“The AirCar fulfills a lifelong dream to bring the freedom of flight into the hands of everyday people.”
The price? Between $800,000 and $1 million, depending on specs.
Don’t forget the cost and time investment in getting your pilots licence.
Also there is no way this is going to be legal to drive on public roads in most countries - just look at the massive tail boom that sticks out. This is just a fancy aircraft for people that want an overcomplicated Cessna.
The tail boom is massive compared to a sports car but I think the folded-up package looks not bigger than a giant American SUV.
Speaking as one who routinely has trouble parking a motor home and driving over curbs with it — this big awkward-looking vehicle doesn’t look like a great city-car but it does not compete with motor homes for the awkwardness prize.
I couldn’t find specs skimming through the article, but it doesn’t look like it would fit in any normal parking space. Driving around might be as unwieldy as a motorhome or box truck, without the height advantage when you inevitably drive over a curb while turning. Doing that might also make it un-airworthy.
Give me a intercity train or intercity tram any day.
Yeah, I too once thought flying cars were the best idea since sliced bread. I’ve since grown up and realized that they’re just airplanes with extra steps, cause it’s not like you’re ever going to be able to land it on a highway or whatever. It will always be cheaper to just buy an airplane and a car and use one to get to the other.
It’s also that usual cars don’t fall down on someone’s head. And can just stay on one place for traffic jams.
Not possible until Star Wars style repulsors are created, and even then TBH not that cool.
The vehicle, certified for airworthiness and flight-tested over 170 hours with more than 500 takeoffs and landings, is now headed for mass production.
Jesus fuck please tell me that’s a typo and they left some zeros off. Your average commercial pilot has more than that before any airline is even willing to consider hiring them, that is absolutely not sufficient testing.
Still, early adopters may face bureaucratic turbulence. Potential buyers must be both licensed drivers and certified pilots.
No shit. And that is never going to change, becoming a certified pilot is a lot fuckin harder than getting a driver’s license, and for very good reasons. If some BMW-driving cunt can’t even be arsed to use his turn signal do you really want to ease the “bureaucratic turbulence” just so he can fuck up and crash into a packed airliner? These things still have to use runways, the people flying them still need to know how to behave themselves at airports, how to identify and avoid restricted airspace, how to communicate with ATC and how to behave if (let’s be honest, when) they get Intercepted.
And all of this so you can have a car that’s worse at being a car, and an airplane that’s worse at being an airplane, but hey at least you won’t have to book a rental car at your destination airport, which I remind you they still have to use.
As long as they’re only using smaller airports. Let the millionaires and billionaires have this. It’s like another ocean gate scenario.
I agree with everything you’re saying though haha.
The ocean depths arent above innocent people’s heads.
There are street legal autogyros that are a lot cheaper and make more sense as a crossover vehicle
Damn, we really got flying cars before
- GTA 6
- Elder Scrolls 6
- Half Life 3 (but barely? Hopefully?)
It’s called a plane.
Seen this like 10 years ago lol
That’s not very expensiv…
No thank you, I’ll take a drone cab over this any day.
What problem does this solve? And is that problem worth all the negatives this brings?
The problem it solves is that most small airports are located miles away from the communities they serve. That isn’t an issue with a car, but it does suck when traveling.
Uber/Lyft have mostly solved this problem. However. There are plenty of small rural communities or small vacation destinations which are too rural to have taxis or uber/lyft.
Is it worth it? No. But it’s a legit problem
I’d rather have a FLDSMDFR. Sorry not sorry. People already drive like ass on the road. I don’t need that in the sky.
I think I’d like to have the full alphabet instead.
That’s not the “flying car” anyone envisioned or wanted. That’s just an airplane but a lot shittier.
Looks a bit like in “The Man With The Golden Gun”
Apart from all the discussion regarding how stupid this is, how the fuck would this even fit on a road? I doubt the wings would be durable enough if they were retractable. This shit would take up 2 lanes and fuck up any and all intersections. And as a added bonus, it would fuck with everyone elses perception who are used to the distances you keep away from regular vehicles when theyre turning in front of you. This shitheap wouldnt even make it to the airport because someone will probably misjudge the turn radius with the wings and fuck it up on the way there.
