Q-Car

The Q-Car is the future of urban transport. Cheap, disposable, and all about image. Takara's Q-Car outdoes the Smart car for fashion cool.

History

If you look through the history of fashion in cars, you see Renaults and Citroens everywhere. The Italians made a few interesting but rust prone cars and the Germans finally produced the Beetle, a car resurrected in a pseudo Fisher Price style as an attempt at a fashion icon in the 1990s.

The first modern fashion icon would be the Chrysler PT Cruiser, a Chrysler Neon with a few body panel changes that let Chrysler sell the Neon for double the price. Those new body panels had just the right hint of 1930s and 1940s styling to make the car interesting. People suckered in to buying the resurrected Beetle, dumped their novelty cars for the unique PT Cruiser.

Toyota and Honda quietly released hybrid petrol-electric cars. Everyone else talked about fuel calls and hydrogen power.

A subsidiary of DaimlerChrysler, Smart, released a sad imitation of the Mercedes A series named the Smart car. The only innovation was the active suspension donated from the Mercedes A series by Mercedes. Smart made the small car heavier by adding an extra layer of body panels made of plastic and made the panels replaceable just like the covers of some cheap mobile phones (cell phones in the USA).

Smart followed up with their forfour model, a car based on the Mitsubishi Colt. In Australia the Mitsubishi version will be far more economical and practical but will not get the press because Mitsubishi do not have the Mercedes level of profit margin to pay for all those product placements in the media.

Clearly Smart has demonstrated that you can sell cars that have no practical use and are far more expensive than their manufacturing cost. That makes the Smart a fashion accessory rather than a mode of transport.

So what do you drive when you are not parading your Smart car in front of friends? The Toyota Prius hybrid car would be the cleanest practical car.

Enter the Toy

Tanaka manufacture very successful toys including the transformer series. They are always innovating and invented the ChoroQ toy car that invented the market for fast racing cars that did not need batteries.

The Toy Grows Up

Tanaka decided to build an adult version of the ChoroQ. The result is a car that fits one person, produces absolutely no pollution, and comes in lots of models so you can drive one that looks like your favourite petrol engine car. The Q-Car does need batteries but can be recharged in 45 minutes and you can use electricity from your favourite wind or water powered generator.

A car made by a toy manufacturer sounds strange until you realise that Tanaka make toys far more complex than a car. Look at Sharp's home entertainment systems with plasma screens then think of Sharp attempting to manufacture their first product, a pencil. Honda started with motorcycles. The first useful electric car might as well come from a toy manufacturer.

The Q-Car comes with the outer skin shaped to look like a Model T Ford, an old racing car, or a golf buggy. There is even a model that emulates the version of the Volkswagen Beetle that in turn emulates a Fisher Price toy.

The Q-Car travels at the low 50 kph speed limit imposed on our local suburban streets and will last 80 km from a full overnight charge. Our local shops require only an 8 km round trip which means I could go shopping 10 times per day in the Q-Car.

Q-Cars do not yet survive road safety crash tests which limits their use to golf courses, gated communities, factory grounds, and, for old people, the sidewalk. Old people can replace their electric chairs with something that is more fun and faster.

On the Road

The Smart car is way to small to be safe on our local roads but seems to survive because people use Smart cars for only a few local trips. The Q-Car could be just as safe, or unsafe, if fitted with safety belts and air bags. You would be demolished if hit by the oversized vehicles our state government allows on our local roads but the resultant mess would look far more fashionable when shown on television. Your 15 seconds of fame as a Q-Car traffic statistic would rate higher than the 15 seconds of Smart wreck.

Second Car

A lot of two people families have a second car, a smaller car, for shopping trips. The Q-Car is too small for joint shopping trips and is a better fit for families where one person buys the groceries. That would make the Q-Car a possibility as a second car for families where one person works at home.

Third Car

I sometimes work in the city and commute via train. Instead of driving my large car to the station, I could use a Q-Car. I still need my large car for other trips. In my family the Q-Car would be the third car.

Conclusion

If you traded your Volkswagen Beetle on a plastic Smart car, you are way out of fashion, oh so last century. Trash the Smart. Be first with a Q-Car.