Dude, where’s my flying car?
It’s become a cliche to ask why we don’t have flying cars yet, since they’ve been a dream of science fiction writers and gadgeteers for decades. It’s not easy to build a flying car, that’s why–but Moller International has been working on it for years and has announced that it is in the process of completing its fourth “Jetson”–well, they don’t call it a flying car, they call it a “volantor airframe,” but still–and expects to complete forty of them by 2009. And Moller, as a glance at its website will reveal, has much bigger plans down the road for their flagship design, the M400 Skycar. (Via Gizmodo.)
The two-passenger, saucer-shaped M200G Jetson is designed for operation at up to 10 feet above the ground (so its operators don’t need pilot’s licenses), uses fly-by-wire technology (meaning a computer takes care of all the tricky control stuff and you just have to point it where you want to go) and:
can take-off and land vertically, is the size of a small automobile, operates vibration-free with little noise and is also qualified to travel short distances on the ground as an automobile as well. The prototype M200X has completed over two hundred flights with and without a pilot on board and can be seen flying here. In addition to the M200G, the Company plans to offer the M200E, a kit-built version of its Jetson aircraft with sales beginning in 2010. The M200E will not have the same software enabled altitude constraints as the M200G and the Company expects the M200E to be operable as an Experimental class aircraft.
The eight rotary engines give the Jetson a cruising speed of 75 miles per hour, a maximum speed of 100, a range of 100 miles, and a cargo capacity of up to 250 pounds. The engines operate on unleaded gasoline and can also be configured to run on other fuels.
If you want one, you have to identify yourself as a “candidate qualified to bid” in the planned international auction by establishing your ability to meet the $150,000 reserve.
On the plus side, you don’t have to pay anything until you actually win the bidding.
I wrote a column about aircars back in 2003. In it I mentioned a company called Roadable, which has since been purchased by the Mundus Group, which is still pursuing the technology, and Urbanearo, which is also still in the game. Gizmodo, which provided the article quoted above, has also profiled the Cell Craft concept of Italian designer Gino d’Ignazio Gizio.
Of course, Moller has been pursuing flying cars for something like 40 years now. Has the time finally come for this concept to, pardon the expression, take off…or is it doomed to remain nothing but pie in the sky?
(Image: Moller International.)
It seems to be the custom for new Futurismic posters to introduce themselves. I don’t see race, sex, age, residence, politics, or preferences. But people tell me I’m a 53-year-old white guy who lives in Arizona, leans to the left, and likes fiction, history, journalism, science, 
