WEBVTT - Dude, Where's My Flying Car? 0:00:00.160 --> 0:00:07.240 Brought to you by Toyota. Let's go places. Welcome to 0:00:07.400 --> 0:00:14.280 Forward Thinking, Hey there be one, and welcome to Forward 0:00:14.320 --> 0:00:16.239 Thank read the podcast that looks at the future and 0:00:16.280 --> 0:00:18.440 says the power of love is a curious thing. I'm 0:00:18.480 --> 0:00:22.680 John Strickland, I'm Lauren Vocalbon, I'm Joe McCormick. What what 0:00:22.760 --> 0:00:25.200 was the Oh no, it's okay, we're going back to 0:00:25.239 --> 0:00:27.440 the future. Yeah, we're going back to the future. Gonna 0:00:27.480 --> 0:00:29.920 go back in time, Yes we are. What we're not 0:00:30.000 --> 0:00:32.920 talking about time machines today. That will be a future 0:00:32.960 --> 0:00:37.239 podcast or maybe a past one. But no, today we're 0:00:37.240 --> 0:00:40.200 gonna talk about flying cars. I was trying to render 0:00:40.280 --> 0:00:45.000 the future perfect tints of mind blown, mind will be blown, 0:00:45.320 --> 0:00:50.280 mind will have been will have been blown? Yeah? Okay, okay, okay. 0:00:50.280 --> 0:00:58.760 Flying cars the ultimate futurism cliche, right, articles magazine covers 0:00:58.840 --> 0:01:01.880 that you know, you tube videos. Where's my flying car? 0:01:02.320 --> 0:01:04.160 I thought it would be the future. Where when am 0:01:04.160 --> 0:01:06.480 I going to get my flying car? Well, today we're 0:01:06.520 --> 0:01:08.560 finally going to talk about it, So let's talk a 0:01:08.600 --> 0:01:10.880 little bit about first of all, the the whole science 0:01:10.959 --> 0:01:14.000 fiction angle of this. I mean, clearly, like when when 0:01:14.080 --> 0:01:17.240 I say when you hear the term flying car, what 0:01:17.440 --> 0:01:19.200 is it that you think of? Like, what's what's the 0:01:19.920 --> 0:01:22.720 thing that pops into your head? Blade Runner? Blade Runner 0:01:23.760 --> 0:01:26.559 a combination of like the Jetsons and the Fifth Element, 0:01:26.600 --> 0:01:29.119 which probably explains a lot about me. See, I always 0:01:29.160 --> 0:01:31.800 think of Back to the Future, but but I totally 0:01:31.840 --> 0:01:33.920 I've seen all the other ones you've mentioned, and all 0:01:33.959 --> 0:01:36.720 of those also are somewhere in there. I mean, I 0:01:36.760 --> 0:01:39.679 love the design a blade Runner, and I love how 0:01:39.800 --> 0:01:43.920 how grungy the flying cars are in Fifth Element. Yeah, 0:01:43.959 --> 0:01:46.720 they're so grungy in all these movies. You wonder like, 0:01:47.000 --> 0:01:51.440 why why hasn't haven't people just been completely disgusted by 0:01:51.480 --> 0:01:53.800 the idea of flying cars. The idea of it is 0:01:53.840 --> 0:01:56.480 so novel, or at least you would think it's novel. 0:01:56.520 --> 0:01:58.200 As it turns out, the idea of a flying car 0:01:58.280 --> 0:02:01.200 is pretty old. We'll get into that. Uh. The idea 0:02:01.360 --> 0:02:03.559 is novel enough in the sense that we don't have 0:02:03.880 --> 0:02:07.280 flying cars everywhere that I think people are still fascinated 0:02:07.320 --> 0:02:09.880 by it. But they love this idea of a future 0:02:09.919 --> 0:02:13.080 where flying cars are not only a reality, they've been 0:02:13.120 --> 0:02:17.080 around long enough to become mundane. And I mean, it 0:02:17.240 --> 0:02:20.600 seems so easy just if you don't know anything. Sure, 0:02:21.040 --> 0:02:24.920 you just look at it, like we've had airplanes and 0:02:25.080 --> 0:02:28.600 cars for a