Flying cars are one of the coolest products of science fiction, and today people are closer than ever before to making this idea a reality. At the moment, the developers of many companies, both large automakers and small startups, are working on creating a working model. In this overview of the development of dreamy engineers who want to take cars to the sky.
1. Kevin Colburn - Terrafugia
The flying car that can be reserved now (mass production scheduled for 2019) is the Terrafugia Transition. The company's chief executive officer and vice president, Kevin Colburn, says the vehicle is faster than a conventional car and more comfortable than an airplane.
The company also plans to release an incredibly futuristic TF-X model. The TF-X has a cruising speed of 321.8 km/h and does not require a runway due to vertical takeoff and landing. But this model will have to wait until at least 2025.
2. Douglas McAndrew - Aeromobil
This is car? This is a plane? Actually, it's both together. Aeromobil was made in Slovakia a few years ago, but its development reached a new level only last year, when the company hired Douglas McAndrew as technical director. A veteran engineer who has worked for Jaguar, Mercedes, BMW and others, he is now working on reducing the car's weight and improving its aerodynamics.
Their latest project, the Aeromobil 5.0, is expected to be ready for mass production in the next ten years. Also in 2020, a limited edition 4.0 sports model is expected, equipped with a hybrid electric engine and capable of traveling 640 km on a single battery charge.
3. Paul DeLorean - DeLorean
Why go only where there are roads. If there's a company that seems like the perfect choice for a flying car, it's DeLorean. DeLorean Aerospace is led by a CEO who is the nephew of John DeLorean, the man who gave humanity one of the most iconic cars in pop culture history.
The DeLorean DR-7 is powered by an electric motor and is expected to be fully autonomous, meaning the user won't need a pilot's license to fly it. The company plans to build a full-scale prototype this year.
4. Jim Tai - Kitty Hawk Cora
The Google-sponsored Cora aircraft from Kitty Hawk began its test flights earlier this year. , made under the direction of chief engineer Jim Tai, is almost ready to become a safe and sustainable flight taxi that can compete with Uber and Airbus.
The Cora is equipped with 12 vertical takeoff and landing (VTOL) propellers that are fully electric and move independently. The model can reach a height of 150 to 900 meters and has a top speed of 180 km/h.
5. Rodin Lyasoff - Airbus A³ Vahana
The Vahana boasts one of the fastest transitions from initial idea to prototype construction of any aircraft under consideration today. Just two years after the idea was born, Vahana began test flights. The company's CEO and aerospace engineer, Rodin Lyasoff, even said mass production would begin as soon as possible.
The project intends to be the first autonomous all-electric aircraft, and in fact it will be really cool. The model differs from many competitors in that it uses sensors to keep passengers safe and ensure a smooth flight.
6. Robert Dingmans - PAL-V Liberty
In March of this year, the Dutch company PAL-V announced that their Liberty would hit the market in 2019. This would make the Liberty the first commercial aircraft, and according to CEO Robert Dingmans, the company is just waiting for the final necessary certifications to make the vehicle ready for sale.
The Liberty has two engines - one for driving and one for flying. It boasts a top speed of 160 km/h on the ground and 180 km/h in the air. Pre-orders will begin in 2019, and the estimated cost will be $400,000.
7. Dara Khosrowshahi - UberAIR
Uber has become very serious about having cars in the sky... so much so that it teamed up with NASA engineers and even hosted a flying car summit. CEO Dara Khosrowshahi believes that flying cars will become commonplace within the next decade and hopes to have a flying taxi by 2020.
A large part of the project is the development of an automated air traffic control system, which will ensure the safe flights of all types of aircraft in the near future. The first test sites for UberAIR are Dallas, Texas, Dubai and possibly Los Angeles.
8. Patrick Naten - Lilium Jet
German startup Lilium has announced its ambitious flying machine project. The Lilium jet model is to be autonomous, capable of carrying up to five people, and can be summoned using a smartphone app.
Startup co-founder Patrick Naten hopes the jet will revolutionize public transportation. The estimated date of mass production is 2025. In addition to being a promising new aerial form of public transport, the Lilium jet will also be fully electric and is the only electric aircraft capable of jet-powered flight.
9. Tsubasa Nakamura - Toyota SkyDive
Although the Toyota SkyDive is planning to open the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games ceremonies, the car is not just for entertainment purposes. Firstly, it is the smallest electric car in the world, only 2.9 meters long and 1.9 meters wide.
The car is the brainchild of a group of Toyota employees led by Tsubasa Nakamura, who designed the car in his spare time. The team hopes the car will be able to reach a top speed of 150 km/h on the ground and 100 km/h in the air. Testing will begin this year, and mass production of the car is expected in 2030.
