Japanese ‘Lunar Cruiser’ Named After Toyota Land Cruiser
We’re no stranger to amazing builds, but this Toyota Lunar Cruiser rig is totally out of this world. Also maybe literally.
The Toyota Land Cruiser has conquered some of the toughest terrain on earth. So it’s only natural that the Japanese space program, the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, would want to instill some of mighty machine’s can-do spirit into its forthcoming moon vehicle. Dubbed the Lunar Cruiser, the vehicle will be developed in tandem with Toyota, and if everything goes according to plan, we’ll see a test mule in four years’ time.
While it’s still early in the development cycle, we love the idea of a Toyota on the moon. But when we initially heard about this project? We were struck by two distinctly different trains of thought.
The first involved our own country’s exploration of the celestial body. More specifically, why weren’t the astronauts of the Apollo program rolling around in Willys-branded rovers? Seems like the marketing folks at Kaiser Motors were sleeping there. The second was how terrifying the prospect of a Land Rover lunar vehicle would be. Yikes. At least the explorers would have a cool interior to chill in while they ran out of air.
As you can imagine, when it came time to choose a moniker for the vehicle, there was a public relations angle to be considered, and the reputation of Toyota’s venerable off-roader made it a natural choice. Here’s a relevant bit from the press release:
The name, which references the Toyota Land Cruiser SUV, was decided upon based on the quality, durability, and reliability expected of the pressurized lunar rover, and the concept that Toyota has long held to for the Land Cruiser, which was for people to ‘come back alive,’ especially true for the lunar rover as it will be traversing the harsh environment of the moon’s surface.
In the renders of the six-wheeler, the wide front end actually recalls the FJ Cruiser more than the Land Cruiser, but since this rig is designed for extraterrestrial ventures, we think it’s OK if function takes a back seat to form. Anything else, and you’d have a Land Rover situation on your hands.
While a large bank of solar cells dominates the Lunar Cruiser’s left side, primary drive will come from hydrogen fuel cells, as the lack of an atmosphere obviously means a traditional internal combustion won’t work. Technical details are few and far between at this point, but the most exciting part of this news is how JAXA and its partners envision the future of humans on the moon.
JAXA and Toyota have been discussing laterally with a variety of industries via study meetings based on the theme of ‘a lunar society pioneered by the manned pressurized rover’ (also known as Team Japan Study Meeting). The meetings focus on how the manned pressurized rover becomes the starting point of a vision of a future lunar surface-based society while discussing the challenges associated with the creation of this type of society.
If you feel cheated — as we do — that you’ve lived your whole life without not having once taken a vacation on the moon, then this is somewhat encouraging news. Perhaps someday, when we’re very, very old, we’ll be able to hop on a rocket, and get the opportunity to play around on a surface with 1/16th of the earth’s gravity.
Just think of all the activities which would be next-level awesome without the restrictive pull of gravity! Even if you’re out of shape, you could dunk a basketball like Michael Jordan!
Like anything space related, the time frame here is pretty protracted. According to the schedule, we should see a full-scale development tester by 2024, but there’s still the whole problem of how it actually gets to the moon. Obviously, that’s not an insignificant hurtle, and the vehicle that’ll take it there has yet to be designed.
So while there’s bound to be some great footage of this baby running around in the next few years, actual extraterrestrial use is much further out. But we’ll be keeping our fingers crossed that this most far-out of Toyota trucks doesn’t have to wait too long to earn its keep.
Photos: Toyota