is my favorite thing
on the list. It is not really the craziest thing
because what we're about to talk, what we're about to
hit on next belongs in a James Bond car. Yeah,
this seems like a high tech gadget that Yeah, I could.
I could picture this in a Bob movie for sure.
It's air bags that helps stop cars. So they don't
(23:08):
stop people in cars, they stop the whole car. They
stop the whole car. This is really, this is weird.
This is a in addition to breaks, of course, in
any system that would help slow the car using the
vehicle brake systems. Now now Mercedes Benz is working on
this already, so this is something that they're really looking
at for production. Um. It's a it's an air bag
(23:30):
with a a friction material on the on the bag
that deploys beneath the vehicle if a crash is eminent,
if its senses that it crashes eminent, which you know,
we know that they can do that, um with their
you know, applied breaking and all that. Um. It will
deploy below below the car to slow and then stop
the car, stop the vehicle. Which is amazing. And this
(23:53):
isn't just some wouldn't it be? Neat engineer had the
afternoon off and came up with the idea on a
cocktail napkin type type of things. Scott, this is on
the s UH the s F two thousand nine. That's
a S four D hybrid. Sorry and it uh this
is sort of Mercedes benz Is traveling safety showcase they
(24:17):
like to call it. And um they're calling this bizarre
air bag the breaking bag. It uh will inflate about
a D two hundred milliseconds before your collision, and the
idea behind the bag, according to the project manager, is
to decelerate the car faster than you can. This bag
(24:39):
is coated with steel and rubber, which is how it
can hit the road and still you know, inflate. So
it's adding to the friction that your vehicle's tires already
have on the road. It's just like it's another way
to throw down more friction material in order to slow
yourself down. It just makes sense. It's like if you're
dragging your feet feet on a skateboard or something, right,
(25:00):
it would be great if you could drag both, but
then you would be off the board, right, So you
need you need to be able to have more friction.
So it's almost like dragging a bigger shoe. Really, that's
I guess the way to think of it. And it go,
and it takes it from being a passive system the
air bags inside it inside right to an active system.
This is an active safety system, and that it deploys
without any driver input other than other than you know,
(25:24):
waiting too long to break or whatever happened, you know,
to lead to that imminent collision. Right. Yes, And before
we go on to more, I've got just a couple
more things about the air bag, and then we've also
got number one, which I'm really interested to see what
you think about this one. Number one is energy storing
(25:48):
body panels. Ben, Now this isn't you gotta really think
about what I just said. Energy storing body panels. We're
not talking about energy dissipating body panels, not like crumple
zones or anything like that, not like heat seeing No, no, no,
We're talking about energy storing like if you have a
hybrid vehicle you would store. This is almost like the
body is the battery really right, because as we know,
(26:11):
the current albatross around the neck of the hybrid industry
is the weight man. Just the batteries, the ones we
have that are the type of that supply the type
of energy we need are just heavy. Well, sure, lead
acid batteries are way way heavy and uh the uh
the lithium ion batteries also, I mean they're still heavy,
(26:34):
they're not I mean they're they're lighter, not as heavy.
But imagine if you could create a body panel that
was able to store that energy and you know, provide
the shell for the vehicle. You know, it doesn't have
to be every panel, It could be you know, the
back end or whatever. Um. But if you were able
to create a panel out of a material and a
lightweight material as well. But I mean these are made
(26:56):
out of poly fiber and carbon resin um, so you
know they're they're lightweight to begin with. But if they
were able to store that energy, um, you could do
away with a lot of that battery way yeah, and
that could reduce the car's weight by up to Now
why is this a big deal? There's another statistic that
(27:16):
you need to know to understand why energy storing panels
or basically battery panels for lack of a better word, Uh,
why are these are so important? Well, according to a
couple of predictions, most notably one by x On Mobile,
uh is going to be the year when half of
all new cars coming out of production will be hybrids.
(27:39):
I don't know if I believe it either. I a
long time away, Scott, that is a long long time away.
