Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

No Longer a Dream: Silicon Valley Takes on the Flying Car

mobile.nytimes.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

41–50 of 58 posts

Re: No Longer a Dream: Silicon Valley Takes on the Flying Car

#41

Post by johan_larson »

Piskvorrr wrote: post #34
demarq wrote: post #30

Every x months since the early nineties there will be an article about someone developing a flying car, and the inventor/ceo painting a jetsons future where riding in a flying car is but a casual experience of the future. I'm not complaining, I just find it a truly fascinating phenomenon. In 20 years we'll be reading this same article written by someone else for the 16 thousand time.But hopefully that article will en…

Since the 1950s, actually. This is one of the technologies that's always 5 years in the future. "Jam tomorrow and jam yesterday, but never jam today."

The big problems are safety and noise. If "flying cars" operated in large numbers in urban and suburban environments are going to become a thing, both need to be solved.

Best guess, we can solve the safety issue. With enough on-board safety systems, pilot training, appropriate rules of the road, and mandatory transponders, we could make things safe enough. But that still leaves noise. What conceivable propeller or turbine system could lift a thousand pounds while being as quiet as a modern car? Probably none of them.

Re: No Longer a Dream: Silicon Valley Takes on the Flying Car

#43

Post by diggan »

demarq wrote: post #30

Every x months since the early nineties there will be an article about someone developing a flying car, and the inventor/ceo painting a jetsons future where riding in a flying car is but a casual experience of the future. I'm not complaining, I just find it a truly fascinating phenomenon. In 20 years we'll be reading this same article written by someone else for the 16 thousand time.But hopefully that article will en…

> "to go on sale this later this year"

Funny that you say so, since this article says this but I don't think it makes it more true

> Kitty Hawk, the company backed by Mr. Page, is trying to be one of the first out of the gate and plans to start selling its vehicle by the end of the year.

Re: No Longer a Dream: Silicon Valley Takes on the Flying Car

#44

Post by ProblemFactory »

demarq wrote: post #30

Every x months since the early nineties there will be an article about someone developing a flying car, and the inventor/ceo painting a jetsons future where riding in a flying car is but a casual experience of the future. I'm not complaining, I just find it a truly fascinating phenomenon. In 20 years we'll be reading this same article written by someone else for the 16 thousand time.But hopefully that article will en…

The thing is, we have had "flying cars" - helicopters - for almost 100 years. Helicopters match the core functionality of a flying car: can fly, can carry 2-6 people, can take off and land almost everywhere.

So why are helicopters still relatively rare, and what is different in a "flying car" that people dream about? It's not 4 tiny wheels after all (and you can get a helicopter with tiny wheels).

* Price: helicopters are expensive to buy, and very expensive to maintain. You need about 1 hour of maintenance for every 10 flight hours.

* Fuel cost: vertical thrust for lift is very energy intensive.

* Difficult to pilot: needs professional training.

* Noise and airspace restrictions: many cities do not allow personal helicopters to fly low or land in urban areas due to noise and fear of accidents.

"Difficult to pilot" is the only area where I see significant possible improvements in the near future, if autopilot gets good enough to remove the pilot altogether.

But there is no obvious engineering breakthrough on the horizon that will improve the maintenance, energy use or noise issues. Maybe if there is a breakthrough in battery technology, then electric helicopters could improve on both the energy and maintenance costs, but that is not really up to people working on "flying cars".

Re: No Longer a Dream: Silicon Valley Takes on the Flying Car

#45

Post by beaconstudios »

golergka wrote: post #36
wanderingjew wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a mention of Ehang in the article. However, I cannot put this more succinctly: The Ehang is an abortion of aviation. Instead of going into the idiocy of an autonomously piloted passenger aircraft (which will never be legal under any sane civil aviation laws), I'm just going to go over why the current Ehang 184 doesn't make any sense. The Ehang 184 is an octocopter, with two rotors stacked on top of each othe…

From your description, it sounds like a solid prototype: fix the lights and other typical prototype stuff, wait for battery technology to catch up, which a LOT of companies around the globe are betting on, and here you have a flying car.

