LocostUSA.com

I'll be there, Tom, and I'm sure I'll be findable. Ask any of the staff where MAX is parked, and i'll probably be nearby.

I had a good time at the Maker Faire, except I was standing outside talking for so long that I sunburned the inside of my lower lip. That's a first for me.

One odd thing: I am (seriously) considering changing my business name. "Hey look, honey, a kinetic vehicle. Where are the pedals?" Kinetic sculpture races are sufficiently the In Thing in Northern Cal that people are genuinely confused. I explain that Kinetic Vehicles is my business name; kinetic doesn't mean you pedal it, it means it moves, kinetic sculptures are sculptures that move, and when I'm done the say, "Yeah, but why do you call it Kinetic Vehicles if there aren't any pedals?" I'll bet I got that once every 20 minutes for two days.

Any good name ideas? Not for a car, for a business.

You could always go with my favorite from Newhart. The 3 brothers Larry, Darrell and the other brother Darrell had a business called "Anything for a Buck". Or you could go with "No Pedal Cars Here- Keep on Moving LLC"

But seriously, Kinetic Vehicles" just sounds good considering you move from platform to platform. Bike engined builds to turbo-diesel to bio-turbo diesel. Who knows if electric or hybrid is next? It is good that your name isn't Locost-something. Your designs always are changing. Consider the Whippet followed by Locost followed by aeroMax. It is like not only your cars are kinetic but so is your business. So, if my vote counts, I vote for staying "Kinetic Vehicles".

Yo, Jack-
I'm with Chuck... Kinetic Vehicles is a perfectly good name, it expresses the nature of your business just fine. No matter what you name it, there will be people that don't understand or some that will want to tell you what it "actually" means. Perhaps you should get business cards with the definition of "kinetic" printed on the back, followed by the words "It doesn't say PEDALS!" or something...


JDK

I'm with GonzoRacer et. al. on this one. Not one of the many definitions across many pages of a Kinetic google search mention pedals.
__________________________________________________________

ki·net·ic/kəˈnetik/
Adjective:

Kinetic energy is energy of motion. The kinetic energy of an object is the energy it possesses because of its motion. The kinetic energy* of a point mass m is given by

Kinetic Energy = 1/2 m*v^2

Kinetic energy is an expression of the fact that a moving object can do work on anything it hits; it quantifies the amount of work the object could do as a result of its motion. The total mechanical energy of an object is the sum of its kinetic energy and potential energy.The total energy of an isolated system is subject to the conservation of energy principle.
__________________________________________________________

Sounds to me like the people you met have some local politically correct new definition. Don't lower the meaning of your [business] name to satisfy a local fad. (Although I'm the guy that had an over sized wind up "key" on the Corvair motor at the back of my VW framed dune buggy.)

Stick with the name you're known by. If someone wants to produce kinetic energy by pedaling a car let them try it for a week going to/from work. Besides you have pedals in your car.

This is scary. I'm agreeing with Gonzo, AGAIN. Anyway, don't be part of the dumping down of the country. It's not your fault some people are ignorant.

"That's why I need a name that's cutting-edge, like CutCo, EdgeCom, Interslice." -Homer Simpson

While I agree that I like 'Kinetic Vehicles' for your current Locosty business, I also understand that if you actually want to sell something you also need to grab the attention of your target market. What about just abbreviating it to KV? Hmmm, the KV Max...On second thought, you might start having to field an entirely different genre of questions from people that don't read it closely enough.

Personally I find it silliness in the extreme when a group tries to co-op an existing term, e.g. lawyers and the use of the term "Esq."
I ended up having to give a language lesson to a divorce attorney several years ago. .. (I ask you, who own's "0" and "1"?)
I suppose that they expect Kinetic Aerospace to be building pedal powered launch vehicles

There are kilovolts [KV] coming out of ignition coils. But Jack is/was running a Diesel so he'd be back in trouble with the name police again.

Then the FCC would want an electrostatic field intensity test done on his car to assure that he is in compliance with the rules.

But this label on the car should help,
"Handle with Extreme Care: This Product Contains Minute Electrically Charged Particles Moving at Velocities in Excess of Five Hundred Million Miles per Hour."
___________________________________
Disclaimer,
Extracted from:
A Call for More Scientific Truth in Product Warning Labels by Susan Hewitt and Edward Subitzky from the Journal of Irreproducible Results, Vol. 36, No. 1

pedaless kinetic vehicles, sound like an amaising scientific name but i guess the idiots would think it powered by the rotation of the planet or by water.

you could try "vehicular kinetics"

Okay, that's enough, y'all convinced me. I'll not worry about a rename for the moment.
Roger that. My business name is a joke; there's Kinetic Aerospace, and Kinetic Vehicles, and the parent company is Kinetic Ltd. So named because both KA and KV produce devices that don't weigh very much and don't go very fast; hence, they have limited kinetic energy. Kinetic Limited (tha-DUP).

Or I could just call them K-cars for short. Nope, been done. But maybe it'd work; the K 7 and K 11 and K Mk1. Attention K Mk shoppers!

The name probs are; 1) People in general don't understand it, 2) People who don't understand the name feel stupid when I explain it to them, 3) It's clumsy to say, and 4) It's hard to spell, which I'm sure costs me internet hits.

Arg

I love the name but I do have to agree with you on the spelling though. I am quite literate, but it never fails that my fingers spell it differently than my brain does.

Keep the name... buy up all the alternate domains that it could be spelled like and let it roll.

Cheers to your continued growth and success!!

KS

"KV Racing" has already been taken.

The "K" is Kevin Kalkhoven, who owns something called "Cosworth". Cosworth supplies stuff to Caterham, which of course is caught up in the current Lotus debacle.

KV Racing used to be the "Lotus team" in IndyCar, and we all thought that Lotus would use Cosworth motors, but that is yet another chapter in the Lotus debacle -- Lotus went with Judd, and those motors are missing at least 100 hp over the competition this weekend at Indy.

BTW, Kalkhoven is a helluva nice guy.

The "V" is Jimmy Vasser.

AFB or Anything for a Buck is taken here in AZ and I believe California. I know the guy that started it.

Use initials. It's a proven fact that people like initials better than full names.

Tom

Good point, T. I'm thinking KVR for Kinetic Vehicle Research, since......and fortunately it's chosen acronym is KVRT (T for Technology) so the likelihood of confusion is low. KVD (Kinetic Vehicle Design) KVC (Corp.) KVL (Ltd.) but gosh, every acronym has its users already, I'm not likely to find three letters that haven't been taken. For example, KVR is everything from Kickapoo Valley Reserve to Kuusankoski–Voikka Railway, with Klive's Video and Records thrown in there for good measure.

JMcC

Your description of initials reminds me of the early days of domain name registries.... what few 2-, 3- and 4-letter domains (ie, gm.com) weren't snapped up by the rightful owners, soon were snapped up by cybersquatters.