Honda’s Uni-Cub is a Bar Stool on Wheels
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For company known for hot cars and even a business jet, Honda’s Uni-Cub is a bit of a contrast.
This “personal mobility device” weighs about 40 pounds and has a top speed of 2.5 miles an hour. It’s a prototype that could eventually result in a product that helps the disabled — or just plain lazy people — wheel around homes or down sidewalks at a walker’s pace.
Basically, it’s a bar stool on wheels.
But an interesting bar stool. There are no pedals or hand controls. To make it move, you simply lean gently in the direction you want to go, and the electric motor takes over. Break dancers take note: It does spins. Uni-Cub’s maximum range is about 3 or 4 miles per charge.
While Uni-Cub might seem like the perfect transportation mode for larger Americans, there are two problems. First, it has a maximum weight capacity of 220 pounds. Second, it hasn’t come to America aside from its demonstration for the North American International Auto Show going on here.
But something like it could eventually emerge from the robot side of Honda’s house, where it was developed, officials say.
Until then, keep walking.