So I think it's kind of tough. There's got to
be some intervening variables there maybe. But there's two companies
that really firmly believe this, I bet ye. And those
companies are are both Volvo and Toyota, who are both
(28:00):
with working on they're currently working on these panels, these
energy storing body panels. Um. So you've got two major
automobile automobile manufacturers that are really buying into the fact
that you know, we're gonna need a way to store
battery power in the future that is a lot more lightweight, um,
a lot more I guess, a feasible way of carrying around, um,
(28:22):
all the stored energy. Right. And of course, uh, this
is where we this is where we sort of went
out of our way to say the writer's number one pick,
which again, uh doesn't that these are not put in
any value order, right. So the energy storing body panels
(28:42):
are a fascinating thing, but they're part of a larger
initiative to figure out how best to carry this stored energy.
There are other technologies that would also be working in
conjunction with this, like regenative breaking, which is really cool. Um.
And even you know, you saw that part where Toyota
is attempting to make the body panels also capture solar
(29:03):
and yeah, that's really cool too. So Toyota is kind
of up the game a little bit and saying that
they want to add solar capture capability. Now the regenerative
breaking that you mentioned, that energy would be stored in
a panel, um, so that you know, just like it
would in a battery now, but with less weight. Um.
Also there's um, well, any any electricity that you know,
you've you've gathered from you know, being if it's a
(29:25):
plug in hybrid, if you store maybe if you could,
you know, any energy, it would be stored the battery
overnight would be stored in the panels. That's maybe the
easiest way to say that. Um. You'd be able to
reduce the size of the current battery packs, which are enormous, right,
I mean they're really big. In fact, a lot of
times they occupy the entire area below the cabin a
(29:45):
lot of these cars. So that just gives the idea
of some of the space savings that these things will provide. Um,
and we mentioned Wade a few times, but um, I
really do think that, you know, that's that's probably the
biggest thing for these things. If they can redu some
of that weight. Um, We've we've talked about hyper cars,
We've talked about weight savings and how important it is
and and all that, you know, fuel conservation. It'll make
(30:08):
these things just that much more efficient, right, And we
should also we should also give some verdicts on this guy.
I think we should give some verdicts. You well, okay,
so let's let's go at number one. What do you
think future body panels gonna happen? I think that in
limited runs they will. I don't think that it's going
to be uh, you know, completely across the board. If
(30:31):
I don't think everybody will be doing this, Yeah, I don't.
I agree. I think that Toyota involved are definitely gonna
do it. They've already got sort of a sunk cost
in terms of time and R and D. But they
don't have uh, they don't have the code cracked yet.
And I'm not sure if this is gonna be something,
(30:53):
it's it's gonna take a while for the technology to
become affordable enough to go into a bunch of cars,
because like remember, and carbon fiber first came out, I do,
and it was fantastically expensive race car stuff and that
was it. Only only that And now you know, just
a few years later, we're living in a world where
(31:13):
carbon fiber body or carbon fiber car bodies are becoming
increasingly affordable. It's a reality now. I mean, look at
the Volkswagen one leader car, the or whatever they call
it now, the the Xcel XL one I think is
what they call it. All right, then number number two
on our list, the air bags that helps to have cars. Now,
Mercedes Benz is already doing it. You think that you
think that they're gonna actually see production or maybe other automakers,
(31:37):
that's a great question. I think they I think we could.
