Audi Snook

The Audi Snook is a concept for a single-person vehicle that rides on one wheel and balances itself electronically. Its drive is a single large ball in contact with the ground, mostly enclosed in a cage with three rollers spaced around its circumference so that it can move in any horizontal direction. The cabin sits on top of this assembly and is kept upright by an artificial intelligence control system working on the inverted pendulum principle, and all of its power was to be electric. The driver's seat splits in two and the halves join in a combed fashion, and the spherical cabin was meant to echo the spherical drive ball. Tilmann Schlootz designed it as his diploma thesis project at HfG Offenbach, and the two-sphere idea was partly inspired by the Eurofighter Typhoon, which also depends on handling through instability. It was shown at the 2007 Frankfurt Motor Show, where it won the VDA Design Award, and at the 2008 Detroit Auto Show, where it won the Michelin Design Award. No vehicle has been built as a result of the student research project.