Firebird III? I am absolutely crying that they thought this as going to be a thing.

So much for those flying cars, metal roads and an undersea tunnel from the US to Europe where you travel in capsules pulled along by vaccum, which were apparently going to be commonplace by the 1980s! 🤣

"There'll be Spandex jackets, one for everyone...." (Donald Fagen)
 
Don't forget Ed Straker's car in 'UFO' !

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It seems to have caught quite a few people's imagination. in a very, very serious way....

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Personally, I long thought it was a real, Mercedes, gas turbine prototype vehicle or even later I heard it was a 220mph diesel. However, the evidence above seems to blow that idea out of the water....
 
I was eight when UFO hit the TV, it was a fantastic series that was a serious science fiction action program with a great special effects and a very polished look, there was great care taken to make the cars and other vehicles look from the future, the clothing was very late sixties in design with a sexy look being more important than being practical but it it's of an age which political correctness was as alien as the organ napping visitors from another world, being a huge fan of ITC TV production from the sixties I collect them all on DVD, build the models and wish I was still that young lad waiting to see the next episode 😁
 
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I know what you mean. A workmate of mine was besotted with Gabrielle Drake - Lt Gay Ellis I believe. Little did either of us know at the time, that she had starred in Au Pair Girls 1972 parts of which would be considered 'quite racy' by today's standards....
 
I was going to comment on Firebird 111 but the chat seems to have moved on.
Mini skirts and boots. Oooh I could get in trouble here. Say Porthcawl.
 
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The 50s and 60s were definitely decades of optimism together with social and technical leaps, an explosion of creativity which sadly has not carried on, now we prefer rehash the same things over and over and increasingly live out our fantasy's life on the web as real life is just too difficult ☹️
 
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Ah yes, the Nucleon. Another one from the book of "What the hell were they thinking?" ~The thing would have to have a few tons of shielding alone, as well as an absolutely fail-safe cooling circuit and an on-board boron-carbon scram system. And it one did get hit hard enough to breach containment (say, by a Nucleon lorry...) you now have an accident scene that has to be attended by the AEC in bunny suits. I don't know why I typed all that because it's blatantly obvious, it just baffles me that a team got paid to go thoroughly mad scientist over something that could never exist.

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Is it just me, or does Straker's car look like the demented offspring of an Opel Manta, a Trans-Am and a Citroen DS?

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I was going to comment on Firebird 111 but the chat seems to have moved on.

I say go ahead. It would be difficult around a barbecue where there is a definite flow, but not so much in a forum post.
 
Mako, well since you asked....
Yes I see Trans Am in it.

I think it’s fantastic that they could find the budget to fund such free thinking. As such it’s amazing, bring on more of these idea factories.

The main flaws ?
It’s huge but only room for 2.
Those 2 sit under individual glass bubbles and they tested this, was it Nevada ? You could die in there from the heat under that glass.
Oh yeah then split that bubble with a join across the top for access, I’d like to see that made rain proof.

As to Nuclear powered vehicles, maybe but not in our lifetime .
The present government does see compact nuclear as an option. Heck if Rolls Royce make em for submarines I reckon the future will be one of these in every village.
No more pylons striding across the scenery as generation will all be very local.

Bet you wished you hadn’t asked now. ;)
 
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Bet you wished you hadn’t asked now. ;)

Nah, I'm okay with it.

I don't think that small-scale personal nuclear reactors will ever happen here on Earth. If we ever become a proper space-faring species, we might have them on our ships but that's about it.

I used to work at a nuclear power plant and quite frankly, I don't want people treting them like personal appliances the way they do thier washing machine. I don't care how safe we make trhem - even if they're dustbin-sized. The consequences are just too high.

But the fact is, I don't need to worry. Remember Noel's comment about "electricity too cheap to meter?" Never going to happen. Too many people with massive yachts have their monetary futures at stake. Even as the Russian gas thieves do their best to reclaim their assets. the market will set the price, just as it does currently with solar. I don't see that changing any time soon.
 
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