#The Autopian

[automotiveamerican]

A Trained Designer Imagines What American Motors Corporation Would Have Been Like If It Had Survived - Jason  Torchinsky @TheAutopian

In the universe we currently inhabit — the one in which Facebook is re-launching Second Life under a dumb name, Russia invaded Ukraine just to be dicks, and Taco Bell is bringing back the Mexican Pizza — AMC, the American Motors Corporation, is long gone, and we can trace its death all the way back to 1987. That’s when Chrysler bought out Renault’s 46.1% share of the smallest American automaker…

[biglisbonnews]

Watch Beau And Me Drive The Last Stickshift Gasoline Lotus: The Incredible 2024 Lotus Emira Autopian co-founder Beau Boeckmann is a sports car connoisseur, so running Porsche, Aston Martin, Ford, Lotus, Polestar, and many other dealerships is, naturally, a dream for him. And few moments in the dealership world are as exciting as when an all-new, driver-focused “product” rolls in from the factory. I know this because Beau’s excitement about […] The post Watch Beau And Me Drive The Last Stickshift Gasoline Lotus: The Incredible 2024 Lotus Emira appeared first on The Autopian. https://www.theautopian.com/watch-beau-and-me-drive-the-last-stickshift-gasoline-lotus-the-incredible-2024-lotus-emira/

[turbinepaints]

Turbine Divinity, “Armeline’s Celica”, 2022

[brightlotusmoon]

Tesla's Cybertruck has a serious problem that only a complete redesign

https://www.fastcompany.com/90945689/teslas-cybertruck-has-a-serious-problem-that-only-a-complete-redesign-can-fix

It’s official. The Cybertrucks coming out of Tesla’s Texas factory are bad. Bad, bad, bad with a capital Musk, as shown by the judgment of the X-kingpin himself. After taking a production candidate of this polygonal horror for a spin, Musk wrote an internal email to Tesla employees, revealing his concerns in categorical terms: “Due to the nature of Cybertruck, which is made of bright metal with mostly straight edges, any dimensional variation shows up like a sore thumb.” However, the real problem here is that these aesthetic troubles are rooted deep in the very nature of its design, which may make them extremely hard—if not impossible—to fix unless there is a complete redesign, as we foretold back in January.

Musk’s observation refers to the problems in the body of the Cybertruck, which include misaligned doors and uneven surfaces that make the car look wobbly, weird, and very unlike the clean angled renders Tesla has presented over the years. It’s a mess that underscores the inherent challenges of the Cybertruck’s unique design. As Adrian Clarke—a professional car designer who now writes design critiques for the automobile publication The Autopian—told me back then: “The Cybertruck is a low polygon joke that only exists in the fever dreams of Tesla fans that stands high on the smell of Elon Musk’s flatulences.”

The problem, according to Musk, is the bright metal construction and predominantly straight edges mean that even minor inconsistencies become glaringly obvious. To avoid this, he commanded unparalleled precision in the manufacturing process, stating in his email that “all parts for this vehicle, whether internal or from suppliers, need to be designed and built to sub 10 micron accuracy. That means all part dimensions need to be to the third decimal place in millimeters and tolerances need [to] be specified in single digit microns.” Drawing a comparison to everyday products known for their precision, Musk added, “If LEGO and soda cans, which are very low cost, can do this, so can we.”

Professor X believes that Tesla can attain such precision, but Clarke questioned the demand in an email he sent me today."

[insect-whorefare]

holy shit

[ralfmaximus]

The Cybertruck accelerator pedal is glued on, and when the glue doesn't cure properly the cover slides off, jamming the throttle wide open. They're fixing it with a rivet.

[kenyatta]

My conclusion is that this video represents a way of thinking that has doomed Tesla’s entire automated driving program, and, I think, needlessly, because so much of the underlying technology is actually genuinely impressive, and has massive potential to do good. You can think of it like this. Once Tesla decided to develop Autopilot and FSD, it had two paths they could choose to go down: one path would be to use the technology as something that works as a backup to the human driver, a pair of AI hands hovering over the drivers, invisibly, ready to leap into action when it becomes clear that the driver has done something that could cause harm. In this approach, Autopilot would have become a safety feature, pretty much exclusively. There would never be an expectation that a driver is not paying attention and, you know, driving, but if fatigue or poor conditions or distractions or having to pee or whatever caused the driver to make a poor decision, Autopilot would be there, always ready and alert, to take over and help correct potentially fatal mistakes.

