How Are You Planning To Handle Drive Throughs, Toll Booths, Atm's, Etc...?

[Chaz]

Dang! You must live near one of the coasts. Here in the Midwest, we're a couple years behind the trends...but we like it that way. "For now", we still have cuties on rollerskates. Not looking forward to the PC people ruining for us. Next thing you're going to tell me is bell-bottom jeans and tube tops are out of style!

I live in Springfield Mo, so I am not by the a coast.

 

[NSTG8R]

I live in Springfield Mo, so I am not by the a coast.

Just a few hours away! Definitely not by the coast.

 

[MaxToreador]

Ah the drive-thru, one of the reasons I think if it wasn't for price and weight (namely the complete lack of balance it would cause) that the Koenigsegg style door would have some legitimacy on an Elio. Can't reach the window? Oh let me just get the door completely out of the way and step out with no fear of scratching anything.

Tuner? No, fat American that wants to use the drive-thru.

 

[ross]

When use the drive through, I place my order at the speaker, drive forward to pay, pull ahead to get my food and place my order on the passenger seat beside me. With no place to put my food in this narrow cockpit, it might just be easier to go inside to eat. It might also be difficult to pass food to the backseat passenger. We will all learn together.

 

[Cedartick]

With the money I save on gas...I can afford to stop, park, and go inside like a big shot!
It will be fun to see if anyone notices the Elio.
I agree with rmcelroy, I always go in anway...cawz
Like they said in the movies...you always get f*&^k!d in the drive thru!

I once ordered pancakes at a drive thru. When I arrived at work, the pancakes where nice and hot, but they did not give me syrup. The gave me ketchup.

 

[Jeff Bowlsby]

Will an Elio be able to go through a carwash? Don't they all have center tracks that the rear wheel would conflict with or a left hand track for front/rear left side wheels?

 

[NSTG8R]

Will an Elio be able to go through a carwash? Don't they all have center tracks that the rear wheel would conflict with?

The ones around here are the drive-in brushless sprayer type, but I know the kind you're referring to...those would definitely be a problem. Probably stick to the 'drop some quarters and spray/brush it yourself' type.

 

[Dallas B. Sims]

It'll be weird having so much space on the left and right side while driving on the expressway, I'm always going to be right on the center of the lane.

I've driven motorcycles and you can train yourself to drive outside of your norm. I steer the rear end of a ladder truck from center mounted cab. I keep a constant eye on my mirrors to maintain the center of my lane. Granted, failure to maintain the center of my lane could cause catastrophic results due to the couple of inches of clearance. I have no doubt I will use my mirrors to stay centered out of habit.

 

[RUCRAYZE]

I've driven motorcycles and you can train yourself to drive outside of your norm. I steer the rear end of a ladder truck from center mounted cab. I keep a constant eye on my mirrors to maintain the center of my lane. Granted, failure to maintain the center of my lane could cause catastrophic results due to the couple of inches of clearance. I have no doubt I will use my mirrors to stay centered out of habit.

That called a "tiller Man"? open cab??, thought they went out with sliding down the pole!!

 

[goofyone]

Will an Elio be able to go through a carwash? Don't they all have center tracks that the rear wheel would conflict with or a left hand track for front/rear left side wheels?

This is a good question and one that I have been paying attention to this since someone brought it up a while back and I do believe I have come up with some good answers. The simple answer I have found is that the Elio is likely compatible with most 'Touchless' automated car wash systems as found in many gas stations, may not be compatible with the brush type of automated car wash, and is definitely not compatible with the one-sided tracked systems.

The Elio would not be compatible with the kind of car wash that uses a wheel track system on one side of the vehicle to pull a vehicle through regardless of any other possible issues. The reason is that you simply can not pull any reverse trike using only one front corner as you would end up dragging the vehicle.
So in the picture below you can see that in this car wash, as the Elio is wide tracked the rear tire would be where the license plate is, there is room in the center for the rear tire to ride on concrete. However this would not matter because if you tried to pull the Elio using only one front wheel the other wheels would actually roll backwards until the center rear tire struck the track system and would then either be dragged along or jumped the track and caused even issues.

For the drive-in/drive-through automatic car washes, as typically found at gas stations, I have found that the Elio could safely be driven into most of those in my area however only the 'Touchless' systems would likely actually work well due to the position of the cleaning brushes and how narrow the Elio is. Most of this type in my area either have a smooth floor with drainage to the side(s) or the drain is a heavy cast iron grate which could be run over by just about any vehicle let alone one as light as the Elio and I am sure this is by design.

Normal brush type:

Touchless:

I noticed one or two that had a narrow separation bar in the center however I did not see this as an issue as it would be possible to just put the rear wheel to the left or right or this bar. A handful of these in my area would not work as they had larger raised center partitions, narrow flimsy center drains, and/or other obstruction in the center of the lane.