Car /plane combination for $279,000
www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-17626818
Sales are believed to be taking off next year
|
Without being any more of a kill-joy than usual I do see a few drawbacks.
Is there a dual control version (how will one learn to fly it)?
What about comms and navaids? I guess GPS will do but one still has to talk.
Will it be tested and serviced as a car or an aeroplane or both and who will do it?
Does it have full instrumentation for flying or is it clear blue skies only?
While it may fly well how well does it glide if the engine fails. A bit like a brick I guess.
Looks to me more like an expensive rich man's toy than anything seriously practical. It is clever and nobody has really cracked the concept before though.
|
How many times has the "flying car" been launched/invented since the 30's? Someone, someday will realise that this market simply does not exist.
|
Agreed - only for the sort of people who want a showy toy, Lambo, Aston177 etc and it will never have a useful day to day function
|
I imagine its aimed at flyers with the basic private pilots licence or even the more basic sports licence, probably only equipped for VFR (visual flight rules) flying with basic instruments, no navaids , dead reckoning and pilotage map on the knee looking out of the window stuff
|
They would buy a (share in) a plane. As you can only take off and land from a runway or strip, having a flying car makes no sense.
|
How many truly successful dual- or multi-purpose products are there? Even the Swiss Army Knife (Victorinox, please - no Wenger imitations here) is a useful way to have a blade and a screwdriver in your pocket, but I've never used one to prepare my dinner or put up a shelf. I suppose the Sharp radio-cassette I bought in 1981 did a reasonable job of both functions - although both were still compromised for the sake of portability. I have a meat thermometer in the kitchen that also has a timer function, but I'd still have bought it if it didn't.
So who's got something that's genuinely useful for more than one function?
|
>>So who's got something that's genuinely useful for more than one function?
SWMBO can multi-task.
So she claims.
|
"So who's got something that's genuinely useful for more than one function? "
Ahem, ........most blokes were born with one.
|
There have been a few of these flying cars over the years. I'm pretty sure the first one was from the 1930s, certainly the forties.
Only a demented gadget freak would want a clumsy fragile car that became, probably not too easily, a clumsy fragile aeroplane. A very rich person with sense would rather have a Rolls-Royce and a Lear jet, best of both worlds instead of worst...
|
I'd like a helicopter. I can't afford one and I don't know how to fly one but I'd like one.
|
I wouldn't. But I wouldn't say no to a polished rotor hub on an ebony plinth as a sitting room ornament.
|
...most blokes were born with one.
Good shout, Dulwich-san! How did I not think of the ultimate multi-purpose bloke thing - the shed?
|
>> ...most blokes were born with one.
Two surely? Either thumb can be used for goosing people with a sharp upward gesture, and condemning them to death with an emphatic downturn.
Those who also use the thumb for picking their noses risk enlarging those well-chiselled nostrils.
|
My long distant recall of lady places leads me to think they have 3 functions - one in and two out, one of which is babies.
|
The biggest problem with multi function items, is if you get senile, you can end up not knowing if your coming or going.....
|