Lexus channels its inner Marty McFly with working hoverboard prototype
Car company Lexus is working on a hoverboard, teasing the product with a short video showing off its prototype that flies using magnetic levitation.
Lexus wants to take us "Back to the Future" with that tantalizing and much-dreamed-about transportation device that always gets heart rates soaring -- a hoverboard.
The Japanese carmaker released a short promotional video of what it's calling a "real, rideable hoverboard" to its YouTube channel on Tuesday, ever so briefly showing off the prototype to the world.
The clip begins with several seconds of a skateboarder riding along who then stops and slowly walks over to a Lexus-branded hoverboard that would make Marty McFly jealous. Of course, the clip ends right as the rider's about to step onto the hoverboard, so we don't actually see the craft in action, but it's a promising first step from an unexpected source.
The hoverboard flies using magnetic levitation, relying on high-powered magnets and semiconductors, both of which are cooled by liquid nitrogen, Lexus says.
Such technology is being used more and more in Lexus parent company Toyota's home country of Japan, with devices like a super-fast maglev train. The carmaker has previously indicated it was working on bringing this technology to its cars as well, though that's likely a ways away.
The Lexus Hoverboard is the latest in a series of hoverboards we've seen recently, including a crazy craft that set the world record for longest hoverboard flight, a "Back to the Future" lookalike that failed to actually hover and this DIY craft pieced together from common yard equipment. And, of course, there was the crowdfunded Hendo hoverboard, which the company somehow convinced skateboarding legend Tony Hawk to try.
Testing of the Lexus Hoverboard will take place in Barcelona, Spain, in coming weeks, and sadly, you won't be able to get your hands on one just yet. Still, it's only a matter of time before we're all whizzing around on hoverboards, in flying cars and all sorts of other modes of transport previously only thought possible in science-fiction books and movies.
We'll learn more about the company's plans for the prototype on October 21, the day Marty McFly, Jennifer Parker and Doc Brown went back to the future in the second installment of the film. Maybe Lexus will have some drone dog-walkers to show off as well.
