4 ms·

So we've got Franky Zapata, and we've got Richard Browning building something comparable in the UK, and David Mayman in Australia. Is there anyone else? Why is

by twic 7y ago

So we've got Franky Zapata, and we've got Richard Browning building something comparable in the UK, and David Mayman in Australia. Is there anyone else? Why is this all happening now? They can't all have made revolutionary breakthroughs of their own simultaneously. Is there some underlying technology that has quietly improved to the point where personal aerial dickery has become feasible?

rwmj 7y ago
I assume these boards must be self stabilising, so the breakthrough would be the kind of miniaturised gyroscopes, accelerometers and associated processing power found in smartphones.
- wereHamster 7y ago
  Those chips are already very small. Modern toy drones have a PCB 16x16mm with all the electronics you need to control the drone: CPU, accelerometer, gyroscope, video signal processor, …
- jackvalentine 7y ago
  I'm not sure that's 100% true, I saw an interview with the french guy who said it took tens of hours to learn how to balance before he could fly it.
- jillesvangurp 7y ago
  Adam savage used arm mounted jets to power his iron man suit: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U1wEO-pHizQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U1wEO-pHizQ I'm guessing the person flying this controls this using their legs and center of gravity.
daveoflynn 7y ago
The primary things that's changed has been the availability of small powerful gas-turbine engines. That's what's made the folks you've mentioned, plus the Jetman project, possible. To the best of my knowledge, this class of engines were originally developed for model aircraft.
- Zenst 7y ago
  I had a quick look and seems some impressive little jet engines out there in the model aircraft domain. Quick look found one capable of 25KG thrust, weights just over 1KG. Then when you factor in fuel per minute and weight of fuel per minute. Can soon see why a 22 mile trip needed a refuel. Though still better than jetpacks. But certainly not cheap, looking around $2,000 mark and much of that would be due to supply/demand aspect. If demand increased, that price would drop.
  - cstross 7y ago
    Dirt cheap by military supplier standards. Makes a lot of sense as a small drone/cruise missile engine. Coming soon to a wannabe State Level Actor's arsenal! I'm thinking Da'esh here, but could equally well be white supremacist militias or the New IRA post-Brexit, or just about anyone with a weapons R&D budget in low single-digit millions. Just as smartphones have given us all a general purpose James Bond gadget in our pocket, so too is the availability of cheap computing elements, drone components, and tech like this going to give every militia on the planet the sort of smart weapons capability that was bleeding edge in the 1990s.
  - amelius 7y ago
    Here's a nice video showing such a model jet engine slurping fuel. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u42QrTqmYwg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u42QrTqmYwg The description of the video contains all the numbers, including: Max. power: 300N (30,5kg) Fuel consumption: 980ml/min (at max power) Price: 5295 €
- api 7y ago
  So you're telling me we are finally going to get both shiny silver vertical landing rockets (SpaceX) and jetpacks!?!?!
  - SpikeDad 7y ago
    Big difference - shiny SpaceX rocket fails meh. Shiny jetpack fails dead person. Some of the earlier attempts did have ballistic parachutes but you still had to deploy at least 75 feet high. Any lower and you're dead.
pessimizer 7y ago
I think Franky Zapata's development was gradual and incremental as far as I can tell. He started with the idea for the flyboard and kept thinking about what he was going to do next after he figured out the problem he was working on now. I mean, why did the flyboard wait until 2012 to be invented? I don't know that there's a significant technical advance in it.
- trhway 7y ago
  >why did the flyboard wait until 2012 to be invented? I don't know that there's a significant technical advance in it. technically it has already been available for a long time, just at a very different price point : https://youtu.be/uXNNc_HFodI?t=486 https://youtu.be/uXNNc_HFodI?t=486 Like drones and private space (SpaceX/etc) it is all about cheap&powerful electronics mostly and the good economy with a lot of money available for R&D at all levels.
qqn 7y ago
What everyone else said: the imagination was there, it's just now that technology has caught up. I'd been following this topic for the past year and literally just today wrapped it all up by a blog post on the topic: https://spmx.ca/flyingcars https://spmx.ca/flyingcars. The biggest surprise? That human-powered flight has been a thing since the 60s. Second and third place, respectively, are the twins who made a bathtub fly and the drone BASE jumper. Insane!
- JasonFruit 7y ago
  Human-powered flight has been a thing since the 1930s! The earliest craft were only barely capable of unassisted takeoffs, but they made some surprising sustained flights after an assisted start. By the 60s, they were making real flights after unassisted takeoffs, and the 70s saw them with low-enough power consuption to complete turns and cross-country flights. Now we even have human-powered helicopters!
- peteretep 7y ago
  > drone BASE jumper This was less good than I was hoping. They start the guy off on a radio tower, drag him a few meters, and then he lets go.
  - qqn 7y ago
    The reason was safety: there is a minimal height required for the chute to open in time. Any fall below that and the jumper's toast. They had the fellow start on the tower to ensure he'd have time to pull the chute in case of any slip-up.
aaron695 7y ago
Internet. Old tech. The internet allows it to be fine tuned, progressed and be globalised. Plus to a lessor extent computing power. It super speeds the internet. ie. modelling is quicker, which allows quicker iterations.

