knight rider online

I was watching Killer KITT earlyer and it got me thinking about how I used to think alot about how things worked when I was growing up.


I realy liked the seasion 4 KITT as at that stage I allways saw KITT being so full of gadgets and tech that there was hardly any room left inside him to add any more.

I thought I would share with you some of how I thought KITT worked.

There were the bits Kitt had added in earlyer series, the grappling hook, oil slick, smoke screen, fire extinguisher, flip around number plate, auto roof, eject seats and loads more besides. All these items would need tanks to hold the compressed gas to fire the grapiling hook, a tank for the oil slick ect. The smoke screen would be a bit smaller than the other items as all they would have had to to was fire desil or intifreese into the hot end can of the exaust.

Just the parts that poped out or changed shape would have taken alot of room. ie SPM, C mode, EBS ect. All needing electric motors to make them move.


The Dash in sesion 4 still had the wow factor but it was simpler and easyer to read.

The single screen I thought looked better than the twin screens in sesion 1 and 2.
The vox box looked way better esp having Oil Press insted of just OIL, and the Sat com light to me Made Kitt seem even more hi tech.
I never did quite work out where the buttons for SPM were fitted, i gessed they were in a centrol concel under the main dash, sort of where the radio would be on a normal car.

SPM I realy liked I know alot of people say it wasnt needed but rember this was a time where transforming things were very popular.

When watching KITT in SPM i used to think on how it would work.
Heres what I sorta worked out at the age of 10.
Starting at the front, the nose splitting into two parts was to apply down pressure to the front wheels much like a formular one car, the side wings were allso to aid in this down force and the tips would move with the front wheels much like a planes flaps.
The hump on the bonnet raseing was to allow more air into the turbine, to make the air box bigger so to speak thus forcing more air into the turbine. Sort of acting as the ramjet.
The vents at the sides of KITT at the front were for cooling the extra heat genirated in the engine would have to vented off down the sides of the car.
The vents behind the doors were extra air intakes for a secondry tubine engine which would give KITT a extra boost when needed.
The rear section that poped up at the rear was a cobination of a spoiler providing more down force and the tail lights to move up to reveal extra exausts/afterburners.
These would provie a sort of jet boost effect propelling KITT forward alot faster than if he was just using the rear wheels as drive.
The section under the rear bumper that folded down was also for providing down force, but fitted above would be a series of radiators and fans to provide more cooling for the exaust systems. Taking advantage of any air forced under the car.

So thats sorta how I think the poppy out bits work but what about driving at those speeds?

As good as a driver Micheal may be he isnt going to have the reaction time to drive at 200 mph and higher.

So when Pursuit mode or SPM are activated Kitt and Micheal are driving together, Micheal would be basicly poinitning KITT where he wants to go, KITT would be scaninng the road and making ajustments to the suspention, aceliration and slight ajustments to direction as to the best way to travel at that speed.
Kitt would also be scanning ahead for any obstrurions and hacking into any trafic maingment systems to allow them a clear path safely.

I kinda think that when KITT was distroyed by golioth the ram jet Micheal bodged onto KITT was a early version of SPM, ie he got kitt running with the ramjet the output of power was difficult to control as it could only be used as a sort of on off swich.
So Kitt only had full power or nothing, proving very difficult to drive.
Also the ramjet produced temps that his exaust system couldnt handle, so later with SPM the extra exausts and vents could cool much better.
So they took the ram jet idea and improved on it making it useiable for SPM.

Well that my ramblings for the day.

Sorry about the spelling but am having a bad dislexia day.

Does any one elce have ideas on how KITT worked?

Hey mabie we could make a complete guide as to how KITT could work.

Gadjet

I always figured that KITT assisted Michael in Pursuit and Super Pursuit mode too. But I think that was also mentioned in the show? I mean aside from the pilot where KITT went around that semi before we knew of KITT.

I wondered how the sliding t-tops worked would one be a bit higherthan the other and just slide? some episode they would lift up and some would look like they were sliding.

Gadjet wrote:As good as a driver Micheal may be he isnt going to have the reaction time to drive at 200 mph and higher.

So when Pursuit mode or SPM are activated Kitt and Micheal are driving together, Micheal would be basicly poinitning KITT where he wants to go, KITT would be scaninng the road and making ajustments to the suspention, aceliration and slight ajustments to direction as to the best way to travel at that speed.
Kitt would also be scanning ahead for any obstrurions and hacking into any trafic maingment systems to allow them a clear path safely.

You took the words right out of my mouth Gadjet!KITT has stuff like Stability Control,and such things like that.

I pretty much agree with everything here. I like the Seasons 3-4 dashboard much better. I think it's an overall better fit than the white striped Seasons 1-2 dashboard. I also hated its octagonal frames around the monitors. I also understand why a lot of people never liked Super Pursuit Mode or thought it wasn't necessary, but I am a fan of it mainly because it made a lot of Season 4 episodes feel more climactic. If anything, my only complaints about it would be the lack of seam lines and the fact that it was used too often.

I believed the turbo boost featured worked by providing a brief bust of speed which would push the air up underneath the front noose thus lifting KITT into the air.

Nah, it didn't because there were instances where KITT did Turbo Boost from a standstill position and while in reverse. I always assumed it was due to the trajectory of the, I don't wanna say exhaust or thrusters but you know what I mean of KITT's turbine engine.

The impression I got was there was two different turbo boosts. I can't verify it but I felt like there was a speed turbo boost and a jump turbo boost even though the same button is pushed.

It's all TV physics anyway.

Judd wrote:The impression I got was there was two different turbo boosts. I can't verify it but I felt like there was a speed turbo boost and a jump turbo boost even though the same button is pushed.

It's all TV physics anyway.

Yea Series one they sorta used turbo boost for jumps and a boost of speed.

Later the speed boost was activated when Pursuit mode was engaged.

As for how turbo boost worked I always thought the turbines output was directed downwoods and the suspention would compress then extend very quickly at the same time as the tubines power was reliced.

I seam to rember a eppisode where Michel tells KITT to reverve his turbo booster.

Gadjet

Judd wrote:The impression I got was there was two different turbo boosts. I can't verify it but I felt like there was a speed turbo boost and a jump turbo boost even though the same button is pushed.

It's all TV physics anyway.

Turbo Boost had a Trajectory Guidance System, used in episodes like Blind Spot and (if I remember correctly) Big Iron. It allowed Kitt to choose the angle of the Turbo Boost. Probably if this angle was set to Zero, Turbo Boost would manifest itself as a burst of speed...