BythepowerofPlank
101924
1586
32
Oct 20, 2023 5:50 AM
BythepowerofPlank
101924
1586
32
knifiespoonie
Talk about creating solutions for problems that don't exist
Shoutrr
nice, you need twice the power and add a very cool uncertainty about how well it works to do the same job
TohmaytohTohmahtoh
What could possible go wrong! (Everything. Every. Damn. Thing.)
Nikolai5
The blight of shareholders. Companies have to come up with stupid new shit all the time to show shareholders that they're making efforts to grow. It's why so many companies come out with the most daft shit that nobody wants and then disappears into the ether after a few years.
LeCoq1963
Just because you can do a thing, doesn't mean you should do a thing.
StontiumJaguar
So why would I buy something that will costs the same if not more than a base model car when I already have to have a car to take me to the same place the trailer is going? Shouldn’t I just save money by buying a vehicle large enough to take me and the trailer there.
LeCoq1963
I predict that his will be used by wealthy a-holes to send the "tug" on ahead to secure prime parking/camping spots.
SergeantMajorSpoiler
A textbook example of "just because you can, doesn't mean you should."
kabummBaron
#1 OK I googled it and it seems to be actually a thing. But why? Seriously what's the point of having that? It makes no sense to me
supermario182
I could see it being a self driving thing in the future, but but a wifi thing lol
LunaticLemming
Wouldn't a van just be easier at this point
Turboslacker
spattr
It should be called The Big Tow
Drix1942
And then add a chain for safety, like with the airpods and their added strap.
TeeweeAndSmashboy
I’m pretty sure Toyota factories have already designed robots that tow palettes of materials, or parts, etc., sans driver.
ThePunishersVengefulBrother
I've been to the Volvo truck plants. They have robots driving around giant engines and transmissions. It's super-cool.
WorthwhileCanadianInitiative
From the mad scientists who replaced buttons and knobs on dashboards and replaced them with crappy touch-screens....
JohnThatcher
Touchscreens are more profitable for the manufacturer to charge you to replace when they break.
IOftenDeleteCommentsCauseISuckAtTyping
I'll play devil's advocate. A large number of now popular inventions probably sounded this boneheaded before they were realized. Including the car that runs on thousands of mini controlled explosions.
Colopty
Because adding like 50 more points of failure to something simple is a brilliant idea.
Kingloki6
You’ll find this in the Rules of Aquisition, specifically in the Book of Late Stage Capitalism.
ztygs
If you're the one being paid for repairs when that shit breaks, it's an excellent idea.
pleaseconsiderthatImightbejoking
hahaha repairs. Buy a new one
AdrianDunne
This is something I saw that they had planned to implement with truck convoys. Was that Toyota too? If it actually worked you could have one driver take charge while the others rest, which would allow for quicker deliveries. I'm not holding out hope of seeing anything like it any time soon.
pleaseconsiderthatImightbejoking
It really it true. With sufficient development any attempt to improve transportation will become trains.
Guluuba
A driver at the head of a long chain of heavy loads? might have a hard time on the highway, why not put it on rails and call it a train?
AdrianDunne
And rest times aren't so big an issue on trains when the thing can be manned entirely by people doing regular hours along the route and swapping. But I think the idea was trucks could hitch onto the convoy and leave as their routes required it and save the drivers from having to stop when the tacho demanded it.
pleaseconsiderthatImightbejoking
Just use intermodal containers.
AdrianDunne
Never heard them called that before. I dun lurned a wurd.
BlastyMcBlastblast
DrSharkbite
PoopSammich
Helluva day, isn't it?
Stuey1221
Probably the most terrifying thing about that movie
4Astaroth
The funniest part of the movie.
rcantProblemCreator
"Most terrifying part" That movie was pure hilarity.
8Cor1
What movie?
dingybasement350
The Godfather.
retrogood
Total Recall
funkystay
The opposite of "I completely forgot".
16bitStarbuck
Ah yes, You Partially Remebered! Good flick.
HappyBanjoGuy
Taxi Driver
unpunnyfuns
The way he whistled the Norwegian national anthem.
SillySnowFox
What's wrong with Robert Picaro?
smothatehdecay
His D fell off
meatshake001
Possibly the greatest thing. It's how Verhoeven let us know not to take the movie too seriously. If we're in a world that has a Johnny Cab up front rather than space for additional passengers it is a silly future.
Stuey1221
I don’t think anyone took it seriously from the start. Still one of my all time favourites
gnomedeplume
more terrifying than the effects of someone trying to breathe in martian atmosphere?