Tesla's Faked 2016 Autopilot Video Was The Start Of Where Things Went Wrong - The Autopian

[things-about-cars-in-posts]

hi hi i love your blog and i have recently gotten into cars and i really wanna know ALL cars lol, but uh i don't know where to start? can you lend a lil guy a lil hand please? thank you!

Well, knowing ALL cars, as I touched on and shown again and again and again, is a sisyphean task, but I understand that's hyperbole. As far as knowing cars goes, if you really are curious it will just come naturally: the cool thing about cars is they are all around you! So if your experience is anything like mine, you'll just look around until you notice a car you don't know at all, find out what it is (depending on your attitude by sheepishly taking a picture to come ask me to ID it or by shamelessly sprinting towards it to poke around a random car with suspicious enthusiasm) and perhaps look it up then to know just what you're dealing with. At some point, you will know enough to be able to make guesses about the era and sometimes even the brand of what you don't know, making it easier to find them out, and your knowledge will make the newfound piece slot in a more complete puzzle (by knowing some context around the new car).

That and, of course, you'll find sources of information about cars and engage with them because they talk about things that interest and captivate you! I've personally learned a lot from magazines, which have kept me up to speed on new cars as they were coming out -the images of the Juke-R in this post come from the Top Gear Magazine article I learned of it from!- and shows like Top Gear Show (or just Top Gear for friends), which showed me everything from classics like the Hilux to (then) new cars like the Audi RS6 and everything in between like the Caterham Seven -all cars in my wishlist thanks to them!- but now that times are a-changin' a lot of young folks like you are going to get this information from The Internets, whether through online publications like The Autopian (site friend of the blog Jason Torchinsky left other cool site Jalopnik to co-found) or Speedhunters (home of car reportages of indescribable breadth, depth and beauty), or YouTube channels like Doug DeMuro (car reviewer who, despite always being accessible, goes over every last little quirk - if its glovebox handle is in any way unusual you WILL know) or Regular Car Reviews (equally interesting channel much more focused on cars' place and impact in culture and... shall we say peculiar humor) and to a much lesser extent lone madmen posting random stuff on social media, like,,,, uh,,,, wait, lone madmen posting random stuff on social media, I'm sure I knew one such person..... oh right!, Drew Wilson (who posts a worrying amount and variety of incredible used cars for sale on No One Is Calling It X).

But none of those would I call the best way to learn about a car: that'll go to seeing it in person at an event! Of course, you'll be limited by the car selection, which depends on the event's size and location, but any car show, even the ones low on actually interesting cars, is guaranteed to have a bunch of people very enthusiastic about theirs who would LOVE to talk your ear off about it and even show you around!

Pop quiz: what's this one? Hint: not my car!

So I highly encourage you to look for car shows near you and head wherever they may be with a camera and an open mind! Of course, what large events will be near you will depend on where you are, but US-wise, apparently Cars and Coffes are pretty ubiquitous, and if you're lucky enough to be near the right places I cannot begin to recommend Radwood enough. Of course, there are also cool exhibits like friend of the blog Lane Motor Museum, so be on the lookout for those! (if any European wants a list of cool car places or events just submit a post asking!)

Links in blue are posts of mine explaining the words in question - if you liked this post, you might like those!

[turnstileskyline]

bands need to do this shit again im so fucking serious imagine crashing the one direction car

[chromeography]

Jason Torchinksy pays tribute to GMC’s funky serif days.

[petrany]

Nem semmi.

[foreverlogical]

The US has achieved US energy independence for the first time in 40 years while Europe and China compete for global energy resources.

[the-city-in-mind]

The Autopian had car designer Adrian Clarke rethink what a modern EV cab-over pickup truck would look like. It’s lower down, with excellent visibility, a usable truck bed with fold-down sides and clever storage. Closer to a Japanese kei truck or, in fact, the 1960s Ford Econoline.

Cities need compact vehicles for transporting things - for deliveries, tradespeople, municipal services and the like. Things that are easy to park and don’t take up 2.5 spaces.

Chicagoans have seen Amazon’s new electric delivery trucks, built by Rivian, roll out over the past year, that embrace a cab-over style design, making them a little safer than those old Grumman vans, while also providing more standing headroom for driver comfort.

MKBHD had a look at them:

[toyota-supra]

Join The Autopian discord. Fantastic car blog ran by ex Jalopnik writers, very inclusive community 😊

hmm... well I talk very rarely in the discords I'm in but I might, thanks!

(also in relation to cars, I am at least in the Time Extend discord, which is a racing video game podcast community, and yeah it's very comfortable and inclusive there but I mostly read up messages there once a week and say something once a month. but I do like it!)

[sciencefiction-and-comics]

Wow, this only just happened??