Automotive

EOscc2 electric car can drive sideways and make itself shorter

EOscc2 electric car can drive sideways and make itself shorter
The EO smart connecting car 2, or EOscc2
The EO smart connecting car 2, or EOscc2
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Created by a team from the German Research Center for Artificial Intelligence, the EOscc2 was designed to be "an ultra-flexible micro-car for mega-cities"
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Created by a team from the German Research Center for Artificial Intelligence, the EOscc2 was designed to be "an ultra-flexible micro-car for mega-cities"
The EO smart connecting car 2, or EOscc2
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The EO smart connecting car 2, or EOscc2
The EOscc2's wheels can turn completely sideways
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The EOscc2's wheels can turn completely sideways
The EOscc2 has butterfly doors
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The EOscc2 has butterfly doors
The EOscc2 design team, with their creation
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The EOscc2 design team, with their creation
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Nissan's Pivo 2 and NASA's Modular Robotic Vehicle are both rather special prototype vehicles, in that they can rotate all four of their wheels 90 degrees in order to drive sideways – a feature that would definitely make parallel parking easier. Now they've got some company, in the form of the electric EO smart connecting car 2, or EOscc2.

Created by a team from the German Research Center for Artificial Intelligence, the EOscc2 was designed to be "an ultra-flexible micro-car for mega-cities." It's powered by a 54-volt lithium-iron phosphate battery pack, which drives four 4-kW wheelhub motors.

The car is also equipped with stereoscopic front and rear cameras, potentiometer sensors, a LiDAR system, and six 3D time-of-flight cameras. Tied into the onboard computer, this suite of sensors allows for autonomous parking and other driver-assistance functions.

It is hoped that once developed further, the technology will also allow the automobile to drive itself with complete autonomy, and to link up with other EOscc2's to form connected train-like "platoons" for longer road trips. Sharing each others' battery power and experiencing less wind resistance, the cars in these platoons would use less power than if they were each making the trip individually.

The EOscc2's wheels can turn completely sideways
The EOscc2's wheels can turn completely sideways

And yes, the EOscc2's wheels can turn completely sideways. This means that it can pull straight in and out of tight parking spots, made even easier by the fact that its cabin can sort of "hunch up" while doing so, making the whole vehicle one meter (3.3 ft) shorter – not unlike the experimental Armadillo-T car. It can also turn on the spot, and drive diagonally.

Should the car not be big enough or have enough range for some applications, it also has a docking interface that allows not only for the platooning and battery-charging, but that additionally lets it receive extension modules such as range extenders, passenger modules, or cargo modules. Rinspeed's Dock+Go concept works along the same lines.

There's no word on whether or not we'll ever see a commercially-available version of the EOscc2. In the meantime, you can see it in action on YouTube.

Source: German Research Center for Artificial Intelligence via Mashable

View gallery - 5 images
6 comments
6 comments
Tom Lee Mullins
I think that is cool yet a little dorky on the design side.
Tom Lee Mullins
I think that is really cool. It would be nice to park sideways.
Noel K Frothingham
Perhaps that's why it is a 'concept' car?
mgb
Isn't this a variant of the hiriko car originally developed by MIT? I think the hiriko looks better and a bit more aerodynamic than this here boxy thing, but I like what it does, still.
Len Simpson
complexity invites disaster
Germano Pecoraro Designer
What does it prove this project? It is not enough to realize a box on the stilts