'Flying Saucers' to Go On Sale Soon 327
gihan_ripper writes "Perhaps the ultimate nerd acquisition, the flying car, is to go on sale in a few months. Speaking to the BBC, the inventor Dr Paul Moller described his creation, dubbed the Flying Saucer, as a VTOL aircraft designed to hover at 10 ft. above the ground. The flying saucer has eight engines and is expected to sell for $90,000. Dr Moller expects to produce a successor within six years, a 'Skycar' capable of a climb rate of 6000 ft./min. and an airspeed of 400 mph."
Back to the future 2!! (Score:5, Interesting)
oil won't like this (Score:1, Interesting)
Re:at least 20 years old (Score:5, Interesting)
Skycar (Score:5, Interesting)
Second, while the technology may be sound and there were doubters to the helicopter and "aeroplane" alike, this design seems a bit more like rocketry than either of the prior two. Ducted or directed fan technology is hugely inefficient compared to wing technology. Coolness aside, there's something of an "experimental" quality of these machines that they cannot seem to shake. If I'm watching YouTube videos of the Moller employees coming and going in these contraptions, then perhaps my doubts will be alleviated, but until then, I keep picturing a screwball in an oversized frisbee darting over the park and eventually plowing into the trees.
Infrastructure? Safety? Economy? (Score:5, Interesting)
Next is safety. While cars have been pretty focused on protecting their occupants, this takes that to a whole new dimension. A stall is no longer just an inconvenience, but a high probability that you are going to die. What about the people on the ground that you crash into? How many car wrecks are there in an average size city. Now imaging that for each of these wrecks, you have a heavy, flammable piece of metal, glass and plastic falling to the ground! It would seem to me that the only way to make these things remotely safe would be to equip them not only with a parachute, but with airbags on the outside to protect those that are going to be in their homes beneath these things!
Economy. With all the current focus on global warming, dwindling oil supplies, wars in the middle east etc, I don't see how flying cars will help alleviate any of these problems. As a matter of fact, I see the exact opposite happening! Could you imagine what would happen to the demand for energy if half the auto's on the road were not flying over it!
Of course, these issues are just a few issues that my ignorant-ass can come up with in a few minutes. I'm sure that there are problems that real life engineers haven't even dreamed of yet! So I'm afraid that building a flying car will be the easy part.
Re:Is it just me, or... (Score:2, Interesting)
It's not just you. It's been everyone who's paid attention to this nut for the past 30 years.
I'd like to see him succeed. He wore out what little credibility he ever had in the 70s. Fancy computers can now make aerodymanically-unstable aerofoils "fly", but they can't solve the problem of power output. The funky fiberglass model shown today is the same fucking thing he's shown since the 80s.
The only reason he's still in business is because the "journalists" who write "science" articles... are neither journalists nor scientists.
"Wanting to see him succeed" is probably why he gets all the free publicity every few years.
If he were a nut, it'd be wonderful. Flying cars would merely be the automotive equivalent of nuclear fusion. Always just A Small Matter of Engineering away from reality.
The sad part of the story is that he's not just a nut, he's a fraud. And the media keeps falling for it, hook, line, sinker, rod, reel, and copy of Angling Times. The only thing more depressing than the notion of him paying them off... would be the notion that he didn't have to. Everyone likes a nut. Everyone wants a flying car. Therefore, everyone wants to see the nut with the flying car make it big. All he has to do is keep finding people who've never heard of him before, and he keep the scam rolling his entire life. And convincing people he's just a nut.
The most bitter irony would be if he really was just a nut. What if he actually believes his own BS?
Re:at least 20 years old (Score:5, Interesting)
That's really what was killing him. His initial claims were impressive, but it was easy to see from his hover tests that he wasn't getting quite the power originally promised. In fact, he had to abandon the thrust redirection slats he originally promised, and moved to rotating nacelle design. That, of course, had a direct impact on the stability of the vehicle's hover capabilities.
I remember watching the hover test videos for the first time. Over the loud whine of the engines as they struggled to keep the craft aloft, I kept thinking "those props don't have enough power". Supposedly he recently upgraded the engines on the craft, so we'll see how that goes.
All in all, it's going to be a fancy airplane. You'll still need a pilot's license and you'll still need much of the same clearance as a plane needs. I want to believe that it will be an aircraft that "anyone" can fly, but my gut says it will be a deathtrap for any untrained pilots that dare to attempt to fly the contraption.
Still, best of luck to Mr. Moller. It's great to see a "done" model of this finally arrive!
Re:With Moller... (Score:4, Interesting)
History repeats itself.. (Score:5, Interesting)
Moller may never produce a 'flying car', but someone will eventually.
When that flying car hits the market, it will likely be little different than when the first automobiles we're being sold. There were no parking spots in front of the general store, only places to tie up your horse. As more of these are sold, more spots to park them will become available. More gasoline/diesel stations will accommodate them as well. It will be slow. There won't be any real regulation of them for a while, but that won't stop people from using them. And these will likely be flying deathtraps for a while. So was the car for the first two decades of it's life. Same for the train when we started laying tracks everywhere we could find a place for them but couldn't design brakes worth a shit. As dangerous as these flying cars may be, people will fly them.
If I could afford one, I would buy it to fly it to work everyday. It would be easy for me; I'd just follow the river. The first automobiles were not utilities, they were novelties, just like the flying car will be when someone eventually manages to start selling them.
Aero
Re:With Moller... (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Back to the future 2!! (Score:5, Interesting)
I post this because I remember this exact same person being promoted here on slashdot at least 3 years ago.
In other news... (Score:2, Interesting)
I much prefer... (Score:3, Interesting)
Am I the only one... (Score:2, Interesting)
I am sure a modern version of such a vehicle could be produced that would be easier to get ready for flight, and be more fuel efficient. Not sure how much demand there would be, as a pilots license would be required, and you would still have to drive to the airport. However, it would solve transportation problems of getting to and from the airport on both ends of the flight.
Never going to happen (Score:3, Interesting)
Go read Bob Shaw's 'Vertigo' for some idea of what happens to a society where personal human flight is commonplace. Borders become meaningless, passports doubly so. Criminals are going to love these things - how do you set up a roadblock in the sky? And also, no matter how carefully you build the vehicle to be safe, and easy to pilot, the human element will always be a factor.
"People who were in a hurry tended to switch off their lights to avoid detection and fly straight to where they were going, regardless of the air corridors. The chances of colliding with another illegal traveller were vanishingly small, they told themselves, but it was not only occasional salesmen late for appointments who flew wild. There were the drunks and the druggies, the antisocial, the careless, the suicidal, the thrill-seekers, the criminal - a whole spectrum of types who were unready for the responsibilities of personal flight, in whose hands a counter-gravity harness could become an instrument of death."
Very simple solution to FAA approval (Score:4, Interesting)
I think the problem is: where do you go to get instruction? You're not legally allowed to fly these things without a pilot certificate coz they weigh too much to fit into ultralight categories, and more critically, they're a different type of certificate. To fly a Moeller or the like, you need instruction in 'powered lift' not 'fixed wing' or 'helicopter' or even 'autogyro' -- and there are precisely two 'powered lift' vehicles in existence, the Moeller and the Osprey V-22. Nobody has flown a Moeller, and the only Ospreys are being flown by US military and Boeing/Vertol research/design people. There are no instructors and as such there is no way to get instruction, so the market for an aircraft you're not legally allowed to fly is pretty slim. Moeller has to get a dozen of these things built and four dozen certified flight instructors trained up -- when nobody has any idea of what constitutes a certified flight instructor for powered lift -- before there will be a market for his machines. IF they ever actually work.