10. Daniel Hayes - VRCO NeoXCraft
At the end of last year, the British company VRCO announced its plans to create an aircraft that could be used not only on the roads and in the air, but also on the water. CEO and co-founder Daniel Hayes expects cars to be ready for mass production by 2020.
One of the features that sets NeoXCraft apart from the competition is its innovative design. Its turbofan propellers can be used not only for flying in the air, but also used as wheels on the ground. The device is already available for pre-order and will cost just over $2 million.
11. Joben Bewirth - Joby Aviation
Earlier this year, startup Joby Aviation emerged as the latest bidder for a flying taxi when it raised $100 million in funding. Although it seems to many that the startup just appeared out of nowhere overnight, it was founded by Joben Bewirth back in 2009 and development has been going on all this time.
Bevirt's goal is to create clean, low-cost public transport that eliminates the need to build and maintain costly infrastructure such as roads and bridges. Although there is still very little information about the project, what is known is that the car can allegedly carry up to four passengers and has already successfully completed a 15-minute test run.
12. Shawzi Hu - EHang
The EHang self-driving air taxi received a lot of media attention just last month when it was successfully flown by Dutch Prince Peter-Christian in Amsterdam. It comes months after EHang CEO Shawzi Hu took a ride in the plane car, showing how much he believes in its safety. In fact, the vehicle is so safe that Dubai is pursuing the idea of introducing it as public transport in the near future.
The EHang (or EHang 184 to be exact) is powered by 100% green electricity, and is equipped with a fail-safe system that forces the flying car to find the nearest safe landing site in case any component fails. The takeoff and landing location is digitally preconfigured for a smooth, fully autonomous flight.
13. Bruce Bent - Astro Aerospace
It's already been a busy month for Astro Aerospace - in May, the company acquired VTOL vehicle startup Passenger Drone and brought in drone expert Paul Beard to develop it. Astro CEO Bruce Bent is clearly gearing up for big things and expects the Astro Passenger Drone to become a reality soon.
The working prototype has a carbon fiber shell and 16 independent rotors for flight. The cockpit houses a touch control system that allows pilots to fly manually or switch to autonomous mode. Although there is no expected release date yet, Astro hopes that their flying car will be used in industries ranging from agriculture to the military.
To create modern smartphones, it was necessary to fit a large touch screen, memory and "heart" - a powerful energy-efficient processor in one small case.
The "heart" of the future flying car is its engine, and electric. This will reduce the noise level, which is critical in the city. It's still unpleasant when helicopters fly outside the window.
Electric motors for aircraft are developed by Siemens. In 2017, the Extra 330LE prototype was tested at 340 km/h. Together with Airbus, Siemens will create hybrid passenger aircraft for short-haul flights.
Electric planes will be able to run between cities or, for example, an airport and a city. But inside the metropolis there is an important requirement for such transport: high maneuverability, including the ability to take off vertically. And this means that flying cars will be multicopters or convertiplanes.
Multicopters are aircraft with three or more rotors. One of the first helicopters was a multicopter - a quadrocopter by the Russian-American inventor Georgy Botezat, built in 1922 with the money of the US Armed Forces. The device took off and hung in the air at a height of several meters, and could also lift a load weighing about half a ton by 4 meters.
A tiltrotor is a device with rotary propellers (a device that converts engine energy into vehicle movement, for example, a wheel or a wing - Hi-Tech) - more often screw ones, which work as lifting during takeoff and landing, and change position at altitude and play the role pulling. This is a mixture of a multicopter and an airplane.
Engines capable of lifting a vehicle with one or two passengers on board and quiet enough for a city already exist. Airbus in February 2018 successfully launched the Alpha One, which the company wants to bring to the air taxi market under the Vahana brand by 2020. The model is 6.1 meters wide, 5.6 meters long and 2.8 meters high and weighs 744 kilograms. It carries one passenger. In the future, people will call such an unmanned tiltrotor using an application on a smartphone.
Another project from Airbus was called Pop.Up. This is a modular apparatus with a passenger in a special "capsule". It can be attached to a chassis for road travel or to a quadcopter module for flight.
If Pop.Up is still a concept, then the development of the American Workhorse - the SureFly copter - has already been successful. By 2020, the startup intends to compete with the air taxi Uber. The quadcopter's 200 horsepower gasoline generator powers several electric motors. The device will be able to carry up to 180 kilograms of cargo over a distance of 112 kilometers.
