Tuesday, May 15, 2012

Lady Max


Here's a piece of personal work that I've been thinking about doing for ages, and the chance to put it in an upcoming as-yet-still-secret art book gave me a reason to get 'er done.

She's a bounty hunter or vehicular assault specialist, and her car is a rolling weapons platform with all terrain capabilities. What's that you say? 'Not with those wheels and that ground scraping front end!?' Well, those wheels are special! Apart from being mounted on highly articulated suspension arms, and independently driven with ultra-high-powered superconducting in-hub electric motors, they have a surface that contains spools of carbon nanotube fibers that unwind with centrifugal force to bond with the ground like a gecko's foot. The strands have a special molecular switch that continually sever the setae fibers as the wheel rotates so they generate huge amounts of grip but very little drag. They also have expandable tread blocks for old fashioned mechanical grip on rough off road surfaces. And the whole front end and body is articulated and able to raise right up for maximum ground clearance, and that's before we even get to the front mounted crane arm!