Giving the sQuba the "Q Branch" Touch

Like all Rinspeed designs, the sQuba wasn't built from scratch. It's actually based on a Lotus Elise sports car, a lightweight, agile car that has a distinctive look. Swiss automotive engineering firm Esoro worked on the design while Hornschuch created visual details such as embossed shark shapes. The rear light assemblies have integrated storage compartments for storing items like a cell phone or wallet.

sQuba on land
Photo courtesy of Rinspeed
The sQuba's body is based on the Lotus Elise sports car.

Rinspeed wasn't content to design the world's first submarine sports car -- the company wanted to push technology even further. To that end, the sQuba utilizes an Ibeo laser-guided autonomous driving system. A laser scanner at the front of the car can follow the road, identify lanes and see obstacles, including humans. The car will drive automatically along a road and stop if someone steps into its path.

If that wasn't enough, the car even has a fancy license plate. Flipping louvers switch the words on the plate from "sQuba" to "ZeroEmission" and back again. Why build a car that goes underwater if you can't have some bling?

sQuba license plat
photo courtesy of Rinspeed
sQuba license plate. Fancy from end to end.

While on land, the sQuba rolls on Pirelli tires (205/40 R17 front, 225/40 R18 rear) mounted to AEZ-designed forged alloy wheels, specially crafted to be lightweight and offer low aquatic resistance.

So will you be able to test drive a sQuba at your local dealer? Probably not. Rinspeed has no immediate plans to offer production model sQubas. The only existing car cost $1.5 million. However, Rinderknecht can see the sQuba being marketed to the very rich (the Richard Bransons of the world, in other words) at a cost "cheaper than a Rolls-Royce" [source: CNN].

Aquatic Cars of the Past
Perhaps the most famous aquatic car is the Quandt Amphicar, which was sold throughout the mid-1960s. Built in Germany, the Amphicar was capable of cruising on the surface, though it was not a high-performance vehicle. Less than 5,000 were produced, most of them for the U.S. market. About 10 percent of them remain, and they have a dedicated following of Amphicar enthusiasts [source: Amphicars.com].

The first truly high-performance aquatic car was the Gibbs Aquada. Billionaire Richard Branson set a world record for crossing the English Channel in an Aquada in 2005 [source: Associated Content]. The Rinspeed Splash subsequently broke that record.

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