Dutch flying car gets permission to drive on European roads

https://www.psychnewsdaily.com/dutch-flying-car-pal-v-gets-permission-to-drive-on-european-roads/

by Bologo • 6 years ago

183 106 6 years ago

psychnewsdaily.com

nercury• 6 years ago

Helicopter?

LeonM• 6 years ago

A helicopter that can also drive on wheels and that is rated for driving on public roads.

So no, it's not a helicopter, is a car/helicopter hybrid, a.k.a. flying car.

SwiftyBug• 6 years ago

Not only a flying car, a flying _dutchcar_, which is way more interesting.

rkangel19• 6 years ago

Not a helicopter at all, see this comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24918402

tim333• 6 years ago

Autogyro. Looks quite cool https://youtu.be/RFpNTykIYM0?t=132

rkangel19• 6 years ago

Not a helicopter - an autogyro. The rotor on the top is not driven (literally just spins freely on a bearing). Forward motion pushes air through it, which keeps it spinning and that keeps the aircraft up. In effect the rotor acts like a wing (forward motion results in lift), but without the ability to stall.

I'm learning to fly an autogyro in the UK. They're great fun to fly, and in theory safer than a plane because the short landing distance means that in event of engine failure you have a much greater selection of places to land (in practice modern safe autogyros have only been around 5-10 years so we don't have enough data to compare).

aitchnyu2• 6 years ago

Can they land safely after engine fails and any electric/hydraulic assists are also gone?

klmadfejno2• 6 years ago

It doesn't feel possible that the propeller is enough to provide such forward motion that is also used to push the vehicle up

dosshell2• 6 years ago

There is no engine connected to the blades, it is an autogyro. They are not so uncommon here in Europe, most of them I have seen has been home-build.

Off-topic: some UAV prototypes developed in Europe during the 80s and the beginning of 90s was of the type autogyro, because of its simplicity and short take-off and landing distances.

rkangel19• 6 years ago

For those interested, there is no engine connected to the blades while in flight. Most gyros have is a linkage called the pre-rotator with a clutch that you engage while stationary on the ground. This allows you to get the rotor to about two thirds of the speed needed for take off at which point you release it, and then do a take off roll to build speed and rotor speed.

Jabbles• 6 years ago

Of course without the word "flying" the headline loses some of its impact.

The European Aviation Safety Agency is still examining the company’s request to have the vehicles certified to fly.

rkangel19• 6 years ago

Presumably it has actually flown at least once in a test flight, under a specific licence for that flight. Otherwise yes, it's vapourware.

espadrine• 6 years ago

The flying tech is well-understood and a bit boring, which is good for this kind of offer. And it is pretty safe (as in: if out of fuel while flying, you won’t drop dead).

So yes, the company does show a few videos of flight tests, even though they are not licensed to sell it to be flown by customers.

Of course, the real struggle is to find enough customers at this high price point. Since customers will still need to drive to the airport and clear a flight plan with ATC when they want to fly, the situations where this drive/fly combination is useful are not widespread.

C19is20• 6 years ago

Also "European....", which would lead one to think it was equally legal in Italy, Greece...the UK (until 31 Dec) etc.

rkangel19• 6 years ago

For those not familiar with autogyros, this xkcd was a major factor in me choosing to learn to fly one:

https://xkcd.com/1972/

It's not 100% accurate though: "Can land vertically" isn't true unless there's a lot of wind (although you can almost always land with very little ground roll). "Cannot hover" is less true. In my aircraft you need 35mph of airspeed to maintain height (when relatively fully loaded). You often have 35 mph of wind at altitude, so a ground relative hover is often possible. "Can often be flown without a licence" doesn't apply in the UK.

tgv• 6 years ago

"Common in Europe" isn't really accurate either. I've never seen one.

