Sometimes, a wheeled vehicle isn’t the best way to explore the wilderness. Yeah, you might be able to get your dirt bike down some insane single-track… but what if you don’t have the skills to do so, or maybe you’re physically disabled and have no way of even learning how to ride? And as for four-wheeled vehicles, they’re even more limited in many ways. Yeah, you can winch your Jeep up over that boulder, but do you want to? Considering the damage you’re inflicting on the environment, should you?
Above, you can see Kawasaki Heavy Industries’ take on the problem. They unveiled the CORLEO robo-vehicle at the Osaka Kansai Expo in Japan earlier this month, and while it’s mostly a CGI concept right now, they did have a physical model on display. It might look like a vehicle from a manga, or maybe game art from Metroid, but this is a real-life KHI project.
The CORLEO is powered by a 150cc hydrogen engine, which generates electricity that runs to each of the vehicle’s four limbs. Along with the articulation of each limb, CORLEO also articulates around the vehicle’s center section. In other words, its mechanical movements replicate a real animal.
And you can steer it like a real animal, too, with body movements shifting the vehicle’s direction just as you can steer a horse with your knees while riding bareback. KHI says the vehicle is made for two-up riding, or that’s the idea, but the video above only shows one rider at a time. And steering is actually largely controlled by AI as well as the rider’s inputs.
Could such a thing become a reality? Probably, if KHI thinks people will pay for it. That is, after all, the defining question of vehicle development. There would be technical problems to overcome, but Kawi’s design seems to anticipate the biggest hindrance. Hydrogen engine technology would mean this would be capable of venturing far beyond the electric power grid, offering an all-terrain riding experience that would have been unthinkable in years gone by. It’d be eco-friendly, and capable of traveling just about anywhere.
