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

YC's latest moonshot bet is a startup building a $380K “flying motorcycle”

techcrunch.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

201–210 of 313 posts

Re: YC's latest moonshot bet is a startup building a $380K “flying motorcycle”

#201

Post by mpweiher »

Animats wrote: post #153

Where are they getting the engine? You can get model aircraft jet engines with enough power for this.[1] Various human-carrying craft have been built that way, such as the Zapata Flyboard.[2] But the engines have a lifespan measured in hours and not enough reliability for carrying humans. That's why all the demo videos of these things are over water, or tethered. People have been trying to build small, cheap jet engi…

> [small jet engines, price, piston engines for GA]

Another important reason is fuel consumption. Jet engines in general are extremely thirsty, AFAIK the only reason they became (unexpectedly!) competitive with piston engines is that they allow the planes to fly so much higher where the air is thinner.

In addition, small turbines are even less efficient than big ones.

Re: YC's latest moonshot bet is a startup building a $380K “flying motorcycle”

#202

Post by rataata_jr »

dmurray wrote: post #193
Animats wrote: post #153

Where are they getting the engine? You can get model aircraft jet engines with enough power for this.[1] Various human-carrying craft have been built that way, such as the Zapata Flyboard.[2] But the engines have a lifespan measured in hours and not enough reliability for carrying humans. That's why all the demo videos of these things are over water, or tethered. People have been trying to build small, cheap jet engi…

Agreed, this seems like a huge problem and this > The startup’s most pertinent problem is creating the autonomous stabilization technologies that will make flying the Speeder effortless and safe. looks like a smokescreen for marketing to the tech crowd. Everyone is going to believe they can solve the stabilisation problem: that's "just software" and we see demos of robots solving stabilisation problems all the time.…

Or that is untapped and can be solved.

Re: YC's latest moonshot bet is a startup building a $380K “flying motorcycle”

#203

Post by blueboo »

dmurray wrote: post #193
Animats wrote: post #153

Where are they getting the engine? You can get model aircraft jet engines with enough power for this.[1] Various human-carrying craft have been built that way, such as the Zapata Flyboard.[2] But the engines have a lifespan measured in hours and not enough reliability for carrying humans. That's why all the demo videos of these things are over water, or tethered. People have been trying to build small, cheap jet engi…

Agreed, this seems like a huge problem and this > The startup’s most pertinent problem is creating the autonomous stabilization technologies that will make flying the Speeder effortless and safe. looks like a smokescreen for marketing to the tech crowd. Everyone is going to believe they can solve the stabilisation problem: that's "just software" and we see demos of robots solving stabilisation problems all the time.…

> ... effortless and safe

also the most pertinent problem with a thousand similarly idiotic ideas, from edible knives to jetpacks

Re: YC's latest moonshot bet is a startup building a $380K “flying motorcycle”

#205

Post by nicoburns »

estsauver wrote: post #190
ondiekijunior wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a moonshot. I am a native Nairobian, and would like to know how you will revolutionize the sector. Biggest employer, biggest component of GDP but still extremely low yields, low income and inefficient with lack of adaption of tech.

Agricultural Inputs Procurement, Distribution, and Financing + Uber-style remotely managed field agents + ML Credit Ratings + off taking/market access Basically, we start from "What is the best/highest ROI product we could sell a farmer" and then work backwards to make the rest of the business happen. It's required a ton of infrastructure and ground game, things that people in the developed world take for granted are…

It seems to me that if you want to do this right, you ought ot be thinking about how you can bootstrap the infrastructure and industry to produce the neccesary products and agricultural inputs locally.

Also, can you make it sustainable. AFAIK, industrial farming is destroying soil quality in nations that use it, and some farmers are looking at returning back to techniques like crop rotation...

Re: YC's latest moonshot bet is a startup building a $380K “flying motorcycle”

#206

Post by Smirnoff »

maehwasu wrote: post #144
JimboOmega wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But I've been wondering, why not make the shitload of money first, and once you've got many years saved, then go off and do a moonshot? The usual explanation is something about lifestyle and mortgages and children and so on, but whether you earn the money in your 20s and do a moonshot in your 30s, or do the moonshot in your 20s and earn money in your 30s, don't you wind up at the same place either way?

The answer is that you’re right. I did the money first, and since then working on moonshot stuff has been a lot more enjoyable that what I typically see here. The challenge and stress of the moonshot never goes away, but the stress is more “intense trek through the mountains” and less “my family is going to starve and my friends hate me. “

"Intense trek through the mountains" is more like a vacation when you go through real stress while building your company.

