2005: Germany.
Illustrations on Display at Michelin Challenge Design™
Biography:
Aman Midha’s first and deepest impression of cars was in 1987 when his family visited the Mercedes Benz manufacturing facility in Stuttgart, Germany. At that time he was 7 years old. Since then, he has been passionate about cars, which has been encouraged by his parents, both of whom are doctors by profession. He was born and brought up in Ludhiana, Punjab, India. He received a Mechanical Engineering Degree from the Regional Engineering College, Bhopal. It was during this period that he got informed about car design and started designing, with his first entry for the Designerspace International Online Car Design Competition-2002, which ranked amongst the best 41 designs. In 2002 his design was selected to be displayed at Michelin Challenge Design-2003.
Presently he is a second year student of Industrial Design at the Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi. The fact that his design has been once again selected for display at Michelin Challenge Design gives him great pleasure.
Description:
The German Machine Aesthetic with its strong tradition of functional modern design along with the major concerns of ecology has led to the design of a transportation solution for the cities as a coupe styled open two-wheeler (Couplix), which can be coupled with another of its kind and thus can be used as a car as well.
The platform of the vehicle contains a hydrogen fuel cell (HFC) and powers the rear wheel based hub motor to drive. There are two docks provided on each side of the vehicle which, mechanically link the two Couplix, allow data transfer as well as power transmission support. Couplix is completely drive-by-wire hence when coupled, either of the two Couplix can be used to control the acceleration, braking and steering of the Couplix system by choosing the master and the slave settings for the car mode. Couplix provides a unique experience of biking when single and exciting driving of roadster when coupled. HFC means clean exhaust and single vehicle means less energy requirement, lower CO2 emissions and lesser material requirement per person along with requirement for a smaller parking space. The crossbars in couplix come equipped with airbags to improve road safety. Castor wheels drop down when the vehicle is about to halt. Couplix can seat 2+2 people and brings the benefit of cleaner environment and conservation of resources.