Patent ID: 6976307

Claim:
A method of designing and manufacturing vehicles comprising: designing and manufacturing a plurality of vehicle chassis conforming to a predefined vehicle body-chassis interface system wherein mechanical and electrical connection components are required to be in predetermined spatial positions relative to each other in a body-attachment interface on a chassis and in complementary predetermined spatial positions relative to each other in a corresponding chassis-attachment interface on any body to be attached to the chassis; concurrently with said designing and manufacturing a plurality of vehicle chassis, designing and manufacturing a plurality of vehicle bodies corresponding to said predefined vehicle body-chassis interface system, such that said chassis and bodies are designed and manufactured in parallel; said vehicle chassis and vehicle bodies being designed and manufactured independently of each other; wherein said chassis are designed and manufactured to include a structural frame; a suspension system mounted to the structural frame; at least three wheels rotatably mounted to the suspension system; an energy conversion system mounted to the structural frame, openly connected to at least one wheel, and controllable by wire; a by-wire braking system mounted to the frame and operably connected to at least one wheel; a by-wire steering system mounted to the frame and operably connected to at least one wheel; and a computer operatively connected to the energy conversion system, braking system, and steering system.