Re: YC's latest moonshot bet is a startup building a $380K “flying motorcycle”

#207

Post by dalbasal »

dmurray wrote: post #193
Animats wrote: post #153

Where are they getting the engine? You can get model aircraft jet engines with enough power for this.[1] Various human-carrying craft have been built that way, such as the Zapata Flyboard.[2] But the engines have a lifespan measured in hours and not enough reliability for carrying humans. That's why all the demo videos of these things are over water, or tethered. People have been trying to build small, cheap jet engi…

Agreed, this seems like a huge problem and this > The startup’s most pertinent problem is creating the autonomous stabilization technologies that will make flying the Speeder effortless and safe. looks like a smokescreen for marketing to the tech crowd. Everyone is going to believe they can solve the stabilisation problem: that's "just software" and we see demos of robots solving stabilisation problems all the time.…

If that "most pertinent problem" is tech savvy investor/journalist bait... it's genius. I read that and thought "well that's probably solveable."

OTOH... In the context of a moonshot, maybe the non-existence of an affordable & appropriate engine is ok. Tesla started with an unaffordable battery, and built a really expensive car with it. The car was good though, compared to other cars in the sheiks & princes price range. It was an important step on the way and proved that the real pertinent problem was affordable batteries. Not an easy problem, but still.

There's probably some demand for flying motorcycles, even if they cost >€1m and are only good for 10 minutes of hovering over a lake.

From there... who knows. I'm not sure flying cars a mass market idea even if they cost the same as rolling ones.

Re: YC's latest moonshot bet is a startup building a $380K “flying motorcycle”

#208

Post by estsauver »

nicoburns wrote: post #205
estsauver wrote: post #190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agricultural Inputs Procurement, Distribution, and Financing + Uber-style remotely managed field agents + ML Credit Ratings + off taking/market access Basically, we start from "What is the best/highest ROI product we could sell a farmer" and then work backwards to make the rest of the business happen. It's required a ton of infrastructure and ground game, things that people in the developed world take for granted are…

It seems to me that if you want to do this right, you ought ot be thinking about how you can bootstrap the infrastructure and industry to produce the neccesary products and agricultural inputs locally. Also, can you make it sustainable. AFAIK, industrial farming is destroying soil quality in nations that use it, and some farmers are looking at returning back to techniques like crop rotation...

The good news is our farmers are way too poor to put too much fertilizer/inputs into their fields, they're generally applying fertilizer with a spoon seed by seed.

To be honest, we're not going to tell farmers that they should pay 4x more to produce their inputs locally. These are some of the poorest people in the world, telling them they should continue to have a hunger season every year because of long term concerns about soil quality isn't in me. If you want someone to help lobby for a nitrogen tax in the developed world though, I'm your guy :) .

Re: YC's latest moonshot bet is a startup building a $380K “flying motorcycle”

#209

Post by notahacker »

schoen wrote: post #110
dmayman wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Our tech could not be more different to the MJP. Theirs was a gasoline engine powering a pair of ducted fans. Too many single points of failure and never able to keep the engine cool, not possible to fly much faster than 60mph. Ours is 1/3rd the size, will fly at 4x the speed. We’ve flown our jetpacks all over the world. We already have a development agreement with the US Navy. They are perfect for overt (perhaps not…

I think small flying vehicles are cool and this is a good use for them, but if this is true, are there other ways to get more people equipped with some of these lifesaving skills at possibly lower marginal cost? CPR training? More AEDs? Some more kinds of injectors that can be used by people with minimal training? Maybe there are other devices on the model of the AED that could administer other kinds of potentially-d…

There's also the ability to stick AEDs on drones, which relies on the member of the public reporting the heart attack to use it, but can make them available to that person much more quickly than instructions about where to find the nearest publicly-accessible AED.

You can obviously also have a lot more defibrillator drones available across a city than jetpack-equipped paramedics. I've seen it as a concept, not sure how many are in use and what their success rates have been.

Re: YC's latest moonshot bet is a startup building a $380K “flying motorcycle”

#210

Post by lioeters »

chriselles wrote: post #166

I am a motorcycle nut and aviation nut since birth. I’ve also jumped out of a dozen aircraft types via static line and ram air free fall chutes. And I enjoy paragliding. There’s nothing more I would like to see than a new form of personal flight. However, I don’t see the viability of this thing at all. Likely due to my having been in close proximity to the Martin Jetpack slow motion disaster over the last decade. Rel…

Fascinating! It's not a "sexy" idea, but it sounds practical and technically feasible (from how you describe it). I especially like that tolerance to failure is built in the design.
Post reply on HN