Ming the Mechanic:
Oscar
The NewsLog of Flemming Funch
 Oscar2006-12-09 22:19
6 comments
picture by Flemming Funch

The OScar Project:
It is the goal of the OScar Project to develop a car according to Open Source principles. In our opinion, a car is not a vehicle full of high-tech gadgets. Instead, we are looking for a simple and functional concept to spread mobility. Form follows function.

Apart from that, OScar is not just a car. It is about new ways of mobility and the spreading of the Open Source idea in the real (physical) world. On this website, you will find a great community of developers and drivers who want to invent mobility anew and together.
Yeah, an open source car. Not that they've gotten that far, but it is a noble project. Read an article about it here.


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6 comments

10 Dec 2006 @ 11:32 by swanny : Watershed
Well this seems like watershed stuff.
"Building a car without an engineering center, without a boss, without money, and without borders. But with the help of the collective creativity of the Internet community… . Three or four months should be enough for the project definition phase. Then we 'freeze' the concept, and start developing. With a little luck and a lot of support…within the next year we should be able to build a prototype".

Not I guess but they are persisting

I wonder how it might be applied to Building Architecture.
Open Source Building Design or Construction.
Best Practices all that sort of thing.
"less is more"
Mies Van Der Rhoe?
Open Source Organic building Architecture

thanks for this ming
they do express a lack of Open Source CAD...

I would have to agree.

A good CAD program can set you back about $7000 smackers

Google has sort of got a free CAD program but not open source unfortuneately.

ed  

10 Dec 2006 @ 13:26 by ming : Open Source Construction
And, now, what does it really mean if a car or a house is 'open source'? That would become really meaningful when, in the future, we'll each have a nano-tech automatic assembler in our kitchen, which can build anything out of blueprints and raw atoms. At such a point, all one needs is the plan for exactly how to build something, and then it becomes very significant what is freely available and what isn't.

But in the meantime? I suppose we could say that a house already is open source. You can easily go and buy books about construction techniques, you can buy wood and cement and tools and fittings, and put it together yourself, without stepping on too many toes. You'd need a permit in most places, but there's really nothing to stop you from doing it. And once you have a house, even if somebody built it, you're quite free to tinker with the parts.

A car is harder to build on your own, of course. Each car is made mostly of parts specifically constructed for that model. Not something I easily can put together myself. Although I'm free to buy all the spare parts and tinker with modifying them if I so desire.

The problem might more be that a think like a car isn't very modular. Would be great if I could have a choice of pieces and put them together in original ways. But the reason I can't is not so much that they aren't open source, but more because they aren't very modular.

Would be nice if we could build a car as we can build a generic PC. The parts of the PC aren't open source, but they're quite modular and sufficiently available that I can do it myself and have a lot of options.  

10 Dec 2006 @ 14:10 by swanny : Yes true
Yes but there is the "code" aspect and standards
Standards I have come to concede are a necessary evil
as once in place hard to change but they do tend
to limit the number of variables or options which is
good cause you can be overwhelmed at time by choice.
Form follows function well form is function sometimes.
Open Source and modularity hmmm excellant point...
still the standards question it is a bit of a pickle.
I wonder if you could incoporate a more democratic aspect
to it. Democratic open source modularity.
Now theres a mouth ful  

10 Dec 2006 @ 18:05 by ming : Standards
Yes, one of the excellent principles we find in the Internet world is standards. Simple norms for how things connect together. Which means that one can do for example an e-mail client in many different ways, which all will connect with the mechanisms for sending and receiving e-mails. And which means one can couple together different pieces of software to some extent. In principle any e-mail client will work with any e-mail server, and any piece of e-mail can pass through them.

That would indeed be handy if we were talking physical items. Like, if there were standard ways a transmission could connect with the engine of a car. And standard ways of attaching either of them to the car. Then, in principle, one could have a choice, and pick one transmission over another, if one wants somewhat different behavior.

It is probably more complex to accomplish with physical items than software. I mean, transmissions and engines would also have different sizes.

We see some standards already, of course. An electricity plug, for example. And I'm sure many of the items in a car are connected with some kind of standard. Like hoses, electrical plugs, bolts, etc.  

19 Jan 2007 @ 08:22 by Taranga @89.242.95.30 : OScar
Electric city cars are heading in this direction [see the various EV groups] The parts needed are fewer and a few manufacturers make almost all the main parts [motor, motor controller, charger & battery pack]. In the uk there several hundred home built/home converted EVs, and i think it is around 500 in Ca. So one good way of cutting your carbon footprint is to build an EV for local journeys and sign up to an eco electricity supplier.  

21 Apr 2016 @ 07:28 by Bison @188.143.232.32 : SmkSXgkzzHoi
Thniikng like that shows an expert at work  

Other stories in
2007-12-26 21:19: LeWeb3
2007-07-04 23:14: Orbo free energy
2007-06-28 22:03: Wide-angle Immersive Stereoscope
2007-06-24 16:51: Spy box
2007-06-14 01:00: Photosynth
2007-04-25 14:01: Open source hardware
2007-03-22 16:33: The Air Car
2007-03-09 23:44: Web 2.0
2007-02-07 16:09: Talkr
2007-01-12 00:15: Open Source Desktop Fabricator


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