The Chinese multicopter EHANG 184 Autonomous Aerial Vehicle not only takes off from the ground, but also flies calmly. This has already been proven by the developers in . The device operates at different heights - up to 300 meters, in different weather conditions - even in fog and with powerful gusts of wind, and two people can be on board - one of whom is a pilot. But in the future, the device will become unmanned.
If even the simple German inventor brothers The Real Life Guys managed to make a flying bathtub out of improvised means, then what can we say about large corporations that can safely invest hundreds of millions of dollars in R&D ").
Where to get energy for takeoff
In 1988, the Radio Shack CT-200 mobile phone was sold in the US, which could be "simply carried from car to car or taken with you". A smartphone with such a battery would not be very convenient. The new devices needed batteries that could handle powerful processors and huge screens. It was important to strike a balance between high capacity and low cost of production, so that the result became accessible to the masses.
In order for self-driving cars to be safely used everywhere, they must reach the 5th level of autonomy: when no action is required on the part of a person other than starting and indicating a destination. To this: developers from the Russian company Cognitive Technologies are training artificial intelligence on really bad roads, of which there are many in Russia. They teach the car to recognize the traffic situation during the day, at night, in slush, to predict the situation by such trifles as the angle of rotation of the wheels of neighboring cars and the movement of the head of a pedestrian.
Not everything is simple with unmanned aerial vehicles. For example, in Russia it is necessary to register unmanned aerial vehicles, even if we are talking about a quadrocopter weighing 250 grams. After that, the owner needs to obtain permission to use the airspace. Now the Federal Air Transport Agency is responsible for these processes. But it is not clear whether this service will continue to work with urban flying taxis, or whether, for example, the State traffic inspectorate will be responsible for this type of transport.
As a result, in order to launch flying taxis, it is necessary to resolve all ethical issues and “combine” the laws for drones and cars, creating a completely new legal framework that makes it possible to distinguish between the responsibility of the driver, service and automaker.
How much will a flying car cost?
A start-up from Slovakia has presented its version of a flying car - AeroMobil. He can not only fly, but also drive on the roads. And you need a sports flying license to fly. The cost of such a flying car will be approximately $1.3-1.6 million, and it will go on sale by 2020.
The Dutch company PAL-V is already accepting pre-orders for its three-wheeled "car", which is a hybrid of a car and a helicopter. The limited edition with the exclusive design of Liberty Pioneer will cost $599,000 for the "auto-air-lover" and the standard Liberty Sport model will cost only $399,000. Driving instruction is included in the price. The lucky ones will receive their innovative mode of transport in 2018.
The American company Terrafugia presented its first prototype of the flying Transition 9 years ago. During this time, tests were carried out (more than 200 takeoffs and landings). The Transition will go on sale in 2019. The expected price is $329 thousand. Those who wish can already pre-order.
When will we take off?
Airbus to launch the Vahana flying taxi by 2020. Uber gives a more pessimistic one - the company wants to launch its hybrid of an airplane and a helicopter as an air taxi in 2023. US Airspace Experience Technologies to "deploy a fleet of 2,500 aircraft in 50 major cities" by 2026.
The founder of the Russian company Hoversurf Alexander Atamanov, the developer of a flying motorcycle, in 2016, the appearance of flying taxis by 2018, but noted that legislation would not be ready for this. And this prediction came true: there are already physically flying taxis, and quite successful versions - an electric device from Ehang has already more than a thousand test flights with people on board. But services based on such aircraft cannot be launched precisely because of the need to refine the laws.
One thing is clear: the main barrier to the creation of a new market is no longer technology - this barrier seems to have been overcome - but legislation.
Dreams Come True. The day has come when cars are ready to lift off the ground and take to the skies. Dutch designers have shown the first production model of a flying machine. What it is, and what opportunities it provides to drivers - in this review.
People have long dreamed of crossing a car and a plane. The first attempts date back to 1917. It was then that the American designer Glenn Curtis tried to create an aircraft that could not only fly, but also ride comfortably on the roads.
Similar attempts were made by the engineers of the Soviet Union, who wanted to make a flying tank. But all these attempts failed. Technology has come a long way in recent decades, and perhaps now is the time when cars can finally open their wings.
An ambitious dream was embodied in a new flying car, which was called the Liberty. It was developed by the notorious Dutch company PAL-V. Surely many have already heard about it, because it was the designers of this company who set out to create a flying car a few years ago.
After 10 years of working to achieve its goal, PAL-V shows a car that, according to the developers, is not at all “another promising model”, but a real production model. The car from the first batch will cost 600 thousand dollars and another 25 for the right to get it among the first.
Together with the car itself, the company promises 10 lessons on how to drive it, and anywhere in the world! Another option to get a car is to pay only 10 thousand dollars, but wait for the second series. And yes, you will have to pay all the same 600 thousand for the car itself.