Stuey1221
Or pull a golf ball through his nose
16bitStarbuck
That is the worst. The eyeball popping out thing was just damn funny how silly it looked.
qtRaven
Lost wifi signal. Now there's a terrible accident.
IAmTheFarmer
As someone who hauls trailers 85% of my very long work week - why are we messing with something that already works really well?!? And is incredibly easy! This is just so, so dangerous.
CaptainBlacklung
Well first off, you're using logic and reason, and that's not what we're basing shit on anymore apparently. Second, now instead of selling them a tow hitch, you can sell them a $10K towing device that also, needs it's own maintenance, it's own tires, etc etc.
Anjhandra
I could see the use of such a vehicle within a fenced area where someone need to arrange a lot of trailers and want to walk around with a phone to do it. But I have a hard time seeing this being legal on the roads in many countries due to safety reasons. I also see no sane person that would add a extra vehicle where a lost connection mean you turn and it doesnt.
fredhoffman1968
what happens when spectrum goes down ..or att ..isnt a toe hitch cheaper ..lol..wtf no thanks you
CaptainBlacklung
Is a tow hitch cheaper? Sure. But cheaper is not what execs are shooting for. They want more money.
Apeofdeath
RedTailedHawk
HeadJamistan
inconsistantsource
the better half for sure
jherazob
Man, i want this one with the audio
SlotCarsarejustsmallteslas
Surely the main problem with this is needing another engine/drivetrain?
mijitdragun
When are we going to get something practical like the wireless showerhead
memesis
A wireless showerhead is the least smart idea I ever heard. What if someone steals it, leaves it running all the time, and runs up my water bill?
WoopDeFrickenDoo
and adding insult to injury, then they could call you to ask if your showerhead is running
ThomasThundersword
hell i could see a use case for a self-hitching trailer/car. get within like 5ft then hit a button and it does the work. then you just lock the hitch and go.
SpringPurse
A local cheese seller here has a motor on their market trailer to help park it, and I think that kind of idea is better than a separate thing for it since you can still attach it to a car that can tow it
NotACanadian
Like the docking rings in modern spacecraft.
MapleSyrupMafia
I was not aware of spacecrafts participating in this sexual activity.
NotACanadian
It gets better. They used to have male and female parts. But during the Apollo-Soyuz mission, neither the Americans nor the Soviets wanted their spacecraft to be the passive female receiver. So an androgynous docking ring was invented.
Einstein9073
I bet this newbee doesn't even have the wireless garden hose from home depot
[deleted]
[deleted]
Einstein9073
the tesla powerwall offers wireless power up to 100' away
RatsLiveOnNoEvilStar
I'm all for technological improvement, but how is this any better than a physical connection to the car. Lets say you have some small car that can't tow the trailer you want to tow, how is this thing going to have enough torque to do it for any length of time?
RailRabbit
My guess, that's the whole reason its wireless. It can accelerate slower and leave room to brake safely. I doubt it will be able to pull anything like a 30' camper, but even the ability to pull an ultralight camper or a utility trailer with a small 2-door car would be pretty handy. For instance, I would love to trade my Trailblazer for something with better milage, but I live in my camper for work and it's one of the smallest vehicles that I can safely tow with.
RatsLiveOnNoEvilStar
I watched a video about this, it has nothing to do with towing a trailer. This image is very misleading. The first car was "towing" a second car. Basically the second car was automatically following the first one.
RailRabbit
I checked out the video and it looks like they were just prototyping the tech to see if it was functional? I'm guessing it's just a first step in a long development process, because otherwise it looks completely useless as-is.
RatsLiveOnNoEvilStar
Oh yeah the idea of wireless towing isn’t very useful, or at least very niche. But the concepts and ideas that can grow from this dalliance could be interesting.
Escapist83
With the towing power of a segway?
68people
Think the size of an engine block with wheels, as that's where the power is.
shakefu
The stopping power of one of those little toy popcorn vacuums for toddlers…
j4gr
I mean, my trailer does most of the braking…but yeah this is still a dumb idea solving a problem that no one has.
shakefu
I mean 95% of the trailers I use have no brakes at all… if we’re bringing single anecdotes into this like it matters. 🙄
DorkJedi
not for the road, but imagine one that grabs the hitch and places the trailer right where you want it no matter how tight the fit.
JoshuaHarazin
They already have those. Trailer dollys.
DorkJedi
powered and automated?
JoshuaHarazin
Powered yes, automated I'm not sure. Automating would be difficult I imagine due to lack of sensors/visibility on the other end of the trailer.
stronomer
That would be the only safe speed and option!
marsgoose
Most of the world has towing speed limited around 80km/h due to undersized car + unstable trailer layout they chose so this might be fine.
marsgoose
A horse drawn chariot can probably do 80km/h if you feed them enough speed in their oats.
