Video The Chevy Segway Keeps On Rolling (Video) 210
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Back in 2009 G.M. and Segway talked about the P.U.M.A., or Personal Urban Mobility and Accessibility vehicle. Now it's the EN-V, which stands for Electric Network Vehicle. G.M. (along with partner Shanghai Automotive Industry Corporation) debuted the thing in Shanghai in 2010, then displayed it at the Las Vegas Consumer Electronics Show in 2011, and now they're showing it off at auto shows, no doubt hoping to get a lot of buzz going for this two-wheeled wonder, which is supposed to be so loaded with navigation and collision avoidance electronics that you can sleep in it on your way to work. (Please wake us up when we get there, okay?)
Wow (Score:5, Insightful)
Could we maybe get a little less talking by the broadcaster and a little more of a look at the damn thing
Solved problem. (Score:5, Insightful)
The problem of getting a large number of people around in an urban setting was solved more than a hundred years ago.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bicycle [wikipedia.org]
No reliance on fossil fuels. No recharge time. Takes very little parking space. Extremely maneuverable. Easily moved when broken. Cheap. Easy to repair.
It does have one fatal flaw - low profit margins.
to hell with that little thing (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:The Government gave us a blank check (Score:5, Insightful)
Though their Volt car seems like a decent idea; not sure why it isn't selling better?
Because they start at like $40 grand and a Prius is $23k. That's a LOT of gas - even the guy at work who has already has solar cells and was going to charge it for "free" couldn't justify the price given the current price of gas.
(We live in PA, so currently he is allowed to spin his electric meter backwards with the solar cells - that is why "free" is in quotes... it would actually cost him the going rate of electricity.)
Re:The Government gave us a blank check (Score:5, Insightful)
So now we can spend money on stupid stuff (like segway clones) that were already proven failures by other companies (Segway).
Segway was a failure because it's too goddamned expensive. Six grand? I only spent ten on my car. When the patents run out and they're a hundred bucks each, everybody will have one.
The volt isn't selling better for the same reason. A teeny little car that costs more than my full sized sedan did new, has limited range, etc? No thanks. When an electric car costs no more than a gasoline car, they too will sell well.
The 1% do not understand the 99%. Most of us don't have much money we can afford to waste on expensive toys like segways and electric cars, and those who can buy any damned thing they please can't get their heads around that.
Re:NYC Auto show (Score:4, Insightful)
Really? You think the booth babe wanted to be hit on? Oh, man - who's the socially inept one?
fair-weather friend? (Score:4, Insightful)
At the very end of the video she points out that this model (2nd gen) has no windshield wipers, headlamps, or climate control. But they are looking to add that stuff for the 3rd gen model so it will be "all weather". It seems to me that by the time they add all the crap to it that a normal car has, it won't be any cheaper than buying a SMART car. Sure you can spin it around and park it more easily, but with the range and speed tradeoffs it hardly seems like a good business model.
Re:The Government gave us a blank check (Score:3, Insightful)
The other problem is that the two parallel wheels thing is just pointless. There are electric scooters [nycewheels.com] that do the same thing as a Segway but are way cheaper because they put the wheels one in front of the other.