U.S. Designers Look To The Future

Press, Volume C, Issue 29505, 5 May 1961, Page 11

U.S. Designers Look To The Future

revolutionary deltashaped vehicle which runs on two wheels is known as the Gyron. and made its public debut at the 1961 international motor show in New York. The car has been designed by stylists of the Ford Motor Company, who believe that its unusual shape, coupled with its two-wheel concept, might lend itself in the future to the use of a gyroscope for stabilisation. Big Changes The company's director for styling (Mr G. W. Walker) says that although tremendous changes and improvements in car styling and design have taken place, one aspect which has been largely unchanged is the basically rectangular shape with a wheel at each comer. Although the car is not operable in its present form. Ford stylists have been assured that a gyroscope no larger than two feet in diameter would be sufficient to stabilise the vehicle on its two wheels set in tandem. Two small outrigger wheels towards the rear and on each side of the car are retractable. They can be lowered automatically to balance the vehicle when the gyroscope is inactive or until it has gained enough momentum to provide stability. Tbe sadists believe the pesence of a gyroscope would enable the car to be banked into turns. The two-wheels-in-tandem concept could tend to equalise suspension forces, offer a lower co-efficient of drag and reduce underbody interference.

Potentially high aerodyna--1 mic efficiency is suggested in the Gyron exterior, which offers an extremely low silhouette centring around a plastic canopy covering the passenger compartment. The shape and silhouette also suggest the possible use of new power sources, such as fuel cells. The car accommodates two people in contoured seats, which support not only the head and back but the upper part of the legs as well. A projectile - shaped console separates the seats and houses controls for the canopy. air conditioning, the gyroscope and adjustable foot bars that extend at right angles from the console. Steering Dial Elimination of the steering wheel is made possible through the use of a steering dial with separate rings for automatic speed and steering control This dial combined with individual accelerator and brake pads on each foot bar. permits steering from either seat. The growing influence of “machines that think like humans” is apparent in the console in the ten-button j panel that supposedly would control a built-in computer. 1 Such a system, Ford stylists ’ speculate, might enable a 1 motorist of file future to • “programme” a journey on ’ a non-stop expressway. The motorist, they say, might be able to press one i

• button to indicate the disi tance between any two I i points, another to indicate starting time, a third to indi-i i cate speed, and a fourth toj estimate his time of arrival.! Both time and speed would be shown in the Gyron on a! viewing screen in the front of! the passenger compartment. I The greater portion of thei screen would serve as aj “snooperscope” which, thanks ’ to infra-red rays, might pic-1 ture clearly the road condi-j tions ahead, either at night? or during the day, and! regardless of fog or other j inclement weather. Communication between I individuals inside the Gyron! and others outside the carl might be effected by means i of a cordless telephone with! a numbered push-button dial’ set into the earpiece, and a mouthpiece at the other end. The instrument is mounted on a vertical panel at the rear of the console. Problems “We don’t presume to offer solutions to all of the problems that would have to be solved before a car of this kind could be built in any appreciable numbers.” Mr Walker says. “It's present cost alone makes it impractical for production, either now or in the foreseeable future. However, we feel that our experimentation with this shape permits us a certain licence to speculate on the innovations that such a shape might lead to.”