hundred years before. Particle physics seems really 0:02:28.600 --> 0:02:32.280 easy if you don't know anything. Divorced from reality, science 0:02:32.360 --> 0:02:34.880 is fun. Um well, science is fun anyway. And and 0:02:35.160 --> 0:02:37.240 also I mean that I don't think that anyone who 0:02:37.360 --> 0:02:40.320 drives has ever not had many moments in a day 0:02:40.320 --> 0:02:43.399 where they're just sitting in traffic and it's terrible and 0:02:43.720 --> 0:02:45.760 you you just wish that you could just rise up 0:02:45.800 --> 0:02:48.400 on jets and just fly right over the rest of 0:02:48.639 --> 0:02:51.840 the rest of the grid. Luck. Yeah, No, that's that's 0:02:51.880 --> 0:02:55.600 a captivating well, especially if you live someplace like Atlanta 0:02:55.840 --> 0:02:59.240 or Los Angeles, someplace that is known for terrible traffic, 0:02:59.639 --> 0:03:02.680 and you get into that, you know, it's it's a Thursday, 0:03:02.800 --> 0:03:04.720 and it's the fourth straight day in a row, and 0:03:04.800 --> 0:03:07.520 you cannot you can see the exit that you need 0:03:07.560 --> 0:03:09.799 to take, and you know it's gonna be another hour 0:03:09.919 --> 0:03:13.720 before you can actually get there. Yes, exactly. Yeah, so 0:03:13.760 --> 0:03:19.360 and that's those days. You can easily imagine a world where, um, 0:03:19.400 --> 0:03:23.600 you know, a flying car would be welcomed with great 0:03:23.639 --> 0:03:27.200 acclaim by the entire populace. Because it would, at least 0:03:27.240 --> 0:03:30.160 in theory, mean you would no longer be stuck on 0:03:30.200 --> 0:03:32.760 this road, stuck behind everybody else. And like we mentioned, 0:03:32.760 --> 0:03:34.520 you know, people have thought that this was a pretty 0:03:34.560 --> 0:03:37.440 cool thing for an extremely long time. Right. Um, I 0:03:37.480 --> 0:03:41.240 think the concept came up really just after the invention 0:03:41.520 --> 0:03:46.160 of both cars and also airplanes. Yeah. Yeah, in fact, uh, 0:03:46.200 --> 0:03:50.000 I mean no, no, less of an authority than Henry 0:03:50.080 --> 0:03:54.440 Ford commented on this, right yeah in ninety he said, 0:03:54.640 --> 0:03:58.760 quote mark my words, a combination airplane and motor car. 0:03:58.880 --> 0:04:02.800 It's coming. You may smile, but it will come. Yeah. 0:04:02.840 --> 0:04:05.880 So if you look at the history of of cars, 0:04:06.080 --> 0:04:07.720 and you look at the history of airplanes, and then 0:04:07.760 --> 0:04:09.800 you look at the history of people trying to make cars, 0:04:09.840 --> 0:04:13.200 what are airplanes? Uh? It turns out Henry Ford was 0:04:13.280 --> 0:04:16.960 kind of behind the times, actually, So you gotta go 0:04:17.040 --> 0:04:19.359 all the way back. So five is really when you 0:04:19.360 --> 0:04:22.839 get the You get Carl Friedrich Benz, who created the 0:04:22.880 --> 0:04:26.320 first guest line powered automobile. Uh. And then you jump 0:04:26.360 --> 0:04:28.120 ahead to nineteen o three and that's when the Right 0:04:28.200 --> 0:04:32.240 Brothers had their famous flight, which, depending upon which authority 0:04:32.279 --> 0:04:35.279 you're looking at, was the first heavier than air aircraft 0:04:35.320 --> 0:04:40.760 that was able to fly the first fixed wing control, 0:04:41.640 --> 0:04:44.800 fixed wing powered heavier than aircraft as opposed to say, 0:04:44.800 --> 0:04:48.840 a balloon or something like yeah and eve, And even 0:04:48.839 --> 0:04:52.320 then you have people saying actually, but