by twic 7y ago

rwmj 7y ago

I assume these boards must be self stabilising, so the breakthrough would be the kind of miniaturised gyroscopes, accelerometers and associated processing power found in smartphones.

wereHamster 7y ago
Those chips are already very small. Modern toy drones have a PCB 16x16mm with all the electronics you need to control the drone: CPU, accelerometer, gyroscope, video signal processor, …
jackvalentine 7y ago
I'm not sure that's 100% true, I saw an interview with the french guy who said it took tens of hours to learn how to balance before he could fly it.
jillesvangurp 7y ago
Adam savage used arm mounted jets to power his iron man suit: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U1wEO-pHizQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U1wEO-pHizQ I'm guessing the person flying this controls this using their legs and center of gravity.

daveoflynn 7y ago

The primary things that's changed has been the availability of small powerful gas-turbine engines. That's what's made the folks you've mentioned, plus the Jetman project, possible. To the best of my knowledge, this class of engines were originally developed for model aircraft.

Zenst 7y ago
I had a quick look and seems some impressive little jet engines out there in the model aircraft domain. Quick look found one capable of 25KG thrust, weights just over 1KG. Then when you factor in fuel per minute and weight of fuel per minute. Can soon see why a 22 mile trip needed a refuel. Though still better than jetpacks. But certainly not cheap, looking around $2,000 mark and much of that would be due to supply/demand aspect. If demand increased, that price would drop.
- cstross 7y ago
  Dirt cheap by military supplier standards. Makes a lot of sense as a small drone/cruise missile engine. Coming soon to a wannabe State Level Actor's arsenal! I'm thinking Da'esh here, but could equally well be white supremacist militias or the New IRA post-Brexit, or just about anyone with a weapons R&D budget in low single-digit millions. Just as smartphones have given us all a general purpose James Bond gadget in our pocket, so too is the availability of cheap computing elements, drone components, and tech like this going to give every militia on the planet the sort of smart weapons capability that was bleeding edge in the 1990s.
- amelius 7y ago
  Here's a nice video showing such a model jet engine slurping fuel. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u42QrTqmYwg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u42QrTqmYwg The description of the video contains all the numbers, including: Max. power: 300N (30,5kg) Fuel consumption: 980ml/min (at max power) Price: 5295 €
api 7y ago
So you're telling me we are finally going to get both shiny silver vertical landing rockets (SpaceX) and jetpacks!?!?!
- SpikeDad 7y ago
  Big difference - shiny SpaceX rocket fails meh. Shiny jetpack fails dead person. Some of the earlier attempts did have ballistic parachutes but you still had to deploy at least 75 feet high. Any lower and you're dead.

pessimizer 7y ago

I think Franky Zapata's development was gradual and incremental as far as I can tell. He started with the idea for the flyboard and kept thinking about what he was going to do next after he figured out the problem he was working on now. I mean, why did the flyboard wait until 2012 to be invented? I don't know that there's a significant technical advance in it.

trhway 7y ago
>why did the flyboard wait until 2012 to be invented? I don't know that there's a significant technical advance in it. technically it has already been available for a long time, just at a very different price point : https://youtu.be/uXNNc_HFodI?t=486 https://youtu.be/uXNNc_HFodI?t=486 Like drones and private space (SpaceX/etc) it is all about cheap&powerful electronics mostly and the good economy with a lot of money available for R&D at all levels.

qqn 7y ago

What everyone else said: the imagination was there, it's just now that technology has caught up. I'd been following this topic for the past year and literally just today wrapped it all up by a blog post on the topic: https://spmx.ca/flyingcars https://spmx.ca/flyingcars. The biggest surprise? That human-powered flight has been a thing since the 60s. Second and third place, respectively, are the twins who made a bathtub fly and the drone BASE jumper. Insane!

JasonFruit 7y ago
Human-powered flight has been a thing since the 1930s! The earliest craft were only barely capable of unassisted takeoffs, but they made some surprising sustained flights after an assisted start. By the 60s, they were making real flights after unassisted takeoffs, and the 70s saw them with low-enough power consuption to complete turns and cross-country flights. Now we even have human-powered helicopters!
peteretep 7y ago
> drone BASE jumper This was less good than I was hoping. They start the guy off on a radio tower, drag him a few meters, and then he lets go.
- qqn 7y ago
  The reason was safety: there is a minimal height required for the chute to open in time. Any fall below that and the jumper's toast. They had the fellow start on the tower to ensure he'd have time to pull the chute in case of any slip-up.

aaron695 7y ago

Internet. Old tech. The internet allows it to be fine tuned, progressed and be globalised. Plus to a lessor extent computing power. It super speeds the internet. ie. modelling is quicker, which allows quicker iterations.