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Of course. But if you're dragging a roadworthy suspension, brakes, transmission etc. with you when you fly, you're handicapping your power/weight ratio right then and there.
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-- Flimsy ? Uhmmm ... Take into account you are not driving this *thing* for pleasure for a long distance. The whole object is to get to an airport, quick and easy ...
For a car, it's very flimsy indeed. It weighs 970 pounds, empty. That's roughly half a Fiat 500.
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-- Fragile ? The latest requirements for any *production* aircraft, NOT being *Experimental* are quite rigorous ...
In a road-going environment, light aircraft are comparatively very fragile - and hideously expensive to repair.
Location: God's Gift to Mankind for flying anything
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Originally Posted by Dane_in_LA
Of course. But if you're dragging a roadworthy suspension, brakes, transmission etc. with you when you fly, you're handicapping your power/weight ratio right then and there.
Can you back that up with *facts* that will prove that this design does indeed have a handicap in power to weight ratio ?
For a car, it's very flimsy indeed. It weighs 970 pounds, empty. That's roughly half a Fiat 500.
This has no bearing on the principles of design for this particular vehicle.
If *you* think, that adding weighty equipment will make a vehicle less flimsy, than what would you change to keep it still flight worthy ?
What makes this vehicle *Flimsy*, and even more so *Very* Flimsy ?
Do you have any proof or again just an opinion ?
In a road-going environment, light aircraft are comparatively very fragile - and hideously expensive to repair.
Statements only made without the real technical background to justify their notions. Compared to what ? Bicycles ? Hideously expensive ? You own a light aircraft ?
I do, and I spend more on maintenance on my car !
As I stated before, when you look at this project from a feasibility standpoint, it is an idea not half bad. It is still just an idea !
It is NOT a road going car for long distances.
The whole idea is to get from your home to an airport as quick as you can, which means if you live hundreds of miles from an airport, this idea idea is useless.
If you had the funds to spend money on a vehicle that can fly you from one place to another, then the only *advantage* of a flying *car* would be the *possible savings* of not having to pay *hangar fees*.
I am not worried about future *crowded skies*, because, IF and When this idea would come to fruition, the majority of people *on the road*, would neither have the funds, nor the mentality, to qualify for the license to fly this vehicle anyway ...
If anybody thinks that getting a pilots license is easy, why do you not get one ? Not that expensive to rent a plane !
So ..., in the end, a neat idea.
For anybody?--- No !
Bad design (under powered, flimsy) ? --- Who are you listening to ?
When there are 100-million "cars" in the sky, what kind of braking distances will they have? Will it be illegal to text while flying? When 90% of the commuters are in the air, someone will come with the very appealihg and revolutionary idea of driving to work on the ground, where there is almost no traffic. Imagine a modern traffic jam on the ground, where nobody could slow down below stall velocity, and had to keep going 100 mph regardless of the congestion.
Anybody who has had a lifetime subscription to Mechanix Illustrated magazine since about 1950 has see a hundred of these useless geewhiz gimmicks come and go. Not to mention the x-ray vision glasses that enabled you to see through women's clothes while walking inconspicuously down the street. http://tomheroes.com/images/COMICAD%...%20glasses.JPG
Can you back that up with *facts* that will prove that this design does indeed have a handicap in power to weight ratio ?
Well, we can compare it to the CZAW SportCruiser, another LSA with the exact same powerplant. Only it cruises 22 knots faster (93 vs. 115) and it provides an additional 120 pounds of useful load. And you'll have about $160,000 left in your pocket to deal with your ground transportation needs.
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This has no bearing on the principles of design for this particular vehicle. If *you* think, that adding weighty equipment will make a vehicle less flimsy, than what would you change to keep it still flight worthy ?
Kind of my point. Take an item like bumpers - in a car, the added weight is worth it, but they add survivability. In the air, they're perfectly useless.
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Statements only made without the real technical background to justify their notions.
Compared to what ? Bicycles ?
To cars. In road-going terms, the Terrafugia has about the passenger and cargo capacity of a Smart, except it's much bigger on the outside and wildly more expensive.
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Hideously expensive ? You own a light aircraft ?
I do, and I spend more on maintenance on my car !
Sadly, no - I do fly a fair bit as passenger in light aircraft, and I have the pleasure of having several plane owners among my friends. But surely you don't disagree that a fender-bender collision in a car can be dealt with at trivial coast compared to structural damage to an aircraft? Unless you're driving an Italian exotic and flying an old Grumman AA-1, if you hit a lamp-post at 10 MPH with your car vs. your plane, what hurts the wallet most?
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So ..., in the end, a neat idea.
For anybody?--- No !
Certainly. It's a neat little rich people's plaything. Like an amphibious car. And if someone tells me that an amphibous car makes a great boat, I'll be doubtful as well.
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Bad design (under powered, flimsy) ? --- Who are you listening to ?
For a roadable aircraft, it's probably a fairly good design. The problems are those inherent in making that weird hybrid in the first place.
Those things have been around in one for or another since the 50's and never got off the ground[pardon the pun]...Popular Mechanics Magazine in the 50's ran a BIG story on them.
True, flying cars have been around for quite a while. There was one, a flying version of the AMC Matador, in the James Bond 007 movie "The Man with the Golden Gun."
One would think that they would be in demand for a place like Alaska, where one cannot get to the majority of the State by road. I have seen a few boat-cars from the 1950s in Alaska, but no flying cars. The most likely reason you do not see them in Alaska is because there is no place to drive once you land because there are no roads.
It would seem to me to be more maneuverable to have a gyroscope.
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A solution in search of a problem.