As for the technical characteristics, here the Liberty boasts a 100-horsepower engine, which allows it to accelerate on the ground up to 160 km / h. Up to 100 km / h the car accelerates in 9 seconds. Some experts are worried about the aerodynamics of the car, opining that at speeds above a hundred, the car will start to shake. For flights, the Liberty uses a different, 200-horsepower engine. The manufacturer claims that the car can fly 400-500 km.
However, one should not hope that the Liberty can take to the skies at any time when the driver needs it. Mode change takes 5-10 minutes. Also, you can't take off anywhere. To do this, you need a solid strip with a length of at least 180 meters for just one lift off the ground.
It is also worth considering that most laws will require that the Liberty take off and land only in specially designed places. And of course, a pilot's license is required to fly such a hybrid.
And recently, the Russian concern Kalashnikov declassified. It's worth seeing.
The idea that you can get rid of traffic jams by simply flying up is tempting. That is why every year there are more and more concepts of flying cars. And today we will consider the most interesting ideas and talk about whether there are chances for their implementation.
Born to crawl
The idea to combine an aircraft and a car appeared much earlier than one might think. The first attempt in history to create a "winged" car was made by an American Glen Curtis in 1916. The designer called his brainchild Curtis Autoplane. The bizarre device had three wings at once and vaguely resembled the triplanes used in the First World War. "Autoplan" could drive, but he was not destined to reach the sky: the maximum that he was capable of was short jumps. The idea of flying cars soon took hold of the powers that be. So, the American industrialist Henry Ford in the 20s allocated money for the Flying Flivver project, in which they wanted to create a "small cheap flying car." His story, alas, turned out to be sad: the very first test ended in disaster. The pilot is dead.
This did not deter the inventors, and over time, many other models of flying cars appeared. The first truly successful Arrowbile, designed by designer Waldo Waterman. The device made its first flight in 1937. The three-wheeled Strelobil was designed for two people. On the ground, he could accelerate to 110 km / h, and in the air - up to 200 km / h. While driving on the road, the huge wings were dismantled: without them, the Arrowbile was registered as a motorcycle. Despite the merits of Strelobil, five such machines were built in total, after which the project was closed, and the inventor was left out of work. Similarly, the fate of his followers was: their creations could both ride and fly, but they were not mass-produced.
Nowadays
In the 21st century, inventors have opportunities that designers of past years never dreamed of. This is partly why in recent years very promising models of flying cars have appeared. The greatest attention of the public among all of them attracts AeroMobil- the creation of the Slovak designer Stefan Klein. This is not surprising, because the company of the same name decided to launch a “winged” car on the market as early as 2017. The car has a bewitching futuristic appearance, although its main feature lies, of course, not in design, but in capabilities.
“AeroMobil can reach 160 km/h on the highway and 200 km/h in the sky. Regular motor gasoline is used as fuel: AeroMobil 3.0 spends 8 l / 100 km on the highway, and 15 liters in the sky. The cruising range on the highway is 875 km, and in the "airplane" mode, the device can overcome up to 700 km "
In the air, the car moves due to the screw, which is installed in the rear. AeroMobil has an autopilot, in addition, it was equipped with a special parachute system for rescue in an emergency. To make it convenient to move on the highway, the wings of the car fold. Of course, no one will take off from the usual road. To make a flight, you need to get to the runway and, of course, have a license to fly, in other words, you must be a pilot.
AeroMobil is far from the only flying car we can already see. Back in 2009, the American company Terrafugia launched its Terrafugia Transition aircraft into the sky. The original look of the car received folding wings, allowing you to put it in a regular garage. Transition can move freely in the air and on the ground. On the highway, the car is capable of developing 105 km / h, in the sky - 185 km / h. Terrafugia needs a runway longer than 500 meters to take off. The developers have been constantly improving their brainchild, and today several versions of Terrafugia Transition have been created. Buy such a car will be "only" for 279 thousand dollars.
Concepts of the future
We examined some models of modern flying cars. As you probably already noticed, they are united by one feature - such machines need a runway (or at least a flat section of the road). Of course, this sharply limits the range of their application. Therefore, now the already mentioned company Terrafugia is working on its new model. TF-X. This is a cross between a car and a tiltrotor. Unlike many other flying car models, the TF-X will not need airfields: the car will be able to take off and land vertically on a platform with a diameter of 30 m. The four-seater car received folding wings, each of which has an electric motor that drives the propellers. The machine also has a 300 hp internal combustion engine. With.