ARandomerDude• 6 years ago

Can you explain the stall comment in the lower right of the cartoon? I don't get it.

mnw21cam2• 6 years ago

https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/1972:_Autogyros#E... is probably the best way to answer this.

capableweb• 6 years ago

https://explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/1972:_Autogyros

Extremely safe, unless you do the one thing you instinctively do to escape a stall in a normal airplane, in which case it will crash immediately.
Autogyros are considered safe due to their slow landing speed, which is important in emergency landings, their forgiving behavior in windy conditions and the fact they are almost impossible to stall. This is thanks to the freely spinning rotor. Unfortunately, as soon as the rotor stops spinning, the whole aircraft falls like a brick and the rotor may be impossible to restart in flight. This is a situation that should be avoided at all costs.
Normally it is not a problem since the weight of the aircraft keeps the rotor spinning. However, if the weight becomes too low or even negative, the angle of attack will become negative, and the rotor will slow down and eventually stop. It can happen when the pilot "pushes on the stick" and dives.
Unfortunately, "pushing on the stick" is also how you escape a stall in a fixed wing (normal) airplane as it is a way to regain airspeed. This is actually a counter-intuitive maneuver but because a stall is an emergency, pilots are trained to do it instinctively. It can trick a pilot trained in fixed wing aircraft into doing the one thing that shouldn't be done on a gyro.

rkangel19• 6 years ago

In a fixed wing plane, one of the big things to worry about is a stall (which isn't possible in a gyro). I a plane, you get out of a stall by building airspeed - nose down and throttle up.

If you do a sudden nose down and throttle up in a gyro at the wrong time a couple of things can happen - you can build up an unsafe amount of airspeed and you can put air the wrong way through the rotor, slowing it down. If you do that too low you'll crash (a gyro without a spinning rotor is just a brick).

Basically avoid doing things which cause negative G. This is important enough that it's printed on a placard on all UK certified Gyros, but is also really easy to avoid doing.

xnyan2• 6 years ago

Autogyros are cool, not quite a helo and quite a plane. They have several unique advantages and are undergoing a modern renaissance after being used in the very first days of non-fixed wing flight:

-Inexpensive and reliable. Far simpler to build and fly vs a helicopter

-Can fly at very low speeds without stalling

-VERY short landing, pretty much anywhere. Not quite so short take-off, but pre-spooling the horizontal rotary wing can mitigation this.

Cost and low stall speed are probably the biggest factors for their choice of autogyro.

rkangel19• 6 years ago

Some others:

* Cheap to maintain, run and store (take up much less space than a plane)

* Cope much better than a plane with strong cross winds on take off and landing (I've had several lessons when all the fixed wing pilots were stuck in the cafe)

* Much smoother ride when going through turbulence - the rotor does a lot of the moving around and leaves the cabin much less affected

* Often fly around at a lower altitude than a plane, particularly if you're over fields (often cruise around at 1000 ft above ground). This means that get a better view (things on the ground aren't too small), and the cloud ceiling can be lower.

* Manoeuverable and 'fun' to fly

Some disadvantages (limiting myself to the main commercially available pre-built ones, i.e. AutoGyro and Magni):

* Slower than a plane (max speed of any is I believe 125 MPH)

* Can only take two people, and often limited luggage space

* Haven't been around as long (in their modern form), so while they're cheaper to buy than a plane, you are limited to new or fairly new.

* None are instrument rated, and only one model is night rated (in the UK)

* You don't really want to fly them in the rain - erodes rotor and propellor

BasilPH• 6 years ago

You don't really want to fly them in the rain - erodes rotor and propellor

I'm intrigued, could you elaborate on why this is different from what happens with a helicopter or a plane in the rain?

Kaytaro• 6 years ago

I assume they are much quieter than a helicopter?

F00Fbug2• 6 years ago

How's the vibration? I've been a fixed-wing pilot for many years. I recently sold my share in a 182 and have considered a gyro for many of the reasons listed here. All the YouTube videos I've seen look like the thing is going to vibrate itself apart! Although, that could be due to strapping a GoPro to a strut or something!