DarkBusterBaron
It's possible for enough towing power the bigger problem is the stopping power.
DizzleSenpai
It's like a tugboat
DarkRedCape
Electric motors are very powerful these days, brushless technology has really transformed them in terms on torque and reliability. Power isn’t the issue, it’s the energy source. It would have to have the same battery, or at least the same capacity as the car so the travel distance is the same, and that isn’t going to happen because it would be very cost ineffective, and the hitch would be massive. Even wireless charging wouldn’t work because the travel distance would be massively decreased.
stingingnettlegurlL7
Diesel trucks have been using electric for years now.
SomeDetroitGuy
Go back and reread the first word of what you just typed.
SunBrolem
Oh! We could run a wire to it! And to ensure the wire doesn't get damaged, we could put it long a rigid metal bar that hooks at either end to the respective vehicles!
PineappleLoopsBroether
By the time this could happen the power source could be solar. Promblem slolved.
DocBenny
a solar panel big enough to directly power a motor strong enough to pull that kind of load would be fucking massive. you'd probably have better luck with a sail
PineappleLoopsBroether
Did you not infer from my purposely terrible spelling at the end, that I am making a funny?
DocBenny
apologies i am in the hospital on pain killers, i read it as perfectly normal words
cdlong
I did not. One extra letter is not on par with "I can haz cheezburger"
giordanom
Nothing I see says it would be electric! It could be like a two stroke with a forklift weight on the wheels, motoring along.
DarkRedCape
My comment was related to the Segway comment. Which are electric.
Isthe4thtimethecharm
The biggest issue is the thing towing it would have to be close to the weight of what it was towing to be able to stop it. This is usually why you need a bigger truck to tow bigger loads. My half ton would move a big load down the road. But have a lot more trouble stopping it than a one ton.
abion47
I could see that being at least partially mitigated by a brushless motor not just braking but actually switching into reverse to actively slow down a load. Granted, it would have limited effectiveness and run into its own set of problems like increased dependency in wheel traction and increased energy drain, but it's not a totally insurmountable obstacle.
Isthe4thtimethecharm
I mean, a 2000 lbs force still has trouble stopping a 20,000 lbs trailer no matter how it stops.
abion47
Sure, but the point is that a force trying to move it in the opposite direction will be more effective than a force simply trying to get it to stop. To throw out random numbers, you might need a 1 ton truck to effectively stop a 1 ton trailer, for instance, but you might only need a 2/3 ton truck if it can throw it in reverse to brake even faster without obliterating the transmission.
cdlong
No is doesn't. A semi tractor (the truck part) weighs around 20k lbs, leaving 60k lbs for trailer and cargo. Trailers have brakes too.
Isthe4thtimethecharm
The big problem isn't the trailer having brakes it is when you try to stop all your weight shifts forward. The trailers weight will remove pressure off of the front tires. Cause less traction limiting breaking power. You could give a one tom pickup the same horsepower and torque as a semi but could never haul the same load safely.
cdlong
True (the one ton part) but weight on the tow vehicle axles isn't the issue with it. A gooseneck trailer doesn't unload the front axle. If it did, it would be a problem for semis as well. No matter how you try to justify it, a semi trailer is 3x the weight of the tractor, it would have the same problem if that wasn't considered in the design. The same applies here. An internet sketch is not a buildable design plan, the weight of the tow vehicle isn't an issue.
TheOneTrueZippy8
hybridgorilla3131
they can charge a monthly fee for it
Conz
Electric cars have a hard time towing for some reason.
thetinymonarch
Any car could be used to tow. Imagine you need to rent a trailer, you wouldn't need to get a car that can tow. Just use your normal car.
chunkstyle
If only they made rental trailers that could somehow be driven themselves. We could give them funny names like pickup, van, truck, box truck... could you imagine?
thetinymonarch
Did you not read my comment? This is a alternative to renting a van, you just rent the vehicle because maybe you have a disability, or your in a country that counts vans as a different car class. It's a neat idea. Just because we already have a solution does not mean it's the best. We had a way to make toast before toasters but toasters made it a lot more convenient. If I can just drive to the trailer rental. Put a little thing in my car and I have a trailer following me
LiterallyAWizard
jekath
spattr
George Bernard Shaw is wondering why when RFK always credited Shaw with this quote in his speeches, it's now credited to Kennedy.