It depends on two things. It depends on how much
of a difference it makes in an accident, not in
a test, but in an accident, right, and and then
that will influence government safety standards. So you know, air
(31:59):
bad became ubiquitous. And yeah, I see this going into
Mercedes Benz for sure. For sure, I think they're definitely
gonna do it. And I think that that's going to
trickle down to other manufacturers, like you know, the high
end manufacturers like Infinity and Jaguar and you know those
(32:20):
maybe even Rolls and Bugatti and those guys. Um. You know,
one thing that we didn't mention is that, you know,
it also lifts the front end of the car up
to eight centimeters so when you're breaking really hard, Um,
you know how the tendency is for the nose to
dive down. What what this will counter counteract that in
that it lifts the front of the car back up
to where it likely well where it really should be
(32:42):
in an accident, so that it's more online with most
bumpers on the road or you know other you know,
the higher the better, I guess. So I see this
as being a safety feature that you know, Mercedes is
definitely I think going to roll this out. I just
have a good feeling about that one. You know, what
about number number three in our list, which was augmented
reality dashboards. So it's gonna happen, you think, So, yeah,
(33:02):
it's gonna happen, because that is that kind of approach
to technology is already occurring in so many other places
and with BMW already having uh, you know, a mild
version of this already out there. I see BMW having
their more advanced version on let's say, their flagship cars,
like their seven series cars and uh, and then who knows,
(33:23):
maybe it'll trickle down to their other vehicles, and then
other manufacturers again the high end ones first like Mercedes
Infinity land Rover, whoever gonna pick that up. This is
just something that I see as so um imminent that
if a car manufacturer doesn't make augmented reality dashboards and
(33:45):
for some reason these don't come into fruition from the manufacturers,
then with the emergence of flexible displays, people are going
to make their own. And I think the ground swell
support for this, and I just hope that what we
talked about before, you know, our our dream maybe of
you know, the augmented reality glasses for for private use
(34:07):
at home, not not just service technicians, but you know,
at home, and if we can download programs for let's
say that I could go out and change, you know,
the head gasket on my car and on a weekend
and it shows me step by step how to do it.
I'm gonna love that. Yeah, I would love that. I
think I think that, uh, you and I can agree
that everybody wants these, But what about what about number four?
(34:27):
What about our old buddy concept self driving cars? Absolutely,
these are these are happening. But um, as we mentioned,
you know, I I don't see any kind of you know,
major infrastructure changing. I see that, you know, like Audi's
idea where the self parking I can see that happening
in small pockets here and there, you know, some of
the some of the malls in major cities. I don't
(34:49):
think it'll be as far reaching is everywhere all the time.
But I mean, like Google's got their car that uh,
you know, drives itself without any kind of infrastructure. You
don't have to have um, metallic pucks buried in the
circus of every road on every interstate you know, of
every state. Um, I think that, you know, things like
the Google car and the auty self parking car, I
(35:11):
think those two are going to happen. Okay, I I agree,
if only because I think the benefit for autonomous vehicles
in military applications does make it inevitable. But I don't
know if it will. You know, I don't know if
we'll live in a in a world where the entirety
of I seventy five now is filled with solver no no,
(35:34):
no no, because that would be the infrastructure change that
we're talking about. If every vehicle can you know, conform
to that and the infrastructure was changed, that's like the
science fiction world, you know, the I robot world where
reports exactly where you're just your your passenger in the
vehicle and you just you just ride, You're you're along
for the ride. Really yeah, and if that happens, it's, uh,
(35:55):
it's gonna take a while. What's our go to ten
years and ten years everybody will be gonna happen, all right,
and then the last one ben vehicles that communicate with
each other and the road. So this V two V
communication or the V two I what do you think totally?
It's I think it's going to happen in some form. Yeah,
I think that the primary reason's going to happen in
(36:16):
some form is that it's a great safety idea. So this, uh,
this concept, it's sort of a it's sort of a
question of why why wouldn't you do this if it's
possible and it's already happening, already happening, and you know,
in small doses, I guess here and there, so um,
you know, just this the change would be from one
(36:38):
vehicle to the next. Now, vehicles are already communicating with infrastructure,
and they're seeing, and they're they're they're they're doing collision
avoidance system things and you know, they're they're able to
maintain lanes and all that. So it's not too much
of a leap to say that, yeah, they're gonna start communicating,
even if it's within Like let's say that all general
motors cars can communicate with other on motors cars to
(37:00):
begin with, and then suddenly, you know, Ford may say, like,
we're going to do the same thing, but you know,
it would be really cool if we could also communicate
with general motors cars that you know, just make it
even that much better, man much safer. And then so
exactly I have instead of listener, mail, I actually have
one more thing. Have you got? So here's something that
(37:25):
did not make it on our five future car technologies
that truly have a chance, And it's because it's wild speculation.
