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At last - the flying car!

For years when I was a kid, I wanted the flying car to become a reality. Then I realized that with how shitty people are at driving, I'd live in constant fear if those same people were allowed in the air. :p

This looks kinda cool. I've seem plenty of flying car concepts before, although I think they've mostly been jet based vertical lift off. This seems to be taking a more practical and basic approach, although that seems to make it both a car and a plane separately, rather than what people think of as a "flying car" like Back To The Future.
 
BlobVanDam said:
For years when I was a kid, I wanted the flying car to become a reality. Then I realized that with how shitty people are at driving, I'd live in constant fear if those same people were allowed in the air. :p
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So would I. Imagine the risk: at any time, a car could come hurtling OUT OF THE SKY and fall on your house, or on you. :eek:

And since there are no such things as lanes in the sky, what's to keep cars from just going wherever they wanted? You would have to have all flying cars controlled exclusively by computers, and even that's a maybe.
 
Avionics technology has advanced to the point where a flying car could be kept straight and level and on a designated course without human intervention--as well as automatically navigating around other vehicles in the air. The sky is pretty big and it's three-dimensional, which is why midair collisions are quite rare.

As for a flying car falling on your house, we could just put a failsafe into all flying cars that will cause them to explode and vaporize in the event of a malfunction. Problem solved.
 
I don't see much of a need for cars that fly, but how about ones that *float*? Just a few inches off the ground, like landspeeders in SW. Would sure come in handy in the winter. And much less dangerous than flying cars.
 
This is more like a driving plane than a flying car. A Sport license will be required to fly it, which is the easiest one to get (it probably costs about $5000 in training on average, over the course of 6-12 months).

Mr. Laser Beam said:
And since there are no such things as lanes in the sky, what's to keep cars from just going wherever they wanted?
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Nothing. That's the beauty of it!

Well, not entirely nothing. Airspace restrictions still apply, of course, as do the recommended VFR altitudes (odd thousand+500 going east, even thousand+500 going west). Altitude separation is of course one of the easiest ways to keep planes away from each other. Also as a Light Sport Aircraft, this plane will probably not be approved for IFR use in the weather, but I can't be sure about that.
 
By the way, I cannot wait for the first time one of these things gets in a high-speed police chase.
 
Hm, I thought I posted in this thread, but it seems I forgot to click “Post”. I had written that the project wouldn't be that popular because it is worse than a car and worse than a small aeroplane, which is a general problem when you're trying to create hybrids, and you'd have to get closer to a real car and to real aeroplane to make it a tempting offer. Thought I'd be willing to buy one just for the awesomeness of it.

Now though, I'm just thinking how awesome could this thing be if the following thing happen:
1. A technology for hypercapacitors get invented and allows this to go all-electric with little weight addition and an increased flying and driving range.
2. The air speed of this thing gets doubled or quadrupled. If you forget the ability to take a short cut, going at 172 km/h is not that much of an improvement.
3. Short speedways for landing and take-off get added beside highways. Is that very unsafe?
4. Make them 5-seated and allowing heavier load. I guess that would be quite taxing on the wings, but still doable, right?


(Now, make it fully pressurized, put a fusion engine and a booster inside, and make it go above LEO and back, and I'd be nearly satisfied. :D :D :D :D )
 
YellowSubmarine said:
1. A technology for hypercapacitors get invented and allows this to go all-electric with little weight addition and an increased flying and driving range.
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There actually is an all-electric Cessna in development. It only flies for an hour or two on one charge, but that's enough to make it a much cheaper alternative for flight training.

2. The air speed of this thing gets doubled or quadrupled. If you forget the ability to take a short cut, going at 172 km/h is not that much of an improvement.
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A cruise speed of 93 knots is a bit slower than the most small planes, but it's in the same general ballpark. Only a few like the Corvalis stand out (maxing out at 225 knots at altitude), but that quadruples the price. A lot of people are used to thinking about airplanes as traveling very fast, but to get much more than 150 knots you mostly need to go into twins or jets, both of which are a considerable price bump. This is a reasonable airspeed for the vehicle. I'd like it if they could push it to maybe 120 though.....

3. Short speedways for landing and take-off get added beside highways. Is that very unsafe?
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Normal highway speeds would probably be sufficient for takeoff. The danger would be hitting cars in the adjacent lanes as you extend the wings. Similar problems for landing, especially since that is usually done at low power settings and the approach probably would not be audible to other vehicles. That's why these will be required to use actual runways.

4. Make them 5-seated and allowing heavier load. I guess that would be quite taxing on the wings, but still doable, right?
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That's not going to happen soon, primarily because of the legal hurtles. Even if the powerplant and structure can take it, this thing is certificated as a Light Sport Aircraft. One of the requirements of an LSA is that it cannot have more than 2 seats.

I rather doubt it's aerodynamically possible anyway. You don't find many 5-seaters short of twins. Even the Corvalis only takes 4. Passenger weights add up.
 
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Lindley said:
This is more like a driving plane than a flying car.
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Exactly. It's really a roadable aircraft -- a concept that's been around since the 1920s. Many experimental vehicles of this type have been built. Not one has ever seen mass production.
 
Picard at the wheel, not quite flying but shark jumping:
Sharkjump.jpg
 
If you want cars or hover baords like you saw in BTTF2, somebody has to come of with an economical and compact way to produce anti-gravity. Once that is achived the sky will no longer be the limit anymore. :)
 
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