Honda files a patent for a drone equipped motorcycle
Honda has filed what is the weirdest patent of 2021 by far, with a motorcycle that is equipped with a drone that’s mounted in its tail
SINCE the dawn of the motorcycle age, Honda has pretty much been one of the most innovative manufacturers on the planet.
Although with every good idea, there are probably twenty that get left on the cutting room floor. Here’s one of them.
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The patent unearthed by Moto.it in Italy, shows an electric motorcycle with cooling ducts that run from the fairing right the way through to the tail of the bike. Mounted in the tail of some fan blades to try and help the cooling flow of air. Nothing to weird so far, in fact, Benelli used to fit small fans in the tail of the Tornado 1130 to keep the under-seat radiator in check.
It’s only when you realise that the small fans are not just there to help circulate the air, but they are in fact a deployable drone that can be launched from the tail of the bike to follow the machine as it goes.
As it stands, we are a little bit stumped as to what the drone’s use is, the patent is very ambiguous as to the machine's actual function, and to make a guess you have to get pretty creative.
It could be some form of an emergency beacon, helping to trace a crashed rider’s location if they and their bike have strayed from the road. Or it could simply be for the purposes of self-gratification; in this narcissistic world we live in, what influencer wouldn’t want a ‘pet’ drone to follow them and take airborne selfies!
All joking aside, we are probably way off the mark on this one, and the true meaning of the HonDrone (yes we made that up) is probably only known by a few key individuals within the Honda family.
Simon (AKA Toad) has been working within the motorcycle industry for more than twelve years, and a member of the motorcyclist family since birth. Growing up around British-built single and twins, it was inevitable that a life on two wheels was on the cards, from a very early age!
