Tomorrow's World

[crickleymal]

Showing my age here :lol: Back in the days when the BBC showed TW I remember them showing "the lorry of the future". Not that I can remember a lot about it but I do recall the cab was streamlined and had a central driving position.

Fast forward 35 years and the lorries on the roads nowadays still have about the same aerodynamic properties as the common or garden household brick. I appreciate that under 40 mph streamlining doesn't have much effect but as a lot of lorries seem to spend their time going up and down the motorways you would have thought it would be of benefit?

[addo]

Oddly, coefficient of drag improves with vehicle length. There's also been subtle raking of the screens, rounding of cab corners and closing in of areas where turbulent drag was formerly created.

[pieface]

Unfortunately because our european roads are narrow and congested those beautiful long bonneted trucks that cruise the highways in the states are a rare sight here, so the brick shape without any frontal sticky out bits help with manoeuvering in tight towns & cities.
The trailer designs have moved on with the larger companies like M & S using the teardrop shaped roofs and enclosed skirts which cuts down drag .
Just showing my age now, but if the television programs of the sixties were to be believed we are supposed to be driving/flying about in jet cars now.:lol:

[crickleymal]

Just showing my age now, but if the television programs of the sixties were to be believed we are supposed to be driving/flying about in jet cars now.:lol:

I'm not quite that old! I was thinking about the late 70s early 80s for that program. Amy way isn't the Berlingo almost there?

[Gadgetman]

Would that be the same stuff as Discovery used to call 'Beyond 2000'?

The extremely aerodynamic truck is a Colani design.

http://auto.howstuffworks.com/under-the-...eeler1.htm