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Flying Bicycle Is Real, Takes First Flight
colinneagle writes "Bringing us one step closer to the hover-boards and flying cars that mid-20th century pop culture had predicted we would have by the year 2000, three Czech companies have come together to develop a functional flying bicycle. Designed by Technodat, Evektor, and Duratec, the flying bicycle weighs a little more than 187 lbs and limits its takeoff weight to about 350 lbs, according to a report from Polish bicycle news site Biketrendy. The report claims the bicycle, which is still just a prototype, is capable of staying in the air for about six minutes, although the companies working on the project hope to extend that to 50 minutes and top speeds of about 30 miles per hour. Currently, the fans propelling the bicycle are powered by a 50Ah battery."
Seriously I think the greatest invention of the 21st C could be silent fans. That bike looks like great fun but the noise is a killer.
I used to have a better sig than this, but I got tired of it
electric scooter or motorcycle maybe, but no flight via manual pedal-power-only means not a flying bicycle
A real tear jerker, it was.
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
If it's not powered by pedaling, then what's the point of the bicycle part? You just bolt a bicycle to the inside of the cockpit of a 747 and then say it's a flying bicycle. Not only that you probably don't even have to do much testing to be sure it will work.
I'd push it well over the takeoff weight. I guess I'll have to wait until they make a flying tandem bicycle.
The Gossamer Albatross is a human-powered aircraft built by American aeronautical engineer Dr. Paul B. MacCready's company AeroVironment. On June 12, 1979 it completed a successful crossing of the English Channel to win the second Kremer prize. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gossamer_Albatross I'd like to see more of these. This was over 30 years ago. C'mon people.
*plays the Apogee theme song music*
flying electric scooter or flying electric motorcycle maybe, but no flight via pedal-only power means not a flying bicycle
It's shrapnel. These things will blow crap in every direction. Every pebble or bottle cap on the driveway or street will risk hurting someone, or worse, damaging someone's precious property. A nice demo, nothing more.
Mostly random stuff.
So by "flying bicycle" they mean "personal hovercraft built around a bicycle".
Besides, wasn't something like the Gossamer Condor (built way back when I was a lad, in the 1970s) closer to the concept of a "flying bicycle"? Pedal powered, and able to fly, and it even had two wheels.
http://alternatives.rzero.com/
This is a test comment. Please ignore. Or moderate the hell out of it; fair enough. I work here. ;-)
Look Ma, no alien!
Never play chicken with a passive aggressive.
But it's not ready for people due to the batteries weight and who wants to hear of a yet another dummy flying.
Seriously I think the greatest invention of the 21st C could be silent fans.
The USAF has been working on "stealth helicopters" for years. They haven't been able to make them silent, but they can make them sound like wind noise, eliminating the distinctive "whap-whap-whap" blade sounds.
Will make real sense if is fully human powered, either for recharging its electric batteries or use it for direct propulsion, but probably is needed more power than what we will provide with low effort.
If they can make it last longer than 6 minutes to fly over the cliff.
Is a 50 minute flight time even a remote possibility?
I suppose that if it does 6 minutes now, and 4x higher density batteries are supposed to be available as prototypes, then that's 24 minutes. If you then doubled the mass of batteries carried...maybe?
this thing looks more like a hovercraft on a bike frame. and why a 50amp battery you would get more flight time using gas powered fans.
I like the Aerofex or Chris Malloy's Hoverbike designs a lot better, the "flying motorcycle" in this article seems a quite inefficient for the task of flying. While I can definitely see the advantages of a dual role vehicle (hover bike for long distance, motorcycle for in town). Something more aircraft with the motorcycle parts added on would seem preferable, not the other way around.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=akA-B64RACU
http://www.hover-bike.com/
Well, Microsoft executives perfected the flying chair.
Table-ized A.I.
It's obviously not a bicycle. It's still cool though, and here's why.
You could fly this as an ultralight aircraft. Whether or not you could street it is another matter; but getting rid of the wings is the first step. Having the propellers enclosed in a cage is nice too.
You wanted a flying car? OK, no go; but this could be a flying motorcycle . It could soar over regulatory hurdles.
For all intensive purposes, "whom" is no longer a word. That begs the question, "who cares"?
by zbledl zavisti!
Maybe somebody can invent something that will make slashdot finally support unicode?
AccountKiller
I want a flying segway for my sister-in-law.
I said - don't look Ethel!..., but it was too late..., she'd already looked.
And I'm not surprised it was done in the Czech Republic. See, the plans of Jan Tleskac for a flying bicycle were the central mcguffin to the plot of several "Rapid Arrows" (Rychle Sipy in original) novels by Jaroslav Foglar, an exponent of Boy Scout movement back home in the late 40s - lot of kids remember his works which were even made into TV series , as well as the "caged hedgehog" puzzle.
Why are there wheels? So they could call it a bike? Maybe you just ride it around like a regular bike for a while before REMEMBERING YOU COULD FLY.
MouseClass extends ScrollClass, which extends TabClass, which extends SidebarClass, which extends PowerClass, w
Yeah it's never going to happen, as in , permitted... legal. Have fun flying on your farm. Why? A body in motion tends to stay in motion. Flying cars and flying bikes and such like ,when they go out of control, go out of control. Nothing to stop it from coming down pretty much anywhere, or flying forward without restrained.
Friction is what keeps cars relatively safe. Plus, physical curbs, dedicated roads, safety rails etc etc. Just regular people flying here there everywhere at a decent speed... the safety corridor needed would be impractical.
Nev-ah.
Gon-na.
Hap-pen.
We all know riding a bike isn't dangerous enough.
Ugh... You sound like one of those "helicopter parents." I can imagine you following your poor kid around with one of these.
Thank you, Edward Snowden.
"Arguments from authority are worthless." —Carl Sagan
This is a dual prop helicopter.
No, it's a quad prop helicopter. There are two big fans in white cages, and two smaller fans in black cages to the left and right of the rider.
When our name is on the back of your car, we're behind you all the way!
Would have made just a good of a story.
That aint no bike. You'd never be able to deliver the energy to get airborne by pushing pedals. A flying moped or e-bike at best.
I hadn't the slightest objection to his spending his time planning massacres for the bourgeoisie... (P.G. Wodehouse)
Strikes me as being a bit heavy at 95kg without a pilot/rider. Since the bicycle part doesn't need to be a bicycle but just somewhere to sit, a lightweight carbon fibre/aluminium frame would be a much better choice, surely?
First though: I need one of them.
Second thoughts: I wonder how many minutes it would take before I killed myself with it, and how many innocent lives I'd take with me?
All it requires is one telekinetic E.T. You can fly a fleet of bikes with just one.
already done! see: http://www.ww2aircraft.net/forum/attachments/sports-talk/68505d1218742962-20-ideas-olympics-bicycle_race_2.jpg
Tomorrow is another day...
Who's bicycle is this?; this is not a bicycle honey, it's a chopper. It's zed's Chopper.
Zed's dead.
And rapid refers to more than just missiles, though "swift" would catch the meaning as well. As far as I recall, they were named by some girl who appreciated how fast they solved something or came to help the weaker ones, something like that.
Troll 2.0 Fear my asocial networking!