A Flying Car; Really!

[American Horse]

At first this thing seems too ridiculous to really fly, and then it actually does, and does it very well.

Flying Car a Step Closer to Reality - VIDEO


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[Ringel05]

That actually pretty cool!

 

[Mr. H.]

There was a TV show in the 50's or 60's about a guy with a flying car (no it wasn't his mother). It was one of my faves. I'm sure the technology has improved but the concept has been around for decades.

 

[American Horse]

That actually pretty cool!

It looks dangerous as hell! The prop in back where it really had to be with the canard in front would seem to make it highly problematic to control, It probably needs a computer assist. If it lost power, might gliding control suffer?

I wouldn't want to get in one of these things unless it had a parachute to bring it down safely.

Back in the early years of flight (or at least back in the 50's) it was theorized that by gong 3-dimensional there would be a whole lot more room in the air than on highways so it would be safer.

But now we know it ends up not working out that way since airplanes tend to need airports to land on and take off from, so they concentrate over them and we have too many near misses. And that's reality even though we now have planes carrying many hundreds of passengers instead of maybe two or three at a time.

 

[Ringel05]

That actually pretty cool!

It looks dangerous as hell! The prop in back where it really had to be with the canard in front would seem to make it highly problematic to control, It probably needs a computer assist. If it lost power, might gliding control suffer?

I wouldn't want to get in one of these things unless it had a parachute to bring it down safely.

Back in the early years of flight (or at least back in the 50's) it was theorized that by gong 3-dimensional there would be a whole lot more room in the air than on highways so it would be safer.

But now we know it ends up not working out that way since airplanes tend to need airports to land on and take off from, so they concentrate over them and we have too many near misses. And that's reality even though we now have planes carrying many hundreds of passengers instead of maybe two or three at a time.

Yup, there is always a downside. Driving is dangerous and vehicles are mostly concentrated on roads. Calculate the near misses every day on the highways alone.
The car is still pretty cool, ugly as sin but still cool.

 

[Oddball]

That actually pretty cool!

It looks dangerous as hell! The prop in back where it really had to be with the canard in front would seem to make it highly problematic to control, It probably needs a computer assist. If it lost power, might gliding control suffer?

I wouldn't want to get in one of these things unless it had a parachute to bring it down safely.

Back in the early years of flight (or at least back in the 50's) it was theorized that by gong 3-dimensional there would be a whole lot more room in the air than on highways so it would be safer.

But now we know it ends up not working out that way since airplanes tend to need airports to land on and take off from, so they concentrate over them and we have too many near misses. And that's reality even though we now have planes carrying many hundreds of passengers instead of maybe two or three at a time.

Probably safe in a glide...It's nearly impossible to stall canard designs.

 

[American Horse]

That actually pretty cool!

It looks dangerous as hell! The prop in back where it really had to be with the canard in front would seem to make it highly problematic to control, It probably needs a computer assist. If it lost power, might gliding control suffer?

I wouldn't want to get in one of these things unless it had a parachute to bring it down safely.

Back in the early years of flight (or at least back in the 50's) it was theorized that by gong 3-dimensional there would be a whole lot more room in the air than on highways so it would be safer.

But now we know it ends up not working out that way since airplanes tend to need airports to land on and take off from, so they concentrate over them and we have too many near misses. And that's reality even though we now have planes carrying many hundreds of passengers instead of maybe two or three at a time.

Probably safe in a glide...It's nearly impossible to stall canard designs.

I'm not so sure about that last. The first designs were very dangerous until some computer aid was built in. And when they run out of gas... well...(Remember John Denver)

 

[American Horse]

That actually pretty cool!

It looks dangerous as hell! The prop in back where it really had to be with the canard in front would seem to make it highly problematic to control, It probably needs a computer assist. If it lost power, might gliding control suffer?

I wouldn't want to get in one of these things unless it had a parachute to bring it down safely.

Back in the early years of flight (or at least back in the 50's) it was theorized that by gong 3-dimensional there would be a whole lot more room in the air than on highways so it would be safer.

