Hasta La Gadget!

Under federal rules, it is a norm for the authorities to check new vehicles for their safety in case of an accident. Manufacturers, too, test their vehicles for different crash scenarios to tweak their designs accordingly for maximum protection of the driver.

Until recently, crash testing techniques have been fairly simple. Dummies would be placed on the driving seat of a given vehicle which would then be crashed against different objects, through different angles. However, the Head of Bioscience Group at University of Michigan Transportation Research Insitute, Matt Reed says, “With 33,000 people in the U.S. dying last year in collisions, there’s a disconnect between crash test results and what underserved people are experiencing in accidents.” (more…)

By Ubergizmo. Related articles: Cow squashes car after jumping over three foot fence, Self-Driving Car Now Available For A Mere $10,000,

Google’s self-driving cars have been quite a sensation. These cars have completed a run of thousands of miles and the search giant hopes to make them commercially available soon. While the world eagerly waits for this to happen, a Chinese electric market BYD has already a self-driving car no the market.

BYD has released a self-driving car which costs a mere $10,365. That is incredibly cheap for a car which packs such a cutting-edge technology (assuming it works). Being called Sui Rui, this car is able to respond to a remote control. With the help of this control, you can summon the car to wherever you are. (more…)

By Ubergizmo. Related articles: Toyota Prius sans conducteur de Google, Remote control driven car from China,

While there are plenty of ways to add a remote-controlled starter to your car so you can let the engine warm up before you get in it, it’s not common to find a car that you can actually drive using the same remote. A newly released car in China is capable of being operated from outside of the car using its remote control.

The BYD Su Rui includes a palm-size remote control which lets its owner operate it from outside the vehicle. Now before you get any funny ideas about life-size R/C car races, you should know that the remote is limited to a distance of about 33 feet, and the car won’t go over 1.24MPH. The remote also doesn’t have analog controls or a remote camera – just a D-Pad. Have you ever tried playing a racing game with a D-Pad?

Presumably, this capability is designed to allow its owner to park the car in tight parking spaces and garages from outside of the car. It’s not a bad idea for those circumstances, I suppose, but I think I’d rather have some sort of parking assist feature for those times, like Ford’s automated parallel parking feature. They also say you can use the feature to bring the car to you when the weather is bad – though the distance limit might present some problems with that.

Given its speed and distance limitations, I wonder how quickly a hacker will get their hands on one of these and mod it so there’s no speed limiter, and they can operate it from a greater distance. That’s certainly the first thing I’d try and do if I had one.

Prices for the BYD Su Rui range from 65,900 to 99,000 Yuan (~$10228 to $15579 USD). Not too bad as car prices go – especially ones with a remote control.

[via Car News China via Gadget Review]

Fisker has had more than its fair share of teething troubles with the Karma, but it has to be given credit for going out of its way to listen to early adopters. The hybrid car builder has confirmed to Autoblog that a question and answer session making the rounds is the official result of town hall discussions that have both acknowledged problems and promised fixes where they’re possible. The answers we’ve been given are a mix of sober realities and practical remedies. Drivers hoping for outright hardware upgrades to improve performance with existing Karmas will have to keep wishing; thankfully, a host of firmware fixes are on the way to improve at least the sedan’s Command Center system and mirrors. PR lead Roger Ormisher even hints that there could be an in-person council that would tackle concerns more directly than the remote pep talks. We’re mostly hoping for the day when Fisker stamps out the bugs and doesn’t need the Q&A to put Karma owners’ minds at ease.

Filed under: Transportation

Fisker confirms Q&A outlining Karma woes and fixes, may establish council to talk issues in person originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 24 Aug 2012 06:29:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Drones seem to be everywhere these days, but in most cases they can get expensive and most remote spy planes are used overseas. Aerospace engineer algorhythmic decided to see what sort of vehicle he could cobble together on a limited budget.

The Xaver Mk.2., his remote-controlled, roving surveillance vehicle, doesn’t look very imposing, but its compact frame is packing a night vision camera and a Raspberry Pi. The drone was hacked together from bits and pieces, including a PlayStation 3 Eye camera as well as a Wi-Fi module. An Arduino controller directs a motor that allows the camera to move. It’s been configured to stream video from the camera via the Internet, and the whole rig is operated remotely by a PS3 controller.

Algorhythmic promises to create a series of videos on how to construct it and how he will tailor his prototype on his website.

[via Ubergizmo]