Pretty sure we discussed it some years back. It was a nose to tail crash between two tail draggers on take off. They were flying in formation but the aircraft in front had to stop suddenly, possibly due to engine failure. The aircraft behind crashed into the leading aircraft because it had no forward visibility.
1 Like
Probably depends on your definition of “available.” In the video they said that the company hopes to start delivering customers in 2022. When it comes to any new aircraft, but especially anything resembling a “flying car,” it’s always best to assume they’ll miss their target delivery date by a good decade or so, if they ever deliver at all.
Edit to add: the company was founded back in 2001 and their prototype first flew in 2012, but they’re still years away from delivery. So pretty much like most other aircraft start-ups.
8 Likes
In the US, this isn’t a flying car. It’s a flying motorcycle with a fully enclosed fairing. The safety requirements for it are pretty lax.
4 Likes
There’s a flying car designed for exactly that, and it is one of the few in that category that’s actually for sale today and has made actual deliveries to customers. Looks fun and dangerous!
2 Likes
Well, that’s the thing - people might call this a “flying car” but more accurately it’s a “drivable light aircraft.” It’s subject to the more strict regulation of aircraft, needs a pilot’s license, needs an airfield for take-off and landing and is subject to air traffic control. It’s not terribly useful, nor does it fulfill the “flying car” fantasy, which is having a car that only requires a driving license but can take off anywhere so you can avoid traffic, basically.
But yeah, a “real” flying car would need some sort of new infrastructure - some sort of automated high-capacity air traffic control system, would need to be fully automated (or have onerous licensing requirements), and even if unhackable, would also have strict maintenance requirements so it didn’t fall apart in the air and rain down on a city. It wouldn’t ever really match the fantasy, even if it were technically possible.
Yeah, that’s been the traditional route for three-wheeled vehicles, but it sounds like the enclosed, three-wheeled “motorcycle” is now regulated, at least in many states, distinctly as an “autocycle”? I’m not sure that’s a workable solution as it seems like there’s been some regulatory changes with that in recent years, and different states have different, contradictory requirements, too, some of which make them increasingly similar to regular four-wheeled automobiles. And the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration apparently really doesn’t like three-wheeled cars, so new regulation should probably be expected:
To meet all state requirements, it’d need seatbelts, a roll cage, air bags, antilock brakes, all passengers wearing helmets, a driver with a motorcycle license, tandem seating, and a steering wheel and pedals (and, possibly, not a steering wheel and pedals)…
1 Like
Yup, this is called flaring, and everything that flies flares (as my skydiving instructor liked to say). It’s the same thing you see birds do as they land- they lean back and flap furiously a couple of times at the last second. There’s a moment right before you touch down where lift vanishes suddenly because there isn’t enough air under you, and if you don’t flare you land very hard. In a normal skydiving canopy you do this by pulling down on both steering toggles at the last moment, which pulls the back of the chute down, effecting a flare.
Airplanes do it by nosing up and a lot of flaps at the last moment, thus sitting on their bums, which is (as you surmise) probably why two wheels in the back of this thing is desirable. Although, most small planes manage to make due with one tail wheel, but I don’t know enough about small plane design to understand how flaring works on them.
6 Likes
Though the main gear on an aircraft with tricycle undercarriage is just a fraction behind the center of mass. When the engines are removed from a commercial jet, the wings have to be weighed down to stop the tail from resting on the ground.
For a road vehicle its different. You want the back wheels to be as far back as possible to prevent the front wheel(s) from lifting off the ground. Presumably this vehicle is a compromise, which is sort of a slogan for flying cars. Not really well suited for either role.
5 Likes
too soon
4 Likes
Rocky Mountain High
Given the track record of the average driver, if flying cars ever take off I foresee a market for armored roofs. But yeah, if the FAA doesn’t put the kibosh on this, the legal liability will.
What goes up, must come down…unless it’s going fast enough, like the Moon, then it may eventually keep going up, up and away. And really, who can blame it for making a break for it.
2 Likes
Autogyros and ultralights are also usually far less regulated than helicopters and airplanes.
In addition to all the reasons others have given, it was strongly implied in the video that the use of a tilting mechanism overcomes the sort of idiocy one sees with Reliant Robins cornering too fast. I suspect it may be like this (but back to front, of course), which would dramatically overcome stability even with the two wheels at the rear.