For all the futuristic nature of the project, it is also impossible to call TF-X a simple “flight of fancy”: obviously, its creators are determined to finish what they started. And more recently, the developer and founder of Google Larry Page invested $ 100 million in the creation of this car. So the project has every chance for development.
Another curious concept of a universal flying car was presented by an American startup Crossblade. His model sky cruiser is an amazing mixture of quadcopter, aircraft and car. In addition to folding wings, the car received four retractable supports, where modules with rotors are placed (each of them spins an 80-horsepower electric motor). These propellers are responsible for takeoff and landing, but horizontal flight is provided by two propellers in the tail section of the car.
SkyCruiser has one drawback - its size. The length of the flying car is an immodest 8.4 meters, and the width with spread wings is 9.5 m. So it will not be easy to park on such a car. But all this more than covers the capabilities of the SkyCruiser. The developers claim that he will be able to fly at a cruising speed of 500 km / h. This is much higher than the speeds of modern flying cars.
Among the concepts of flying cars, there are absolutely incredible creations. Here you can remember the concept Honda Fuzo, which has not only high performance (speed of about 350 miles per hour), but also compactness, as well as mind-blowing design. The wheels of the car in flight move into the body and act as turbines. The designer considered the round steering wheel a relic of the past - instead, the car received a joystick. The entire upper part of the car is transparent: apparently, this is necessary in order to enjoy beautiful views in flight.
Ordinary cars will go into oblivion?
But let's think about whether flying cars can replace ordinary cars. Or at least make them worthy of competition. With all the apparent advantages of flying machines, we can say with confidence - no. Of course, anything can happen in a hundred or two hundred years. But in the foreseeable future, the widespread distribution of "winged" cars is definitely not expected. Why? There are several reasons.
Price. When buying a car, it is often its value that is at the forefront. And in terms of price, a flying car will definitely not have competitive advantages: even according to the most conservative estimates, it will cost no less than 200 thousand dollars. And this means that only a few will be able to buy such a car.
Ecology. When taking off, a “winged” car spends an incredible amount of fuel. So you certainly can’t call it green. In our time, when automakers are trying to make vehicles as green as possible, the idea of \u200b\u200ba “gluttonous” flying car looks like complete absurdity. Such machines will be able to become widespread only when the aircraft switch to other fuels that do not harm the environment.
Safety. The car has never been considered a safe mode of transport. And if you "attach wings" to him, the threat to the life of the driver will only increase. To minimize such risks, drivers will need to be taught how to operate a flying car for many years. On the other hand, unmanned technologies may soon appear that will allow you to fly safely.
Infrastructure. To start using flying cars everywhere, it will be necessary to completely rebuild the infrastructure of cities. On the roofs of the house, at least, take-off and landing sites will have to appear, on which "winged" cars can be accommodated. And we will also need new services and departments responsible for the development of routes and compliance with flight rules.
In general, a flying car is not so much a car that can fly, but more of a plane that can travel on public roads. But does anyone need such a plane?
Last year, the Slovak company AeroMobil from Slovakia presented the third generation of its flying car called The model is currently being tested in real flight conditions.
It only takes a few seconds for the new car to go from car to plane and back again. The length of the model is 6 meters, and the width is 2.24 meters in the form of a car and 8.32 meters with wings spread.
AeroMobil 3.0 is made of composite materials, equipped with aircraft avionics, a parachute insertion system and an autopilot. Thanks to the variable angle of the wings, the novelty can take off in just “a few hundred meters” of acceleration along the runway.
The powerful suspension allows AeroMobil 3.0 to accelerate and land even on uneven surfaces.
The flying car prototype was tested on the road and in the air in the fall of 2014. The model is built on a steel frame and uses a carbon fiber body with folding wings. According to official information from the manufacturer, AeroMobil is equipped with a Rotax 912 engine, which provides models with a takeoff speed of 130 kilometers per hour, flight speeds of up to more than 200 kilometers per hour and road speeds of up to 160 kilometers per hour.
In the air, the model consumes 15 liters of fuel per hour and can fly up to 700 kilometers. The fuel consumption of the car on the highway is 8 liters per hundred kilometers, and the maximum range is 900 kilometers.
AeroMobil is going to launch a serial version of its invention on the market in two years, Za Rulem.RF reports. The aircar will be released in 2017 in both two- and four-seater versions. The estimated cost of the model is several hundred thousand euros. To drive a car, you will need not only a driver's license, but also a pilot's license.
The target audience of the novelty is supercar buyers who want to start an “expensive hobby”. The company is also considering the possibility of launching an air taxi service.
An AeroMobil flying car needs an airport runway or prepared turf to take off and land. Grass lanes can be organized along the highway and near gas stations.