JoeAltmaier• 6 years ago

Do they still have the oscillation problem? Where they start to pitch and the pilot over-compensates which results in an uncontrollable pendulum swing until it stalls? I recall that killed quite a few early pilots.

mcv• 6 years ago

More a road-legal autogyro than a flying car.

anonymfus• 6 years ago

What makes it not a car in your opinion?

kevin_thibedeau2• 6 years ago

Where do you attach the horse?

aitchnyu2• 6 years ago

A three wheeled design was a comical trope in Mr Bean where he frequently topples a three wheeler. And how good are the low profile tires and suspension in imperfect roads and runways (video depicts no shock absorbtion on landing)?

dsomers• 6 years ago

The low profile tires should be fine. I moved to the Netherlands three years ago and I don’t think I’ve seen one pothole in this whole country. But if they drive that contraption into Belgium they’re screwed lol

donalhunt• 6 years ago

This is the true purpose of this vehicle... Avoiding Belgian roads when travelling south to Paris!

7952• 6 years ago

If you look at the second picture there is far more clearance between the wheels and the body. Maybe that is shock absorption that extends before flight.

consp2• 6 years ago

Please note that this is a single issue, early prototype license. Those are quite different from somewhat more normal custom build licenses for these kind of vehicles once they are entering limited production. This has not been approved for any other usage like limited production and is only valid for this specific vehicle. While this license is "European" there are lot of issues driving these kind of vehicles with this licenses across Europe legally.

Addendum: This means they cannot sell them yet as they first have to show production compliance. And have more stringent testing for those vehicles.

Addendum 2: It also has no aircraft license so flying is not an option.

holstvoogd• 6 years ago

Figured as much, IIRC a full type license takes dozens of cars to be produced and delivered for destructive testing.

I just hope cars regulated better than the 'Stint' was, whatever that fall under.

consp2• 6 years ago

The car part is like any other car with respect to road legality (in this case an IGC, or individual license) and production compliance is the same as for all other limited production cars (regular 'typegoedkeuring'). The airplane part is a whole different ballpark.

The stint was something different. Those were not tested as they were technically not cars and treated as mopeds which have very limited testing requirements as far as I know.

Avtomatk3• 6 years ago

I feel that it is still too early to approve the use of this vehicle ... Not only does it need an aircraft and vehicle license, this car is a "hybrid car-plane" and its "transformation" from car to plane on the streets should also be regulated. (Imagine deploying and turning on those propellers in the middle of a narrow street, it would be necessary to take it to a heliport to transform it) apart from the control of the airspace and an endless number of other things (collisions with buildings?). It's the classic pre-"flying cars" regulation from science fiction stories.

CPLX• 6 years ago

An interesting and non-obvious attribute of autogyros is that the large propeller on the top is actually not powered.

jeffreyrogers• 6 years ago

This sort of thinking coupled with increasing ease of litigation is why general aviation is more expensive in real terms than it was in the 70s.

Cthulhu_• 6 years ago

It won't get approval to launch from the streets, simply because you already aren't allowed to launch a helicopter or plane from the street. It will remain a two mode vehicle which you will have to drive / fly to an airport or otherwise licensed location before it is allowed to transform / take off / land.

This legislation is unlikely to change anytime soon.

ansible2• 6 years ago

That's nice. But very expensive. For that much, you could buy a couple nice autogyros and also a nice car to drive around to the airports where they are parked.

I could see this being a little more viable if it was less than double the cost of a modern autogyro.

bondarchuk• 6 years ago

Well yes, but if you actually want to use it to go from A to B then you gotta deal with having your gyro at B while your car is still at A. My first thought was also "why not get an autogyro and a trailer for it" but it does not fulfill the flying car ideal.

ansible2• 6 years ago

That's true.

It does fold up a lot more compactly than some of the recent flying car designs with conventional wings. One of those looked more like a car plus a small trailer in size.

DarkWiiPlayer• 6 years ago

They lost a bunch of points for not calling it "The Flying Dutchcar". Very disappointing.

matsemann• 6 years ago

I also expected a similar play on words. But I realized I only know of the Flying Dutchman based on Carl Barks' story, never read about the original myth.

