40,000 people have paid thousands of dollars for an Elio car - will they ever be built?

“Most Advanced, Yet Acceptable” = MAYA = illusion. Anybody else catch that, or is it just too obvious?

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This takes me back to riding around in my uncle’s Velorex in Czechoslovakia in the 60s. Was there ever another vehicle with a faux leather body?

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But Maya is the ubiquitous illusion of everyday reality. It is the tangible world that for all practical purposes, people assume to be real.

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Speaking of 3 wheeled cars, here is some hilarious shit:
Rolling a Reliant Robin - Top Gear - BBC: http://youtu.be/QQh56geU0X8

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I don’t quite get what they plan to do better than everybody else. The idea of a very cheap car or car substitute is hardly unique. The no-frills models of the big car manufacturers are generally more expensive than their target price. But there is also an established market for “almost cars” that are popular in some countries for licensing reasons.

Is there a niche that everybody else has overlooked? Do they really expect to be that much better than everybody else despite all their disadvantages as newcomers? Do they bring any substantial new tecchnology to the market?

The allusion to the “fascinating Transgender woman”…

It could have been phrased differently, but there is some interest to be found in her having had a past life as a fraud, and in her having a bunch of imaginary kids.

Being transgender doesn’t make you a fraud any more than being in the closet makes you a fraud, being of indeterminate ethnicity makes you a fraud, failing to proclaim your sexual fetishes makes you a fraud, or preferring to keep private matters private makes you a fraud.

The three-wheeled almost-car is a dream product that I have had imagined making a couple times in my life when gas prices spiked. It’s a rebellion against the big-car mentality that pervades the USA. I don’t see it as being all that practical when put on the road alongside all the behemoths that we seem to be driving these days.

When gasoline hits $10/gallon in today’s price frame, then it will make a lot more sense.

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Wow, I didn’t realize they were still around in any form after 2011. I confess I was intrigued by their promise of radically efficient vehicles. I don’t expect anything from them now, as I’m guessing that $2 a gallon gasoline isn’t doing them any favors.

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I am all for small cars, but there are so many of those on the market already. Many of those currently available have significant downsides, but I don’t think that’s for lack of trying. I’m not sure that in a world where things like the Dacia Sandero, the Renault Twizy and Aixam or Ligier microcars exist already there is enough room for a newcomer unless they can offer something really compelling. Of course they can hope to be just generally better, but that is rather ambitious.

One more stipulation at least in CA – To not wear a helmet it also has to have a roof, but I forget the exact legal wording. The new Polaris Slingshot 3-wheeler requires a helmet in CA because it has an open cockpit.

Dy-no-mite!!

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Reliant drivers had the best driving safety record in England, however.

For those who haven’t seen probably the most famous Top Gear episode, I present television gold.

Rolling a Reliant Robin - Top Gear - BBC:

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Reminds me of the old tractor safety movies that we had to watch in high school – the old three wheeled tractors tended to be similarly prone to tipping.

oh yeah, they are terrifying. pray you don’t have to go over any hills in one of those unless it is a straight line.

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Of course not, but counterfeiting, soliciting investments under false pretenses, “selling stock shares without a permit, and selling dealerships and as-yet hypothetical cars […] without a manufacturer’s license” certainly do. None of which would have anything to do with her trans-ness, but given her background as a criminal con artist on the run from the law, it’s not out of the question whether her presenting as a woman was part of a scheme rather than a genuine self-identification.

Someone presenting themselves as the other gender as part of a con job is not transgender, nor would I expect anyone to describe them as such. Yet she has been consistently described as transgender. I haven’t seen anyone suggest this was part of some genius money-making plan (Hey, what could go wrong with a six-foot, 200 pound man presenting himself as a woman in the mid-70’s? Sounds like a great idea, especially since females are popularly associated with the automotive sector, where they have instant credibility.). And she’s nothing if not persistent in her attempt to continue to fool those mid-70’s investors, as she was still living as a woman at least 15 years after being arrested in connection with her scheme.

So yeah, that’s some really great support for your off-the-cuff “theory” that presenting as a woman was part of some sort of scheme.

Some people, such as myself, prefer to do business with only those who refuse licenses or permits. Authority granted by those I don’t trust does not engender my trust in others.

If it’s anything like the Reliant Robin Ep, it’ll be pretty epic

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