Airbus Is About To Build A Self-Flying Electric Robo-Taxi (fastcompany.com)

Airbus said today it is building a prototype of an electric self-flying plane for a single passenger, which it is calling the Vahana. The autonomous plane can fly a single passenger on trips of around 50 miles. From a report on FastCompany: Airbus teased two possibilities for the Vahana on December 14: an electric helicopter and a plane with wings that tilt up to enable vertical take off and landing, or VTOL. After its engineers ran the numbers on both types, Airbus today announced that it's building a prototype of the sci-fi looking tilt-wing plane, which will begin test flights before the end of the year. "The vehicle is being built. Parts are being made as we speak," says Airbus chief engineer Geoffrey Bower. The company's goal is to get air taxis in service in about 10 years, possibly partnering with ride-hailing companies like Uber. "We would love to see what that kind of partnership might evolve into," says Maryanna Saenko of Airbus Ventures.

Comments

A bet between

[Tablizer]

practical mass flying cars and general-purpose maid robots (Rosie-style)?

Which do you think will be first, and why?

I'm a bit suspicious

[Lucas123]

Is it just me, or does that "flying taxi" look an awful lot like Skynet's Hunter Killer drone.

Good design

[Billy the Mountain]

I'm not an aviation professional but I think about designs for these all the time. I'd be proud of this design:

• Simple, inexpensive propellers rather than one or two massive, complex rotor(s)
• Wings so when traveling place to place you don't have to expend extra energy to stay aloft
• Electric. You'll need a fantastic battery, but if that's not quite available you can use a gas turbine powering a generator for hybrid operation

My only quibble is the design relies on differential torque of the propellers for pivot rotation. I think it would be better to arrange for thrust vectoring for this. Also thrust vectoring would allow you to run identical propellers because the thrust vectoring can eliminate the torque.

Re:Good design

[ASDFnz]

My only quibble is the design relies on differential torque of the propellers for pivot rotation. I think it would be better to arrange for thrust vectoring for this. Also thrust vectoring would allow you to run identical propellers because the thrust vectoring can eliminate the torque.

Differential torque is far more efficient than thrust vectoring. To alter your angle of trust you need a minimum of one extra motor that does nothing but provide the function (and weight, and battery draw).

Since your props are already spinning in a counter rotation function (to stop it taking off like a spinning top) the extra function of providing yaw is just about free in terms of weight and battery life.

Re:Good design

[Bruce Perens]

Well, I'm not an aviation professional either, and that might be the problem. Non-aviation-professionals underestimate all of the issues in making this work. Hey, we sent a man to the moon, right? How difficult could it be to make a flying car?

I would have been less sarcastic if they had shown an operating prototype rather than a 3D rendering. A 3D rendering means they haven't started to see if they can really address all of the issues.

Oh, and Moller is about to make their version, too! Since about 1950.

Re: Good design

[Obfuscant]

Yeah, this old argument again.

Engine power controls thrust. Pitch changes the angle of attack. The lift equation depends on terms of velocity and coefficient of lift. The velocity is a complex function of thrust and drag; coefficient of lift varies linearly with angle of attach (pitch).

Trying to isolate the factors is fine for a schoolbook discussion of flying, but in real aircraft real pilots control both power and pitch to achieve the desired climb or descent at the desired airspeed. Yes, they may have rules of thumb for specific situations, like pulling the throttle back to 1700 RPM from cruise at approach speed will give the correct rate of descent for an ILS approach. What is forgotten in that process is that the aircraft also changes pitch when the thrust is reduced, changing the coefficient of lift and thus the overall lift.

And sadly for your statement, yes, indeed, both the cyclic and the collective in a helicopter do not control the throttle and thus the "engine power", it changes the pitch of the blades, either collectively (for "up/down") or during parts of the rotational cycle ("left/right" or "forward/back"). The blades do not change speed except due to the change in drag, and the pilot has to adjust the throttle to account for the decrease in the vertical component of lift as the aircraft tilts or rolls.

Quad drones, OTH, must use engine power to control lift because they do not have pitch to rely on.

Re:Meanwhile Airbus shareholders

[xxxJonBoyxxx]

>> file a lawsuit for stupid ideas

This one actually makes a bit of strategic sense. Re-read this last line: "(Airbus's stated goal) is to get air taxis in service in about 10 years, possibly partnering with ride-hailing companies like Uber." In other words, what Airbus is trying to do is find a rich and somewhat gullible company that's ready to invest in silly ideas that will generate lots of press, and they are hoping Uber will bite on the vaporware (as many governments do today). Airbus never actually has to produce anything - remember that defense contractors already know how to play a 10-year tease - but their shareholders would benefits from a nice infusion of the targeted mark's cash.

Poor Moller

[sycodon]

This guy couldn't catch a break after decades of trying to raise capital and build a flying car.

Suddenly, a bunch of dot.com billionaires are building them right and left.

Re:Poor Moller

[ShanghaiBill]

This guy couldn't catch a break after decades of trying to raise capital and build a flying car.

That is because he is doing it wrong. His "flying car" is really a drivable airplane. The best it can do is go from airport-to-airport, and then drive from there. You could achieve the same result, cheaper and safer, by just renting a car at the arrival airport, or (even easier) taking Uber to your final destination.

