flying car

[kirby1923]

Chuck, we are doomed.

This on a flying car prototype, rotor wing. 3 wheeler ugh! but!!!???


https://www.cnbc.com/2018/03/07/flying-car-ready-to-buy-unveiled-at-geneva-motor-show.html

[oldbike54]

 That's a helicopter , I hate helicopters 

 Dusty

[Antietam Classic Cycle]

Isn't it more a gyrocopter?

[Chuck in Indiana]

Which insurance company are you going to use to insure it? Nobody has been able to do it yet.. no insurance = no plates, no driving on the road.
Would *you* insure a vehicle that could sit in the Kmart parking lot? Me, either.  Probably the most successful flying car was built by Molt Taylor, but he couldn't get them insured, either.

[Chuck in Indiana]

There's a lot of simulating going on in the video.. yeah a gyro.

[Antietam Classic Cycle]

For $621,000, I'd want this one, complete with "Miss Goodnight": 
https://youtu.be/6B-QUGSCV6c

[KiwiKev]

Gyro copters are pretty cool machines an always fascinated me. Can’t see the sense in trying to combine it with a car though. Any minor ding in the car park would render it unsafe to fly


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[oldbike54]

 Heli/Gyro , all semantics , I still hate them 

 Dusty

[Roebling3]

Are we forgetting Rob't Fulton, Jr.? The Airphibian? Middle 40's? The 1st time I saw it, in the flesh, it had a CT plate on it. I've not seen it fly. I believe the only one, of an original 3or4?, is still in the restoration shops at the Air & space Muse`in DC. It was in slighty poor cosmetic condition having traveled (in crates) to Dallas and back. I was trying to get it next to the Larz Anderson Muse` Brookline, MA
Fulton was a friend and likely the coolest, neatest, most unassuming and clever man I will ever know.  R3~ 

[egschade]

It has 3 wheels to technically it's a motorcycle in many states... 

[Antietam Classic Cycle]

Heli/Gyro , all semantics , I still hate them 

 Dusty

Helicopter has a powered rotor, Gyrocopter/Autogyro has an unpowered rotor. Big difference.

[rocker59]

This would be the baddest assest.  If it would work.  If it could be insured.

[ohiorider]

Dusty ...... not a helicopter.  Actually a pretty safe flying machine.  I Googled Kellett Autogyro, and came up with this on YouTube.  Enjoy!  It's as archaic as a Guzzi, and probably as dependable!

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nv3wbbm_Dn0

Bob

[fotoguzzi]

One of the main reasons helicopters have such a great safety record (and they do) is if the engines (single engine) quits the pilot can "auto rotate" and make a safe landing in a small area.

 

BTDT, only we landed on I-610, right in front of a loaded dump truck... had we come down 2-3 seconds later I wouldn't be here to tell the story. There was no time to panic or see my life flash by, it was a hard landing... Our chopper ran out of fuel !

[Chuck in Indiana]

Fading memory says there was a guy in South America that had a flying atv.. a gyrocopter/small 3 wheeler mix. That might work in limited places, too.
Flying cars? No. It actually takes some training and skill to keep from being a statistic when dealing with gravity. 

right in front of a loaded dump truck

I'd rather land behind that one. 

[Lannis]

Dusty ...... not a helicopter.  Actually a pretty safe flying machine.  I Googled Kellett Autogyro, and came up with this on YouTube.  Enjoy!  It's as archaic as a Guzzi, and probably as dependable!

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nv3wbbm_Dn0

Bob

You know, that looks very good, and was great new technology for the 1930s.

Maybe kirby1923 or someone else in the business can tell us why small helicopters and Piper Cubs and such took the jobs that the gyrocopter was designed for, almost completely, both in the military and in civil aviation ... ?   They HAVE to be cheaper to operate than a helicopter, way less complex, and can do just about anything a Cub can do ... so why did they never catch on?

Lannis

[Chuck in Indiana]

They're not very fast, Lannis.. and still need a runway, unlike a helicopter, which isn't very fast, either.

They HAVE to be cheaper to operate than a helicopter,

Oh, Buddy. There's nothing more expensive to operate than a helicopter. You can't imagine..

[kirby1923]

The short answer is that there are too many moving parts,(and the rotor diameter has to be large to lift any real weight. Ungainly? Ugly!
Slow because of retreating blade stall problems.