It's a little question, all right, ready, I think so okay,
three D printers and car parts. Imagine being able to
uh fabricate a part that you need now. I think
(37:46):
Jay Leno has done this. He used three D printers
to fabricate apart from metal printers, right, yeah, his steam
powered car was And um, I think that the question
here is one of you know, material science composites that
could withstand the rigors of an engine. But but what
(38:08):
do you think Do you think that there's a future
for three D printed car parts? I absolutely do, Yeah,
especially as some of these older makes and models start
to get older and older and the parts go away,
and you know they're not making you know, um, original
equipment parts anymore. You know, you have to go you
have to rely on at autumn aftermarket rather And um,
(38:28):
I think that a lot of people are going to
find that, you know, just suddenly there isn't a bumper
from my car anymore that they just I cannot find.
I can't find a used one. I can't find a
you know, one that was left on a shelf and
some dealership somewhere, right, I can't find anybody that's willing
to sell me a parts car. There are literally no
unbroken headlights for my vehicle in the world. What do
I do? So? I think that I think that in
(38:50):
a lot of cases. Um, you know, something like this
would be advantageous, you know, to be able to print
your own part. Of course, uh, time consuming, and you'd
have to know what type of metal you know to
use for each situation, because that's important in uh in
engine you know engine parts and um, you know, suspension
parts whatever. You can't use a metal that's too soft
or too hard. Um. So I think there's there's a
(39:14):
lot of angles that have to be thought of here,
but I think that it's possible. Yeah, would it be
Would it affect uh, brick and mortar auto shops, auto
parts shops the way that Amazon has affected booksellers? You know, Well,
only if the technology is affordable enough, right. Oh? Yeah,
that's that's the key, isn't Yeah, I think it is.
I think it comes down to cost, because if I
(39:36):
could afford a printer that would just print my own parts,
why would I ever have to go to you know,
a big box store in order to get you know, um,
spark plugs or whatever. I can make my own. Oh
holy smokes, that reminds me. I forgot. Does our audience
know that we have a three D printer in our office? Yeah?
We do have one? Knowing Yeah, it's it doesn't print
(39:56):
anything in metal, uses this uh bright plastic composite. But
but it makes some cool stuff. You guys. You can
also check out um Let's see stuff to blow your
minds YouTube series has a really cool piece on there
on our three D printer. Uh, technically it's part of
my department. We press my shoulders off. Here you can
(40:17):
see the actual three D printer that Ben has in
his department. I'm probably not allowed to touch probably expensive toy.
But yeah, maybe maybe we can um print some cool
stuff out with that. Maybe we can print out some
model cars, put them on the Facebook or something, some
tiny cars. They we can't print out life size, working
(40:40):
replica of a vehicle yet. Um, but we're on it.
And while you and I go to figure that out,
let's go ahead and ask our listeners what they think
about future car technologies. Do you think, uh? Do you
think that these will spell doom for the American driver
or the global driver? Man? That's dramatic. Will it just
(41:00):
be too much stuff going on? Yeah? I know what,
because what we just painted if all this stuff happens,
we just painted a world where somebody's basically along for
the ride in their car playing angry birds on their
windshield more or less. And you know when they get
in the wreck, they bump up eight centimeters in the
(41:20):
air and they wait for the robo at least. Then
they just go home and print their own parts. Then
they go home and they print out their new bumper um.
So do you guys think this is likely? Do you
think it's a good idea? You can let us know
on Facebook, and you can drop us line on Twitter.
And if you don't do either of those, but you
still want to talk to us, you can send us
an email at car stuff at Discovery dot com. For
(41:43):
more on this and thousands of other topics, this is
how stuff works dot com. Let us know what you think.
Send an email to podcast at how stuff works dot com.
CarStuff News
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Ben Bowlin
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