1 Like
I will NEVER understand the need for these “youtubers” to constantly have their faces featured so prominently in a video. VO will do just fine thank you very much. Show us the product/machine/whatever you’re talking about and stay off camera.
3 Likes
Aircraft are generally optomised for flight and moving them around on the ground although important, is usually not as high a design priority.
Also, the difference between something that flies well, and something that doesn’t fly at all is a subtle one. Aircraft are not Toyota Hiluxes.
So performance aeroplanes like pylon racers, STOL aeroplanes and aerobatic aircraft are generally tail -draggers. This is the simplest, lightest, strongest configuration but it has its compromises. Visibility over the nose while taxiing is often a problem, but there is a more difficult problem that has to be overcome with additional training and pilot skill.
In order for the aircraft to settle on it’s tail-gear, the centre of gravity must be behind the main-gear and therein lies the problem. Ideally, the CG would be just behind the main-gear but then any application of the brakes would cause the plane to tip up onto its nose. But if the CG is further back, there is a tendency for the aircraft to swing sideways and the tail to overtake the nose. This isn’t such a problem when the aircraft is traveling on the ground at speed because of the aerodynamic stability of the tail surfaces, but there comes a point where the pilot has to be very quick on her toes to stop any swinging tendency before it develops. This requires skill and pilots must have a tail-dragger endorsement to fly this type of aircraft.
This is why tricycle gear aircraft is more common.
The rear gear on a tricycle aircraft can be as simple as that on a tail-dragger (just attached farther back behind the CG obviously) but the nose gear needs to be much heavier and stronger and more complex (at the very least, it will have a facility for steering and shock absorption) and more expensive. On bigger more complex aircraft the nose wheel will fold up and stow away to reduce parasitic drag, but on the vast majority of tricycle aircraft the nose gear is left hanging out in the breeze, uselessly adding drag and reducing speed and increasing fuel consumption.
And even though a tricycle arrangement is easier to drive than a tail-dragger, it’s not without problems (prop strikes being one) and it’s still pretty shit compared to a motorcycle or a car.
Powering a ground vehicle by propeller is obviously a pretty horrific idea but if you use some other form of propulsion (motorcycle chain and gearbox being light simple and reliable) that powertrain just becomes additional dead weight and cost when you are flying.
Being able to drive well, and being able to fly well are IMO mutually exclusive properties and this is why flying cars have never been successful. Well, mostly 'cos they don’t fly well.
If a flying car is ever to be successful, it will be able to take off and fly from right outside your house and land in a parking space at the supermarket or whatever with no need to drive at all. Like a helicopter or a drone.
A couple of other points.
The Gyroplanes of the '20s and '30s were (and still are) the safest General Aviation aircraft ever built. The ones that looked like aeroplanes, not the modern-day contraptions with the pusher propeller arrangement.
Currently, all aircraft (aeroplanes, helicopter and autogyros) that fly will continue to fly even in the event of an engine failure. Aeroplanes do not suddenly turn into to house bricks if the propeller stops. And helicopters have a window of opportunity to be turned into autogyros before they become house bricks. And autotyros, well, autogyro don’t give a fuck. An autogyro will continue to autogyro and descend at a rate slower than an equivalent parachute (weight and size).
This is not true of drone type aircraft, but maybe with the addition of a clever ballistic parachute the FAA will certify this type of aircraft.
3 Likes
Yeah, I saw that before, and it does illustrate the danger of taking off with a big building directly in front of you. But here’s an interesting note: both occupants of that flying car survived the impact! Try doing that in nearly any other kind of aircraft and you’re probably going to get a different result.
1 Like
With enough money, you can make any rich toy fly. When they’ve got a flying Tuktuk, then they’ve got something!
Only one (partially hidden) landing shown. And the passenger would be uncomfortable.
1 Like
One also has to consider the possibility of flying car thieves.
4 Likes
If you’re talking about flying a “car” into a secure location for crime, we’ve already got helicopters for that, though on the other hand, if it’s not fully autonomous, you get more of this:
only the thief doesn’t have to get into a secure airport to do so, they can steal it on the street and dangerously take off from an inappropriate location, too.
But the thing you really have to look out for is carjacking - you’re cruising along at 1000 feet and suddenly there’s a guy outside, tapping his gun against the pilot’s window…