> wait for battery technology to catch up

battery energy density improvements are very small and incremental. It'll take decades to go from 23 minutes airtime to something even slightly practical.

Re: No Longer a Dream: Silicon Valley Takes on the Flying Car

#46

Post by nradov »

robotresearcher wrote: post #23
aphextron wrote: post #5

Another nonsense marketing piece. The image in the article is not even remotely close to a flying car. It is a ducted fan ground effect craft, no different than what NASA and USAF have worked on since the 1950's. Sure you could sort out the stability and flight automation problems with modern software. But the underlying problem to solve is one of energy storage, not aerospace engineering. This company will run into…

> It is a ducted fan ground effect craft, no different than what NASA and USAF have worked on since the 1950's. No, it's not. It's a modern multi-rotor, which have only been possible recently with computer control. No ducts, no (useful) ground effect. Ground effect craft have wings: https://www.google.ca/search?q=ground+effect+craft

Ground effect isn't only a factor for fixed-wing aircraft, it also impacts rotary-wing aircraft including helicopters and the Kitty Hawk Flyer. When you fly a helicopter there is a sudden noticeable loss of lift as you climb out of the ground effect. I'll bet the Kitty Hawk is staying close to the surface at least partially to take advantage of ground effect lift, although the article doesn't make that clear.

Re: No Longer a Dream: Silicon Valley Takes on the Flying Car

#47

Post by nradov »

wanderingjew wrote: post #35
1024core wrote: post #8

No mention of Ehang 184: http://www.ehang.com/ehang184 I don't know much about the company, but they seem to have got something airborne in the last couple of years: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1iyCgy1juHc

There is a mention of Ehang in the article. However, I cannot put this more succinctly: The Ehang is an abortion of aviation. Instead of going into the idiocy of an autonomously piloted passenger aircraft (which will never be legal under any sane civil aviation laws), I'm just going to go over why the current Ehang 184 doesn't make any sense. The Ehang 184 is an octocopter, with two rotors stacked on top of each othe…

Current FAA regulations for rotorcraft require a 20 minute fuel reserve under VFR conditions. So wouldn't that leave only 3 minutes for useful flight?

https://www.law.cornell.edu/cfr/text/14/91.151

Re: No Longer a Dream: Silicon Valley Takes on the Flying Car

#48

Post by nradov »

shoefly wrote: post #19
MikeTheGreat wrote: post #11

I really, really hope that flying cars never come to pass. Right now, when an accident happens, we know where it will happen: on the road or right next to the road (more-or-less). If flying cars were ever to become a thing you could be killed by a drunk driver crashing into the roof of your house / top floor bedroom, hundreds of feet from any road. Disclaimer: I haven't read the article (It keeps asking me to pay mon…

I'm 99.9% certain these vehicles would be forced to fly over existing roads. And it's likely the final product would be autonomous to ensure no one could do a random fly over of your house.

The FAA would never require aircraft to fly over roads. These things (if they can actually be made to work) will be subject to the same regulations as any other general aviation. We are decades away from having autonomous flight control systems which can be certified for carrying passengers and flying through regular airspace.

Re: No Longer a Dream: Silicon Valley Takes on the Flying Car

#50

Post by 1024core »

s0rce wrote: post #13
1024core wrote: post #8

No mention of Ehang 184: http://www.ehang.com/ehang184 I don't know much about the company, but they seem to have got something airborne in the last couple of years: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1iyCgy1juHc

I just watched the Ehang video and was confused because the footage looked like they flew over Hetch Hetchy (00:16s in the video, recognizable valley/reservoir in Yosemite National Park), considering I can't bring any motorized vehicles onto the lake my dog isn't even allowed there I was surprised they could do this. Further investigation reveals most of the footage is fake https://www.forbes.com/sites/ryanmac/2016/0…

Wow, I didn't know that. Thanks for the link; that was very enlightening.
Post reply on HN