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Flying Car Prototype Ready By End of 2017, Says Airbus CEO (venturebeat.com)
Airbus plans to test a prototype for a self-piloted flying car as a way of avoiding gridlock on city roads by the end of the year, the aerospace group's chief executive said on Monday. From a report: Airbus last year formed a division called Urban Air Mobility that is exploring concepts such as a vehicle to transport individuals or a helicopter-style vehicle that can carry multiple riders. The aim would be for people to book the vehicle using an app, similar to car-sharing schemes. "One hundred years ago, urban transport went underground, now we have the technological wherewithal to go above ground," Airbus CEO Tom Enders told the DLD digital tech conference in Munich, adding he hoped the Airbus could fly a demonstration vehicle for single-person transport by the end of the year. "We are in an experimentation phase, we take this development very seriously," he said, adding that Airbus recognized such technologies would have to be clean to avoid further polluting congested cities.
I don't see these being marketed to the masses any time soon - Moving rush hour into the air seems like it would be inviting chaos. Ambulances, however, seem like a perfect fit for this - Skipping traffic could save lives.
He's getting rather old, but he's a good mouse.
Only flying cars were supposed to be available by Y2K.
The predictions for fusion power are remarkably accurate. 30 years ago, they told us it would be 30 years away, and indeed, 30 years later, it is still 30 years away.
I don't see an autonomous flying car in neighbourhoods, except in locales where there aren't:
- Power lines
- Trees
- Pets (and children) that will be blown around lift jets
- Shingled roofs (see previous)
- Anything that can be blown around
- Anything that could come into impact with the flying vehicle
Don't these "futurists" know that their creations won't be allowed to fly/land anywhere aircraft can't fly/land now?
Mimetics Inc. Twitter
With the way I see so many people driving, this is good news for the makers of bandages and burn units.
Seriously, take a short trip down the freeway and watch people drive...then ask yourself, "Would I want these people flying a car near me??"
Just cruising through this digital world at 33 1/3 rpm...
It's not but there are fully autonomous helicopters being used by the military. That said, there is hopefully still some substantive differences between your typical upscale American suburb and the backwoods of Afghanistan. Noise, the acceptance of a half ton of wrecked aluminum in your back yard, more noise - I just don't see it here in the US.
Not to even get into the limited capacity that air corridors have compared to roads. That could possibly change as autonomous flight allows for closer aircraft spacing, but it's not going to happen quickly.
And that noise... If you think the weeny little Phantom-class drones are going to be shotgun targets, wait until this thing tries to land in your neighbor's yard.
Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
I do not believe that Trump's hotel party in Russia will significantly influence color choices of vehicles.
I'll see your senator, and I'll raise you two judges.
Which can carry multiple riders? You mean like a helicopter?
I didn't read this article, but I read one from a different source. What I got from that was not that they were targeting casual residential owners, but rather fleets used as mass transit. I think they're targeting places like New York, Hong Kong, etc. Dense population centres where they would be used as a flying autonomous taxi. Cities where the added noise pollution might not be noticed all that much. I don't think they're even targeting having these flying over your peaceful house in the suburbs.
"That's the way to do it" - Punch
We don't have flying cars for a number of reasons.
Actually we don't have them primarily for one reason. We don't have an energy supply of sufficient power to weight (including fuel) to enable a robustly built vehicle to get off the ground and travel. Basically we need something like Tony Stark's fictional arc reactor to make a flying car feasible. We can build a "car" that flies but with the state of the art in power plants there are simply too many engineering trade offs to make something more than a crude prototype.
All the other problems you mentioned are to a large degree already solved today. They would require large economic investments but they are possible. The only problem that so far is intractable is the power supply for the vehicle. Our current ones are FAR too heavy even if you don't include the fuel.
It's all about energy density. Has been ever since Orville conned Wilbur into riding that damned fool contraption back in the twentieth century. You need to carry enough juice to continuously counter the weakest of four fundamental forces and have a highly reliable power plant that's efficient enough to release that energy fast enough while not being so heavy as to ground yon flying death trap. Oh, and not running into stuff along the way would be nice to have, too. AI might do the stunt, but your average automobile driver can't even manage a groundcar safely. Who's going to insure these things?
here's what happened when Airbus built a fully automated airliner (with no human inside) and have it land itself:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
This was not an automated flight, and was not unmanned: there were 136 passengers on board. Three people were killed, and 34 required hospitalization. The cause was pilot error, and the flight crew was convicted of involuntary manslaughter for pulling a stupid stunt with a loaded plane.