| Author | Message | ||
| Steve (Steve)
Rating: N/A |
If I ever get another chance and the money to build a bus I would put the engine and transmission and transfer case in the middle and and 4 wheel steering drive axles on each end. then I could drive it sideways, spin it in a circle, turn very sharp corners, and shift on the fly 4 wheel drive, with run flat super single tires.. LOL.... | ||
| JW Smythe (Jwsmythe)
Rating: N/A |
Did you have a weird dream last night?  A mid engine would be good for weight distribution, but be odd for storage, cooling, etc. You'd want to use a low design like the transit buses if you're expecting the whacky handling. Some work was done with 4 wheel steering. From what I've read, there were problems with this, due to the shortening of the wheelbase on the side on the outside of the turn. They tended to fall over. It probably wouldn't hurt as bad on such a long wheelbase vehicle. You'd need independant steering on the wheels to make it drive sideways. It'd be cool. Hell, you'd have the only bus that could parallel park without any real effort. If you're going to do it, set it up with two engines, one for the front axle, one for the rear. Then you could drag race it. | ||
| Henry Bergman
Rating: N/A |
I'm fire service retarded...er retired. We had tractor driven tiller steered ladder trucks that had rear wheel steering, but it was not powered. The guy steering the rear wheels was called the tillerman. Such ladder trucks, although they were much longer then the fire engines, actually had a much tighter turning circle. It was neat making a U-turn in a space that seemed impossible. Long ago and far away. Can I have more wine now? | ||
| david anderson (Davidanderson)
Rating: N/A |
Didn't Kramer drive one of those in a Seinfeld episode? David | ||
| Marc Bourget Rating: N/A |
All of the above has already been done, years ago, by the Team Bob Sheaves was working with at GM Military Vehicle Operations. This was the experience where Bob developed the "advanced ability" in cooling system design. More intriguing designs than this were investigated |