Let the Apple Car rumors roll on. Apple has been granted a patent (number 10,308,290) for a “vehicle floor and subassemblies thereof.”
Apple apparently thinks that the floors of current automobiles aren’t durable and protective enough. The tech giant wants to provide a floor structure that distributes forces from outboard impacts and/or minimizes a height thereof to maximize space for other uses (e.g., battery storage).
Here’s the summary of the invention: “A floor assembly for a passenger vehicle includes a lower floor assembly and an upper floor subassembly coupled to and positioned above the lower floor assembly. The lower floor assembly includes one or more compartments for containing one or more batteries. The upper floor subassembly is a sandwich structure composite.”
Of course, Apple files for — and is granted — lots of patents by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office. Many are for inventions that never see the light of day. However, you never can tell which ones will materialize in a real product.
