Vehicle: Car: Tailgating
EV BumperSafetyCar   (+5, -4)  [vote for, against]
Drives in front and behind you, as barrier to crash

Two extra lightweight EV cars drive, one in front and one in back of you. A high resolution camera in the first car, gives you a picture of what's up front.

You are actually driving a type of train, but not sitting up front. The first car is actually a giant driverless (remotely controlled) riding pre-inflated airbag. You control this car, and in the event of it crashing into someone, very little damage is done, if any, since the lead car is very lightweight, and built of flexible material. (No people in car, so no need to have them "survive a crash").

Your car automatically follows the first car, with sufficient distance to stop in emergency, and even if you crashed into it, that would cause little or no harm.

Following you is the tail EV BumperSafetyCar, similar to the leadcar, except that you don't need such a good camera on that one, only a "rear mirror camera". This car simply follows you automatically via remote control instructions. You don't need to control it, unless you are driving in reverse. In which case, you may have it deflate and let you drive OVER it.

Two ropes which are extended from your car to the bumberCars see to it that no-one gets between you and your leadcar/tailcar.
-- pashute, Aug 16 2007

I am at a loss for words. My fishbone will have to speak for itself.
-- globaltourniquet, Aug 16 2007


Surely one's Assistants aready drive in front of and behind one? I find fore-and- aft Mercedes are quite adequate for the staff, are quite economical, and are very effective in absorbing impacts.
-- MaxwellBuchanan, Aug 16 2007


[MaxwellBuchanan] also doesn't need the recently posted food tester, because his staff takes care of all that for him as well.
-- globaltourniquet, Aug 16 2007


No, but they dealt with my mother-in-law very discreetly.
-- MaxwellBuchanan, Aug 16 2007


i think they already have those it's called a 1990s Cadillac except that there all one piece
-- F_R_O_G, Aug 16 2007


Now there's a murder mystery, [Maxwell]. The butler _did_ do it.
-- globaltourniquet, Aug 16 2007


Seeing as how I was away for four years or so until recently, I have to ask - are there new unspoken rules about pedantry these days, rules which perhaps may discourage me right now from jumping on the there-they're platform?
-- globaltourniquet, Aug 17 2007


Driving along up to a junction and BAM! A truck skips a red light and pummels you from the side. In your last moments in the hospital however, you become the focus of hatred as you witness on the television your r/c cars going ballistic due to the broken signals from your vehicle. At first it's just a horrible accident, the runaway cars running over pedestrians, knocking fruit and veg stalls over and looting shops. But soon it becomes clear that the cars have a twisted mindset; their only function in life was to crash and die and in a fit of vengeance they take out their lives' work on us, their fathers. They begin stealing babies and selling them to abattoirs, importing land mines on the black market and leaving them in people's shoes, and sneaking in to soft toy factories and swapping all the cotton wool with asbestos. They continue to terrorise the city, with no hope from the army of stopping them, and then they reap their vengeful wrath further afield, burning villages, raping country folk with no remorse, and stacking cows. Finally, with a fully developed, despite psychotic, consciousness of their own, they aim for higher aspirations and run for office, their campaign backed by a Gestapo like army of Robosapiens, and - to your mind-throbbing astonishment - you witness them being elected out of fear, and finally, taking the country to war with Sweden.

I'm sorry. I can't let that happen. [-]
-- theleopard, Aug 17 2007


A bone for anything that encourages cow stacking.
-- jtp, Aug 17 2007


Can I bun [the leopard]'s annotation?
-- Galbinus_Caeli, Aug 17 2007


Yes and no:

Yes, just head over to any one of my fantastic ideas and leave the pastry there.

And.

No.
-- theleopard, Aug 17 2007


You might want to take a permanent marker and underline "fantastic", by the way.
-- theleopard, Aug 17 2007


<underlines fantastic> by the way, nobody really wants to drive a train of cars around, unless you are a semi-truck (aka lorry)driver and your occupation demands it. if you insist on baking this and having a string of ridiculous-automotive-hobnobs parading through the streets tied together with ropes, at least fill the front and back ones with loud speakers and glue fresh flowers to the sides. and if you fill them with water, they make an even better barrier for crashes which you are sure to get into because - camera or no- you won't be able to see where you are going since your blind spot will have enlarged to the size of a hippo on acid, carpooling with his extended family. which consequently is about how well you will be driving in this thing.</uf>
-- k_sra, Aug 17 2007


Am I the only one who thinks this is a delightfully impractical idea, aka a perfect HB idea?
-- 5th Earth, Aug 17 2007


apparently you are
-- globaltourniquet, Aug 18 2007


After reading your annos, even I don't like the idea anymore. Maybe just a small car in back to keep the tailers from getting onto you.
-- pashute, Feb 26 2008


It seems as the years went by this idea accumulated its fans...
-- pashute, Aug 06 2023



random, halfbakery