anyway, nineteen o 0:04:52.480 --> 0:04:56.320 three was widely recognized as the first airplane flight. Well, 0:04:56.520 --> 0:04:59.000 you don't don't have to wait until nineteen seventeen. So 0:04:59.120 --> 0:05:03.480 just a little over decade later, when Glenn Curtis had 0:05:03.520 --> 0:05:07.120 suggested creating something he called the Curtis auto plane, which 0:05:07.160 --> 0:05:09.880 would have been more or less a plane that you 0:05:09.920 --> 0:05:12.640 could drive around. And in fact, a lot of the 0:05:12.720 --> 0:05:18.520 early flying car concepts were this level, right, this model. 0:05:18.640 --> 0:05:21.400 Even even these days, I mean we do have technically 0:05:21.480 --> 0:05:25.800 flying cars, but all of them are really more drivable planes. Yeah, 0:05:25.839 --> 0:05:28.839 they're really airplanes that have detachable elements to them, and 0:05:28.880 --> 0:05:32.880 then you drive the vehicle out to an airstrip attach 0:05:33.000 --> 0:05:35.680 whatever those elements are. Usually it's wings and the propeller 0:05:35.720 --> 0:05:38.960 and maybe some other elements as well, and then you 0:05:38.960 --> 0:05:41.520 you take off as if it were just a regular 0:05:41.600 --> 0:05:44.880 light aircraft. Right. So, uh, you know a lot of 0:05:44.880 --> 0:05:48.560 the early ones. Robert Edison Fulton Jr. Created one a 0:05:48.640 --> 0:05:53.600 year later, uh, consolidated vaulty developed the conveir Car, which 0:05:53.680 --> 0:05:57.039 was a two door sedan with detachable airplane unit that 0:05:57.080 --> 0:06:00.320 you could convert into a plane. Um. These were all 0:06:01.320 --> 0:06:03.760 vehicles that were kind of built in the prototype stage, 0:06:03.839 --> 0:06:08.320 never went into actual manufacture due to various problems, either 0:06:08.520 --> 0:06:13.920 financial or technological. So for example, Robert Dyson Fulton couldn't 0:06:13.960 --> 0:06:17.200 get UM funding, so I could never really go into production. 0:06:17.200 --> 0:06:21.480 Whereas the convert Car crashed on its third test flight 0:06:21.600 --> 0:06:25.320 and that pretty much killed the project because yeah, no, 0:06:25.320 --> 0:06:28.080 no one wanted to risk the money in it, and uh, 0:06:28.160 --> 0:06:30.719 you know, risk is a big thing. In nineteen sixty five, 0:06:31.040 --> 0:06:33.560 you have Paul Muller who introduces the x M two, 0:06:33.560 --> 0:06:36.039 which was the first prototype of his sky car concept, 0:06:36.080 --> 0:06:39.279 which is like, it reads like a comedy of errors 0:06:39.279 --> 0:06:43.040 if you go through the whole ordeal, right yeah, yeah, 0:06:43.360 --> 0:06:46.560 this is one where the idea was pretty cool. It 0:06:46.640 --> 0:06:50.239 was supposed to be a vertical takeoff and landing vehicle, 0:06:50.440 --> 0:06:52.440 which is going to be something we'll talk about little 0:06:52.480 --> 0:06:54.960 bit later to that will be ready in time for woodstock, 0:06:55.080 --> 0:06:57.440 you know. But the idea was that it was going 0:06:57.480 --> 0:06:59.320 to be this thing that could take off from anywhere 0:06:59.320 --> 0:07:02.800 and land practically anywhere. With enough clearance obviously, but that 0:07:02.880 --> 0:07:05.880 you wouldn't have to go to like an airstrip necessarily, 0:07:06.320 --> 0:07:08.520 and it was going to run on fuel that was 0:07:08.560 --> 0:07:13.120 similar to airplane fuel, and uh, you know, it was 0:07:13.720 --> 0:07:16.680 a project that was kicking around. Even as late as 0:07:16.680 --> 