Ichthypresbyter• 6 years ago

KLM (Royal Dutch Airlines, the oldest airline still operating under its original name) use "The Flying Dutchman" as an advertising slogan, and have done since the 1930s.

Phemist2• 6 years ago

Probably because the joke does not translate so well into Dutch. The translation of "The Flying Dutchman" is "De Vliegende Hollander", so there is no obvious place to put a car pun (but maybe someone more creative than me can interject here).

marta_morena_28• 6 years ago

If you put a Dutchman into the car, it's a flying dutchman. I don't see why they couldn't just use "Flying Dutchman" as name for this car.

contravariant2• 6 years ago

De Vliegende Hollandkar?

dzhiurgis• 6 years ago

dutchman in Lithuanian slang is a driver (typically of a small passenger bus or taxi)

m12k• 6 years ago

It gets about three time the mileage when driving compared to flying - a small reminder of just how energy efficient it is to let the normal force from the ground hold something up compared to expending energy to do so.

upofadown• 6 years ago

It's a gyro-copter. So not a good example of the principle, a fixed wing aircraft would be more efficient.

As an example to disprove the rule, the Grob G 109 motor glider[1] goes 1500 km (vs flying car 1315 road range) on the same amount of gas while probably going faster (180km/h economical cruise).

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grob_G_109

teekert• 6 years ago

I like that they made a video with typical Silicon Valley Start-up, epic, up-beat music but kept the guy with the super dutch accent as the narrator (probably the CEO). Is this some standard iMovie music?

Btw, not so nice: This time I already started the movie and only THEN yt ask me if I want to log in (pauses the vid for it).

gpvos• 6 years ago

YT has been doing that for about a week or so.

exabrial• 6 years ago

Shouldn't the headline be "Dutch flying car gets permission to _fly over_ European roads"?

/me grabs coat and exits building

supernova87a• 6 years ago

Someone brought up a good point in a past discussion --

Think of how many safety checks and procedures you go through with a plane before you entrust your life to it to not fall out of the sky. Are you really going to be wanting to take it on the road, park it in a garage or on the street, and alternate back and forth the use as a car vs. plane? With all the potential abuse a car gets?

dougmany• 6 years ago

I think the user stories are like this:

When I am grounded due to weather, I can continue my trip.

When I arrive at my destination, at a small airport in middle of nowhere, I don't have to figure out transportation.

So it's really not about going back and forth, it is about making your plane usable in a few extra cases.

rkangel19• 6 years ago

I think this is a good way of looking at it - a plane you can sometimes drive, rather than a car you can sometimes fly.

As an aside, I enjoyed how these people got their gyros to Iceland: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TmwEbjzLtDo

unnouinceput• 6 years ago

Title is misleading. The car got a single license (i.e, for it's prototype only) and only for Dutch roads, not full Europe.

jcun4128• 6 years ago

Haha that's so neat. I wonder if it's a bigger target for break ins/bad stuff. Sucks to think that way, guess no different than owning a super car. What a neat idea though, assuming it has great auto-pilot capability you'd be in same vehicle from home to airport and just sit back.

edit: I have seen different versions of these too in the past(with wings). But still this one looks more compact.

canada_dry• 6 years ago

Hopefully in a few decades - when we've got self driving problem licked - we can make these fully autonomous on the road, and in the air!

zed882• 6 years ago

Wonder if this can do pre-rotation, it would be cool to take off like a helicopter.

rkangel19• 6 years ago

Prerotation does not allow you to take off like a helicopter. All modern gyros have a prerotator - without one you'd need a very long take off roll to get the rotor up to speed. The prerotator is definitely not capable of flight though, it's only good to get the rotor up to about 2/3 the speed needed to take off.

zed882• 6 years ago

You can do zero roll jump takeoffs if you have enough rotor speed. Watch this: https://youtu.be/9ISIlgMcb-U

Dutch flying car gets permission to drive on European roads

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