The billionaires are more sensible. Quadcopters are clearly a better technology for this application. They can fly city-center-to-city-center, and you won't need a pilot's license to fly in one.

Rotary wings are not very energy efficient.

[140Mandak262Jamuna]

[I am leaving auto gyros out, though they are technically rotary wing a/c]

In fixed wing aircraft the thrust from the jet or propeller equals the drag, and the lift produced by the wings. The lift to drag ratio for most aircraft will exceed 10. Thus the plane needs to produce one tenth of its weight as thrust. There are specialized aircraft gliders/sailplanes etc that can push this ratio up to 20. I vaguely recall something called Eppler airfoil that has a lift/drag ratio of 40 for a narrow range of Reynolds number.

But a helicoper needs to produce thrust equal to weight. Thus it can hover and take off and land vertically. But it consumes a lot more fuel than fixed wing aircraft. So much so that it is uneconomical even to serve as air taxis between a metro hub and the suburban airport.

People with deep pockets, military, has been trying various formats to get vertical take off and fixed wing efficiency. The tilt wing aircraft like the Osprey (C22?) have lots of stability issues during the transition. Vectored thrust aircraft like Harrier also suffers from fuel efficiency issues. I do not see how changing the energy source from combustion to electro chemistry is going the change the physics of the problem.

Re:Rotary wings are not very energy efficient.

[joe_frisch]

Agreed. Hovering requires thrust > weight. Power goes as mass/time * velocity^2, while thrust goes as mass/times * velocity. So to have efficient thrust for lift you need to move a lot of air slowly, not a little air quickly. This is why helicopters have enormous swept disk areas. Any design that uses less area will be less efficient than a helicopter - already a very inefficient device.

Less efficiency means less range (already a problem with an electric), heavier motors and batteries, AND more noise and down-wash damage.

Tilt rotor sounds great, but adds a lot of additional weight and complexity on an already very marginal system. It allows high cruise speeds, but it takes time to climb and accelerate / decelerate, while navigating crowded airspace. Cruise speed tends to be an issue mostly on much longer trips than 50 miles.

So, how is this better than a single person helicopter?

Then, even if it works, where can it be used? No way noise ordinances will let someone use it from their back yard or city street At least in the US aircraft need to carry a half hour of spare fuel for safety. There are air traffic control issues if there are more than a few of these.

I just don't see a use case that wouldn't be better served with a conventional (but autopilot controlled) helicopter.

Looks like marketing silliness to me. I'll believe it when I see a working prototype

SHUT UP SHUT UP SHUT UP

[Anonymous Coward]

neeerrrrrrddddddddddddddddddddddddd

The Word From Marketing

[Bruce Perens]

The Word from Management is that we have to do something innovative, or we're out of all of those subsidies! Our countries are looking at all of that Musk stuff: electric cars, rockets that land and can be reused. We need to do something different! But not more electric cars or rockets that can be reused, we can't do the same different. We need different different! So, Marketing says Flying Cars! After all, haven't you heard people asking, since the 1950's, Where Are Our Flying Cars?, Well, we're going to have the answer! Here are your flying cars! We have a great 3D rendering of them! Now, half of the people can't tell 3D renderings from the real thing, and Engineering has to make it work now, so we're off the hook and it's more subsidies for everyone this year! Of course, Engineering had better make it work, or they're out!

Uber application.

[mykepredko]

This seems to be a perfect product for the Uber app, I wouldn't expect it would go directly to an address/intersection, but maybe to a local "parking lot" that is convenient to where it is/where it's going.

Re:Uber application.

[BiggerIsBetter]

This seems to be a perfect product for the Uber app...

No, I think Lyft would be a better fit for this one.

Re:Yet another scale model or a real prototype ?

[HornWumpus]

There have been several commercial attempts at flying cars.

They fail because they are bad, crazy expensive, cars _and_ bad, terribly performing, airplanes. The problem is the definition of 'flying car' is nebulous. A helicopter is, in a sense, a flying car.

Making something that's both road and air worthy and not more expensive than an airplane/helicopter and two or three cars is a big challenge. Could be impossible.

If by 'flying car' they mean 'vertical takeoff air vehicle' that's a helicopter.

Safe for kids and dogs

[Macdude]

It has eight unshielded propellers, how safe is it going to be for the neighbourhood kids and dogs when I land in front of my house?

Re:Safe for kids and dogs

[fustakrakich]

The racket will disperse the crowd. If not that, how about a bucket of prop wash? You'll have to land the thing on top of your house.

Re:I for one welcome our new Robo-Taxi overlords

[HornWumpus]

PHB is that you?

Everything you don't understand is NOT easy.

Start by flying these with no passengers

[Applehu Akbar]

A logical first application for this tech would be light, high-value local freight. Imagine delivering deli and fresh seafood to the roofs of restaurants, delivering medical supplies to hospitals, electronics tech and components to businesses, and legal documents to courthouses. Such a delivery network could fan out from big-city airports.

After a few years of safe operation, high end passengers will start volunteering for rides, replacing expensive services like this one:
https://www.newyorkhelicopter....

The correct Sanskrit word should be Vimana

[louzer]

The correct Sanskrit word should be Vimana. Vahana means vehicle. Vimana means flying chariot: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...