KeezieWeezie
And Shaw wrote satan as saying that so I’m not sure why we’re so stoked on that quote
nemesisx00
Capitalism
Syko73
Money of course
raindirve
One of the most anticipated military inventions in the recent future is the Loyal Wingman, a unmanned military aircraft that follows a manned aircraft semiautonomously. It can be anything from a dumb drone that carries more weapons for the pilot, to an autonomous system directed to engage a specified target. Of course, the keen-eyed might notice that military equipment by definition already carries an inherent risk. And the sky is fairly empty, while the road is not. Toyota might not be aware.
HenryLongfellowIII
You might be onto something there. Maybe the real market Toyota is anticipating *is* military. Their export Hilux are popular with some folks, and they already make the BXD20 for domestic military use:
wadatahmydamie
Domestic now, but terrorist in a poor country later
gnomedeplume
tech bros gonna tech bro
DUser01
65454685132465846865163
because whatever happens, it'll be really funny
MagiicHat
federal law has set a max vehicle length and max vehicle weight, therefore 1 human driver (the expensive part of the vehicle) can only deliver XX tons of product. If you can have a robot follow the human intelligence, now you are doubling the number of tons delivered per driver-hour.
TheOneTrueZippy8
Oh, I certainly hope they can do better than merely human intelligence.
MagiicHat
Not relevant. Gov/Unions/Karens aren't going to allow 100ton vehicles to be driverless.
TheMightyMollusk
They were so preoccupied with whether or not they could, they didn't think about whether or not they should.
JustJoe2047
SoraHjort
And it's not even gonna be able to do it that well if it tries to go up or down a hill. Cause either it'll find a slope it can't go up that you're able to go up easily. Or it'll be unable to stop itself from going down hill because of the weight of the trailer.
thehatter10x6
Towing and hitches destroy cars. They're very difficult on transmissions and add a lot of extra workload for tires, brakes, and other wear and tear especially if the vehicle is not equipped with a tow package. It'll make the vehicle last longer if it ever worked
chunkstyle
So what you're saying is, towing wrong is very hard on vehicles. Like, vehicles without tow packages. Vehicles that shouldn't be towing. Non-towing vehicles. Kuzco's vehicles.
BreakablePotato
By replacing towing equipment on the vehicle with a small vehicle with a towing package. Back to square one, except an additional engine, tech, and complexity.
fuckthisusernamebullshit
Maybe if you dont know how to tow and are using an incorrect vehicle. All the problems you listed will still exist for the drone, except now you have two engines, two sets of tyres, unnecessary tech and complexity.
SirButcher
And a ridiculous amount of chance for failure. I wouldn't trust WiFi for ANYTHING critical. It is not a trustworthy protocol.
HelloThere1812
WiFi fails several times a day, every day.
pinephoenix
Many steering columns nowadays are wireless, too. No direct connection to the wheels. It works whether or not we like it or not.
fuckthisusernamebullshit
On certain Infiniti models that all have a back up mechanical system for when it fails. It's more failure points and more cost for zero advantage
SirButcher
Do you have any more info about this? Because as far as I know (at least in the EU) the steering wheel MUST be physically linked to the tie rod. I can't imagine any sane country would allow anything like this.
potshot
A drone is more replaceable and can be better designed to withstand the wear & tear. Getting it to work correctly seems like far too big a task for current tech, but in theory there are clear benefits to it.
fuckthisusernamebullshit
1: we don't need more replaceable tech waste. 2: why not apply that engineering to the vehicle and make the one unit better instead of 2 crappier units. What are the clear benefits? Because so far it seems like unnecessary cost, additional emissions, additional maintenance, insurance, risk and probably licencing too. It's a bad move all round when you can just have a tow hitch installed for a couple hundred bucks
potshot
1: I agree, but the way Toyota is actually developing this tech is to tow other cars. A towing unit is conceptual, and could be rentable for example, when you're renting the trailer. 2: Like I said, they are developing it car-first, with towing units being a conceptual potential design.
DocBenny
now give that drone a power supply beefy enough for it to match the range and power of a car, without making said drone the size of a car.
potshot
It only has to be the size of the car's motor + power supply, though, doesn't it? I think people are jumping to conclusions based on a completely early-stage R&D project.
chunkstyle
In what way would the towing drone be better than the towing vehicle? Any developments in towing tech for the drone could just be implemented in the vehicle without the extra danger of failing wifi connections.
potshot
And it is, Toyota is developing this car-first, with towing units being a potential concept. But the separation of the towed vehicle means the first driver can drive normally, since the dynamics of the vehicle don't change. Adaptive control in two different points is more robust, and adaptive distance enhances safety. Collisions to the towed vehicle don't endanger the towing vehicle. It's conceptual, but development is complimentary to other safety features so it's not "wasted" R&D.