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Flying car prototype ready by end of 2017, says Airbus CEO
- FabHK 10y agoTo misappropriate what Stephan Zweig is said to have said about Brazil: Flying cars are the transport of the future, and always will be. Nitpicks: 1. Ready for a demo flight, maybe. To get it in production takes ages in aviation: The amphibious ICON (iCon?) A5 was first flown in 2008, the first production aircraft was out in 2014, but customers have not yet received any actual deliveries [1]. 2. Flying cars? Very few of these new concept aircraft are actually cars, i.e. designed for extended time on the road. (Exception maybe the Terrafugia Transition: first flown in 2009, deliveries expected "between 2015 and 2016" according to Wikipedia [2].). Not sure what's a good name for these new ones, maybe VSVA (very small VTOL aircraft) or EPA (electric personal aircraft) or something. Ehang [3] and Volocopter [4] are testing multicopters ("drones") already, for 1 and 2 pax, respectively. Personally, I don't like the low rotors of the Ehang - looks like a recipe for disaster to me. Lilium looks interesting, too [5]. I hope some of them materialise soon at reasonable prices -- though we might need some more breakthroughs in battery technology. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ICON_A5 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ICON_A5 [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terrafugia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terrafugia [3] http://www.ehang.com/ehang184 http://www.ehang.com/ehang184 [4] http://www.volocopter.com/index.php/en/ http://www.volocopter.com/index.php/en/ [5] http://lilium-aviation.com/ http://lilium-aviation.com/