Date:04/11/2004 URL: http://www.thehindubusinessline.com/2004/11/04/stories/2004110401730200.htm

Back Daimler's car with a Mind of its own

Our Bureau

The F-500 Mind.

Pune , Nov. 3

A car with a mind of its own and even reads yours... well, almost. Auto major, DaimlerChrysler, on Monday unveiled its ultimate dream machine, the F-500 Mind to a select gathering at a technology seminar celebrating its tenth anniversary in India.

The gleaming chrome and glass car embodies every conceivable technology that the car manufacturer hopes to embed in its products in the years to come.

To begin with, the F-500 Mind, runs on a hybrid engine that works on diesel and electricity with an electric motor generator that automatically recharges. In the future, it can be run on a fuel cell drive train too. Not for the Mind the conventional steering wheel, brake and clutch that normal four-wheelers necessarily have. Instead, those behind the oval shaped steering have everything at their finger tips on an onboard monitoring console that gives information of everything from navigation to speed adjustment to even climate and road conditions. What's more, the steering wheel moves to the right every time the ignition is switched off so that the driver can get in and out with ease.

Also featured in the car, are electronic pedals for braking and acceleration (like touch screen pads) that give occupants more leg room a Machine Human Interface system, a linguatronics facility that allows functions to be activated through speech recognition, and a central touch pad for controlling the audio systems, telephone, navigation and air conditioning among other things.

The car, developed at an undisclosed cost by the company, is in effect a mobile laboratory for its various on-going technology endeavours and among its other hi-tech features are an infra-red night view system for better visibility at night, doors that open both ways in the rear and a holographic image projection system that allows those in the rear to watch television, play video games, run computer programmes or watch DVD films.

The car, which was unveiled by the company at the Tokyo Motor show last year, was in India for just a day. It was flown in by the company for the technology seminar and by the time this copy is read, will be winging its way back to its home in Germany!