Too Virtual to be True

We can easily produce an electric car for less than $2,000. I can make them in my backyard, they are so simple.

The problem is that the easily built electric car is about 750 pounds in weight and cannot be used on the roads without concrete barriers to protect the driver.

Assuming the cost was 100% batteries, that would be a range of 25 miles with current technology.

A car you can pack into your briefcase, George Jetson style, would really help public transportation. The biggest hassle of taking the train into town is that I have to take the train out of town.

Whether it should be taken seriously and whether it's a hoax are two different questions. The domain registration information traces back to a California inventor with a WIPO patent related to "personal flight vehicles". Far-fetched, silly, or asinine, but I'm not convinced it's a hoax. Just run a whois search on the various XP Car domain names.

Yes, I think wind resistance would quite the limiting factor.

Yes, I think wind resistance would quite the limiting factor.

Has anyone ever considered building special tunnels for cars? They have reduced air pressure and/or fans blowing air strongly in one direction, say at 20MPH. This significantly raises the speed at which cars can travel before losing efficiency from wind.

I have no idea if this has been studied before or is a stupid idea. Just tossing it out there.

I'd give it something greater than 0.1% chance that it's the car equivalent of the "fabless" chip manufacturers. Creating something at a low burn rate is a laudable business strategy and companies remain virtual for as long as possible these days. But in this particular case I'm also dubious based on other clues.