"Transition" Aerocar

[Tom Goodrick]

There is a company with a strange name (Terrafugia) in Woburn, MA, formed by MIT students, that is developing an aerocar with folding wings that will qualify as a Light Sport Aircraft (LSA). I saw a photo but it did not show critical details like tail components and engine installation. It did show partly unfolded wings.

(Source: Discovery.news on my new Google "Start page".)

[skyknight]

Tom,

Take a look at this website:

www.terrafugia.com/index.html


Skyknight

[Tom Goodrick]

Their claims are not unreasonable. The long drive mechanism for the prop may give them problems. (It has in all similar designs.) The airspeed probe needs protection while driving - maybe a cover is applied when the wings fold.

It is interesting that rotation speed is higher than max driving speed.

It remains to be seen how practical the LSA regs are. If you go somewhere and it gets dark, you must drive home. If you live near a large city, you may have to drive quite a way before you can fly. The LSA regs are not intended to make transportation practical.

[skyknight]

Thanks Tom. As usual, I knew you could sort-out the "BS" in what the manufacturers claimed.

Their would surely make the commute to work much easier.

Skyknight

[Tom Goodrick]

When I read the above thread a few moments ago, an ad by Google was displayed that could not have been more appropriate. Here is a link to the article that ad took me to:

www.airspacemag.com/flight-today/podcopter.html?gclid=CODL4erQrJgCFVqF7QodHzhxnA

The article has many interesting features about small flying cars or similar vehicles. It quotes a guy at NASA who speaks about robotic craft. That idea has been circulating about NASA for some time. I rsisted it when I was there and will continue with letters to the editor, generally like the letters quoted in this magazine.

I eventually accepted robotic control in certain circumstances. One was with regard to fly-back boosters that I worked on. My idea was that they would operate from up to 500 nm offshore and would return to Kennedy Space Center on the Coast so there would be very limited exposure to the ATC system and to flight over residential areas. But each booster would be close to the equilivant of a DC-9 airliner. It would not be sensible to install a human pilot in them. But you could put human controllers in the loop doing remote control with vieo out the window as well as a display of normal flight instruments.

I do not fear current airliners. I live in a house that is under the approach path to KHSV Runway 18L. I hear airliners going overhead all day long (perhaps one per hour with many smaller planes in the daytime). Do I trust the professionalism of the pilots? Partly. But I know that each aircraft has a pilot sitting at the controls who knows that his continued good health depends on getting the plane safely on the ground.

Put a bunch of robotic planes up there and I'll move.

[skyknight]

Thanks for the link, Tom.

I agree with you.....I have no desire to be in a plane that does not have a human in the cockpit.