Developed by a subsidiary of Toyota Motors called Toyota Industries Corp., the arrow you see above is the three-wheeled Ku:Rin. Powered by compressed air, the Ku:Rin showcases Toyota’s expertise in developing compressors for automotive air conditioning systems.

Recently, the Ku:Rin prototype hit the track at Japan Automobile Research Institute’s test facility in search of a speed record for compressed air vehicles. The Ku:Rin’s posted top speed of 80.3 miles per hour should be enough to rocket it into the record books, and Toyota says it will submit the results to Guinness World Records.

Power for the Ku:Rin comes from a reversed A/C compressor that generates energy from the expansion of compressed air, while the vehicle’s on-board compressed air tanks serve as “fuel.” Though 80 mph seems reasonable, the Ku:Rin’s two-mile total range is laughable. This thing may be fast, but talk about range anxiety.

Toyota Ku:Rin snags compressed air top speed record with 80.3 mph run originally appeared on Autoblog on Fri, 23 Sep 2011 14:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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2011 Red Bull RB7 – Click above for high-res image gallery

Red Bull is once again looking strong as it heads into Formula One’s opening round in Australia. Red Bull ace and last year’s champ Sebastien Vettel took pole position for Sunday’s race by nearly a second in Saturday qualifying. Mark Webber, Vettel’s teammate and Australia’s hometown hero, wound up third behind Lewis Hamilton.

Red Bull claims that neither of its drivers used their KERS (Kinetic Energy Regeneration System) during qualifying, which is usually good for .3 seconds a lap. That means, in theory anyway, Vettel has a potential 1.5 second advantage over the competition when the green flag waves tomorrow.

McLaren’s Lewis Hamilton is sandwiched between the two Red Bulls in second, while teammate and 2009 champ Jenson Button sits fourth behind Webber. Fernando Alonso is fifth in the first of the Ferraris ahead of Vitaly Petrov for Renault. Mercedes’ Nico Rosberg is seventh, ahead of the second Ferrari of Felipe Massa. Kamui Kobayashi sits ninth for Sauber and Sebastien Buemi rounds out the top 10 for Toro Rosso.

[Source: AutoWeek]

Vettel snags pole for Australian GP originally appeared on Autoblog on Sat, 26 Mar 2011 15:33:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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