Old saying  "if the aircraft looks good it will BE good". If it looks like something only its mother could love...not so pretty good.

I have flown a Benson and I liked it..as we say in motodom..its was a hoot!



:-)

[bad Chad]

Wasn't  there a guy from Gary Indiana a few years back,  Who attached weather balloons to a lawnchair along with a BB gun and off he went !!   I believe it went successfully though the powers that be were none too happy. 

[Chuck in Indiana]

Oh, yeah.. he got way too high. Of course, high may have had something to do with it. 

[oldbike54]

Helicopter has a powered rotor, Gyrocopter/Autogyro has an unpowered rotor. Big difference.

 

Dusty ...... not a helicopter.  Actually a pretty safe flying machine.  I Googled Kellett Autogyro, and came up with this on YouTube.  Enjoy!  It's as archaic as a Guzzi, and probably as dependable!

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nv3wbbm_Dn0

 Ya gotta understand fellas , if it has a giant thing whirling around on top attached by a Jesus nut , I ain't getting in it . Powered , unpowered , don't care 

 Dusty

Bob

[Huzo]

My late father built and flew the British Wallis designed autogyro in 1969.
It had 3 axis control with a conventional stick for pitch/roll and rudder for yaw to correctly balance a turn.
Was actually as stable as a brick shithouse and one of the more successful things he buggerised around with.

[KiwiKev]

My late father built and flew the British Wallis designed autogyro in 1969.
It had 3 axis control with a conventional stick for pitch/roll and rudder for yaw to correctly balance a turn.
Was actually as stable as a brick shithouse and one of the more successful things he buggerised around with.

I had a ride in one at an air show up near Auckland. Guy he was taking peeps for rides for $20:00, was a real thrill .

I saw one of the early military models in an air museum in the UK, pretty crude looking craft that was.

Did your old man ever take you up for a spin ?

[Huzo]

I had a ride in one at an air show up near Auckland. Guy he was taking peeps for rides for $20:00, was a real thrill .

I saw one of the early military models in an air museum in the UK, pretty crude looking craft that was.

Did your old man ever take you up for a spin ?

eNo he didn't Kev.
Was a single place jigger.

[Sheepdog]

I spent a bunch of time in helicopters and my daughter flew OH58Ds in the Army. The “five and nine” is a handful, but it beats walking...

[Chuck in Indiana]

I'm sure there are cheaper helicopter hourly rates but MedEvac helicopters are apparently pretty heavily optioned ...

Don't bet on cheaper hourly rates.. $1800 an hour is not bad. There's not a part on one of those suckers that costs less than $10000, and they get replaced regularly.

[Gliderjohn]

i might add on med helicopter costs is crew costs. I have toured a medvac facility and spoke with a crew. It is very specialized flying. This was at the Hutchinson, KS Med Center. Of the two pilots on duty, one is Porto Rico and the other was from the Los Angeles area. They and the rest of the crew live two weeks at a time at the facility. Lot's of support costs.
GliderJohn

[kirby1923]

BTDT, only we landed on I-610, right in front of a loaded dump truck... had we come down 2-3 seconds later I wouldn't be here to tell the story. There was no time to panic or see my life flash by, it was a hard landing... Our chopper ran out of fuel !

I have had more than one event where a "second or two" would have made the outcome less than satisfactory but I'm still here.
Good on the pilot that he kept is cool and got down in one piece but...

Running out of fuel!!!!!! I hope you shook his hand and then a hay maker!!!

If there wasn't a damn good reason for such an event ( fuel leak or......etc.) a professional pilot should be fired...no excuses for running out of fuel period.

[rodekyll]

I have had more than one event where a "second or two" would have made the outcome less than satisfactory but I'm still here.
Good on the pilot that he kept is cool and got down in one piece but...

Running out of fuel!!!!!! I hope you shook his hand and then a hay maker!!!

If there wasn't a damn good reason for such an event ( fuel leak or......etc.) a professional pilot should be fired...no excuses for running out of fuel period.

 . . .not to mention what happens when the FAA sticks the tanks and finds them dry.  That's going on someone's permanent record.   

[KiwiKev]

eNo he didn't Kev.
Was a single place jigger.

Bugger, they are fun to ride in, can’t understand why they aren’t more popular as much more affordable than a chopper. Bugger all runway needed esp if they spin up the rotor a bit for takeoff as some do.