MY FLYING CAR

The car would have 4 motorbike wheels with suspension. It would be a single seat-er like a go-cart and would be roadworthy to drive on highways and roads.

It would have front wheel steering when traveling on a road. The propulsion system would be a counter-rotational fan at the rear of the car between two tail fins. The tail fins would be joined together with an aerofoil to give it up and down control when flying. The wing rim would be a curved edge like on an aircraft wing but that's all.

When driving on the road the wings would be swept back and wouldn't stick out at all on the roadworthy vehicle. When taking of the wing-rim would sweep out to form a delta shape flying wing made from plastic like Kevlar and would open up like an umbrella Steering would be mechanical but based on center of gravity of the single seat-er. Essentially it would be a fan based go-cart that transforms into a hang-glider with fan propulsion.

The wheels wouldn't have a motor connected but would have motorbike suspension and brakes. The engine powering the counter-spinning fan would be a high performance motorbike engine.

When the plane lands the wings would sweep in like an umbrella folding up the plastic Kevlar properly and allow the car to continue to it's destination on land.

Are there any motor-bike companies that would like to build it with me? then PM me.

The plastic wings could unroll from a roller as the craft spreads its wings. Pneumatics would control the center of gravity. The flying care could be flown unmanned by remote control with telemetry of compass reading, speed, and angle of wings to the ground. Followed up with video camera view from various angles until perfected with computer simulations.

What's the point?

All you have is the worst of both worlds.

A sucky flying machine and a pitiful car.

With no real advantage, because, hauling the wing, rudder and elevator mechanism around will make your milage suck and hauling the steering, lighting and propeller protection (can't have an open prop on a car) around on the plane won't improve its efficiency either.

Finally, with the kind of wingspan you need to get the flying car into the air (The delta airfoil you describe won't be great) you will need sufficient wingspan that you can't use a highway (safely) which means you still need to fly to and from airports.

So, the better solution, is simply when you land at the airport, rent a car.

Arthur

The point is it can use motorbike technology. Be easily serviced. You can drive it around the paddocks like a four wheeled motorbike and fly it to your friends country farm.

It would be mass produced, as an alternate `of the road vehicle recreational vehicle' and it would be safer than a motorized hang-glider. And you could drive it at 100KM an hour on the highway.

And Adoucette, if you think it would look sucky then your allow your imagination to run free overnight. Because my impression of it would look very good.

As a recreational vehicle, maybe (though so far all attempts at this have failed to produce a vehicle that sold in any numbers)

As a useful vehicle?

Unlikely

Airplanes, to work well have to be very LIGHT and STREAMLINED.

Once you start having to hang other requirements on the plane your efficiency is only going to go down.

But Ok lets assume we will accept a less than ideal plane.

Now look what hauling a set of wings, elevators and a rudder does to what is essentially a motorbike?

Certainly they have NO USE when on the ground, so again, you are hauling a lot of material around for nothing.

Worse, hauling these items around subjects them to damage which because of their light weight requirement also makes them easily damaged when out of their normal operating enviorment (the sky)

Then there is the propulsion issue.

No one will be happy sitting behind you when you gun that motor.

Propellers work ok for planes.

The SUCK big time for use on the ground.

Arthur

The flying car would be slender perhaps as long as 3 motorbikes. When taking of the roller assembly of plastic wings and titanium-aluminum wing rim would be raised (like the inverse of a planes nose wheel) up. Then the wing rims would spread like a Moths wings unrolling the plastic from the spring loaded tapered spools. Between the roller assembly there would be aerofoils a a strong center of mass pivot. The Flying car would pneumatically be able to angle the angular tilt of the wing the same way that a helicopter can angle its spinning propeller however of-course the delta flying plastic wing wouldn't be spinning. Pneumatics like power steering in a car would tilt the wing and thus shift the center of gravity allowing it high maneuverability. It could be possible to have small propellers between the rollers at the center of gravity to increase the vacuum above the plastic wing at low speeds and also a a precaution to make sure it stays the right way up in a sudden burst of wind, it has to be able to recover. The plastic can be transparent in some sections and artistically streamline-multicolored in other sections.

I want the combined air/hovercraft in stead. Let's build roads with a magnetic stripe that it can 'lock' to when following such boring paths. Is will be somewhat wingshaped and able to lift to ahhh fifty meters ca.. (should it go higher?)

Or my own Zeppelin with the newest electrical technology, solar cells coated on the hull, also in some rigid shell formed for maximum stability while flying/floating in that sea of air. Who wouldn't want to be a mariner of the blue younder :)

Adoucette, at-least my craft is roadworthy on the highway. How would you transport your recreational ultralight to a paddock/farm/airport? The same way you would transport your recreational speedboat to the beach? On a trailer towed by your RUV.

Just one question:
What condition do you think that the paint job on the car behind this propeller driven car / plane would be given how much sand is on the roads?

Paul h, My Fly-Car would give tail-gators a good blow-job in cooling down the heat in their steamy radiators. lol

I was talking about sandblasting the paint off of the car behind you. not to mention the pitted windshield.

Estimation of the FlyCars dimensions depend on the size of the delta wing when it spreads out like Moth-wings and the amount of lift it can generate. The heaviest items in the FlyCar would be the motorbike motor and the pneumatic power-steering like `delta wing tilting mechanics'. The remaining items can be made from very lightweight materials. Lift would increase with speed however speed depends on the weight/size of the motor and that affects the required spread-out wing-span.