World’s Tippiest Car – Top Gear Reliant Robin

Normally, our “Crazy Cool” segment is reserved for fantastic feats of engineering and ingenuity. Every once in a while we like to highlight “good ideas gone wrong.” Engineering feats where hearts were in the right place, but the slide-rule was a little out of calibration.

Watch the video of this cross-country trip without laughing out loud!
(Spoiler alert: they roll this car about 10 different times – no one is injured.)

The guys at Top Gear are at it again. Taking a Reliant Robin on a scenic trip through the English countryside is perfectly safe…as long as you don’t plan on taking any turns!

About the Reliant Robin:

It was the 70’s, the world was in the midst of a gas crisis, people just wanted to save a few bucks (or pounds) at the pump. Reliant’s idea seems perfectly logical. Build a commuter car that can handle day to day tasks while getting the best possible gas mileage.

Reliant’s Design Methodology

What do people want? Great gas mileage!

How do you get great gas mileage? Build a lighter car!

How do you build a lighter car? Eliminate superfluous parts!

What are superfluous parts? Of course, that pesky “extra” front wheel!

Design plan: Put a motorcycle engine in the lightest three wheeled car ever built! It cant fail.

Design Bonus: With this design plan, people don’t even need an automobile driver’s license to operate this vehicle – it doesn’t have enough parts to qualify as one!

British humor side note: What is a French Castle doing in the English Countryside?