Flying Lotus Elise

Wow. Give him an 'A' for creativity. Anybody want to do a flying 914? I don't think either car will hold up well to full-stall landings and I've got serious issues with the flight controls (Throttle by foot, and rudder with the steering wheel? )

-Ben M.

WTF um, no thanks

uhh... no thanks.




M

ask me again after they've got 100 hrs each on the first 5 production units.

i'm guessing a finished package will be in the $300,000 range.

i'm a little disappointed that an aircraft designed does not know that the GPS satellites are not geosynchronous ...

At Oshkosh, when I was a teenager, there was an El Camino car/plane... and even as a kid.. 'I don't think so!'

...and you know kids... "hey, I could get 6 chicks in that thing, and fly out of the county!"




M

I may want one, for the next time I am being chased by James Bond.

Uh

Is it a fly by instruments only contraption? How does the pilot see?

Also noticed that the Web content is dated 2002. Apparently this bird never took off

the grey greenhouse appears to be an artifact of the CGI used to model the Elise, or it may just be 'retouch' grey to emphasize where the car ends and the 'powered wing' portion begin.

only 2 years in development is nothing - Richard Moller has been working to complete his 'SkyCar' concept for 20 years and despite lots of work i don't think they're really very much closer...

the issues i see as highly daunting are a 'standard category' 4g-rated coupling between the powered wing and the capsule, and really, really good dry-break fittings to handle coupling (and uncoupling) the hot, pressurised coolant between the wing's engine and the car's radiator. that part of the concept, i think, is literally "not going to fly."

air cooling would simplify plumbing, but now you have a powerplant that has a hard time generating adequate power to lift the rather substantial bulk. so far all (both) successful 'flying car' products have had a single engine. two separate engines is an interesting concept, but it adds a huge amount of weight, and weight is the enemy in aircraft. looks to have substantial wing loading too.

add to that the unconventional flight control laws (which have been studied before so they're not novel, but they are unlike most every aircraft now flying ...

The idea of a an airplane that converts to a car (especially an Elise) has some limited apeal to me, but I don't expect anyone to ever make it work. It's just not practicle. I'd sure fly more often if it was though. One of the reasons I don't fly much is because of the hassle - once you get to your destination airport you have no way to get around. If I fly somewhere I've always got to call somebody to come pick me up at the airport (unless they live on a farm with a big flat pasture I can land on - but that's never happened). One of the biggest hang-ups I have is relying on someone else for transportation.

-Ben M.

Imagine the nav aids...

ILS says you are lined up, and good to go... and the in-dash is screaming at you to take that last right, onto Fornier Rd..




M

There was the 1950 Fulton Airphibian

The Flying Elise, however, seems to be rooted more in the 1947 ConvAirCar

Here's a cool flying car. Lockheed C5 Gallaxy. It looks like you have quite a lot of options for the "car" part. Anything from a Vespa to a Peterbuilt should be plug-and-play.

-Ben M.

ps - regarding the windscreen on the Elise - it just looks to me like an exterior sun-shade over the windows.



Edited to add: stupid link won't work - site won't allow direct link to pictures. Had to snag it. Will post below.

In a C5, you could pack a Hummer, an M1-A2 with all the good stuff, and a couple small Porsche collections.

It would be the go anywhere/do anything package... as long as you can find a nice flat 12,000ft long piece of pavement 150ft wide..




M

if yer gonna go boonie crashing in the hinterlands, you merely need a C-17; wide as a C-5, long as a C-141, put 'er down in a 3000' unprepared field.

C-17s have set 33 world records – more than any other airlifter in history -- including payload to altitude, time-to-climb, and short-takeoff-and-landing marks in which the C-17 took off in less than 1,400 feet, carried a payload of 44,000 pounds to altitude, and landed in less than 1,400 feet. These records were set during flight-testing at Edwards Air Force Base, Calif., in 2001.

Uhh... yeah, but the aluminum overcast is more than 'fair to partly cloudy' with a Galaxy.





M

Here's the picture I was trying to link to above:

They have onboard hair salons, movie theatres, and a food court.


M

You forgot about the 6 lane bowling alley

Yep, C-5's are BIG MOFO's!

Saw one out in Yuma, they unloaded a couple of trucks, a Jeep, and 2 helicopters!

Tried to get a closer look, but the perimeter gaurds seemed pretty serious about us not getting anywhere near it. (M-16 + Air Force Guard w/attitude = dead/wounded Sailor)

I'd have to check, but I think that the Russian Antonov AN-225 is even bigger than the Galaxy. Had one sitting at Lambert out in front of our hanger last year.....Friggin' HUGE!

rgr that, Antonov is colossal.

Imagine one of those used as a clown car.... you know how many clowns you could get in there?



-circus music plays infinitely-


M

The Antonov was here last year. Stopped to refuel....they payed cash....have one guy who had a big bag of cash.....guess they can't get credit.....