But now we know it ends up not working out that way since airplanes tend to need airports to land on and take off from, so they concentrate over them and we have too many near misses. And that's reality even though we now have planes carrying many hundreds of passengers instead of maybe two or three at a time.

Yup, there is always a downside. Driving is dangerous and vehicles are mostly concentrated on roads. Calculate the near misses every day on the highways alone.
The car is still pretty cool, ugly as sin but still cool.

Now there you have something; we drive cars down state roads and the combined speed is something like 150 mph, and we often times pass only about 4' feet apart; that's a near miss, but a controlled near miss. And we do it in heavy rain and at night when all we can see is the light from their headlights and a bare nebulous image of the road for reference.

 

[Oddball]

It looks dangerous as hell! The prop in back where it really had to be with the canard in front would seem to make it highly problematic to control, It probably needs a computer assist. If it lost power, might gliding control suffer?

I wouldn't want to get in one of these things unless it had a parachute to bring it down safely.

Back in the early years of flight (or at least back in the 50's) it was theorized that by gong 3-dimensional there would be a whole lot more room in the air than on highways so it would be safer.

But now we know it ends up not working out that way since airplanes tend to need airports to land on and take off from, so they concentrate over them and we have too many near misses. And that's reality even though we now have planes carrying many hundreds of passengers instead of maybe two or three at a time.

Probably safe in a glide...It's nearly impossible to stall canard designs.

I'm not so sure about that last. The first designs were very dangerous until some computer aid was built in. And when they run out of gas... well...(Remember John Denver)

The first designs were "dangerous" because a canard layout wasn't the norm....They have differing handling characteristics, as do tricycle vs. taildragger configurations.

Computer aids and fly-by-wire in canard designs are more for weight savings and relative ease of operation, more so than any inherent stability problems.

 

[Mad Scientist]

I'm not so sure about that last. The first designs were very dangerous until some computer aid was built in. And when they run out of gas... well...(Remember John Denver)

The Wright Flyer was a canard and that worked out just fine didn't it?

But let's be reality here. Would you want typical L.A. or New York drivers flying around? Or the drunk illegal aliens?

 

[HUGGY]

Ya don't NEED airports. When I was a smugglin I used to land in streets way out in the toolys all the time.. It would be great for cross country flights. From the air you can see that there are stretches of real good long and straight hyways with no traffic at all. One could fly the thing ...spot a town with a gas station within a few miles of the hyway..land ..drive the puippy to the gas station and drive back out to the hyway and voila!..back on your way.

It would be great for rural life. Horrible for the city. The biggest problem I see technically is the 4 wheels. That configuration is very unstable at landing. If it was a tricycle it would be a lot safer.

Id'd fly it though..no problem.

I wonder what it's range is?

What are it's V-Speeds?

 

[Big Black Dog]

Just a couple of questions come to mind about the flying car:
If I buy one of these new flying cars -

(1) What do I do if my wife says to just circle the parking lot until she comes out of the drug store?
(2) Will I still be required to have a Speed Pass to pay the tolls on all of Illinois' toll roads?
(3) Will there be a speed limit for flying it the same as a speed limit if I'm driving it on the road?
(4) How will I ever play hanky-panky with the wife at 1 mile up? She refuses to be a member of any kind of a club like that.

Can anybody assist with these questions?

 

[HUGGY]

I just went out for an erand and whilst drivin the Caddy I was contemplating this aircraft/automobile...

OK two major problems..wheels/landing gear way to short.. in any kind of a cross wind with gusts there will be a lot of accidents with a wing tip hitting the ground on landings.

The other thing is that the canard isn't really a canard. There isn't full foil air stream. I doubt the canard properties of canard stall before airframe and main wing stall actually occurs in this design.

Just sayin... Oh ya..and there is that 4 wheel landing gear problem I reffered to earlier. The delicate left and right rotation on landing is super critical.

 

[peach174]

It's a pretty scary thought - drunks and potheads flying around . Perhaps crashing on top of our homes. It's bad enough on the streets.