0:07:20.440 two thousand three. They had a demonstration of a vehicle, 0:07:20.520 --> 0:07:22.520 but it really just kind of hovered it and fly 0:07:23.560 --> 0:07:26.160 and um by two thousand nine, there still wasn't a 0:07:26.160 --> 0:07:28.880 flying car to show off, and the company at that 0:07:28.920 --> 0:07:32.600 point had spent around a hundred million dollars in investment 0:07:32.680 --> 0:07:36.160 capital trying to do this and had not created a 0:07:36.200 --> 0:07:40.280 successful car over four decades since. Yeah, can I say, honestly, 0:07:40.320 --> 0:07:42.680 when I look at pictures of this, it looks to 0:07:42.760 --> 0:07:45.160 me like they were just trying to create something that 0:07:45.360 --> 0:07:47.800 looked like what you imagine when you think of a 0:07:47.800 --> 0:07:49.920 flying car. So in other words, you think they were 0:07:49.960 --> 0:07:52.080 just kind of like from the appearance, you look at 0:07:52.120 --> 0:07:53.560 and you think, oh, that thing is meant to fly, 0:07:53.720 --> 0:07:55.800 But then you start to think, wait, how would that 0:07:55.840 --> 0:07:59.480 actually work? It looks like a sci fi illustration. It does. 0:08:00.280 --> 0:08:04.680 And eventually Mueller would go and file for Chapter eleven protection, 0:08:04.760 --> 0:08:09.000 so bankruptcy protection. But the company itself is still operating, 0:08:09.040 --> 0:08:12.360 although in a much more limited capacity. So, you know, 0:08:12.400 --> 0:08:15.040 there were a lot of other attempts to create a 0:08:15.120 --> 0:08:19.440 flying car that all met with you know, kind of 0:08:20.560 --> 0:08:24.040 limited success if any. Most of them didn't go beyond 0:08:24.040 --> 0:08:28.480 the prototype stage, or they had very modest flying capabilities, 0:08:28.520 --> 0:08:30.880 like it was more that they had a giant parachute 0:08:30.960 --> 0:08:35.760 and could use a fan to paraglide as opposed to 0:08:36.320 --> 0:08:38.320 powered flight the way we would think of like with 0:08:38.400 --> 0:08:41.320 a propeller or jet engine or something like that. Uh, 0:08:41.360 --> 0:08:44.480 there are a couple of companies that are still working 0:08:44.600 --> 0:08:47.000 quite hard to try and bring a true flying car 0:08:47.120 --> 0:08:50.040 to the market. Uh there's the aero Mobile V two 0:08:50.120 --> 0:08:53.120 point five, which was a propeller driven aircraft that also 0:08:53.160 --> 0:08:55.400 acts like a car. So again more in the lines 0:08:55.440 --> 0:08:57.720 of those early designs where you have the plane that 0:08:58.200 --> 0:09:00.760 kind of strips down and then becomes a vehicle. Yeah, 0:09:00.960 --> 0:09:03.480 you have to take it to the airport or something 0:09:03.520 --> 0:09:05.880 like an airport in order to get in the air, right. 0:09:05.920 --> 0:09:09.240 And then there's a Terrafugia that is planning on bringing 0:09:09.320 --> 0:09:13.079 a car called the Transition to market by two thousand 0:09:13.080 --> 0:09:15.800 and fifteen. Now this one, again is another one of 0:09:15.800 --> 0:09:17.320 those where you would have to take it to an 0:09:17.320 --> 0:09:19.880 airstrip in order to take off, and you would have 0:09:19.920 --> 0:09:21.880 to have a pilot's license in order to operate it, 0:09:21.920 --> 0:09:26.200 because I like sportcraft license. Yeah. Yeah, well, and we'll 0:09:26.200 --> 0:09:28.320 talk more about that in a bit too. But it's 0:09:28.360 --> 0:09:30.720 not the kind of vehicle that you would you know, 0:09:30.800 --> 0:09:32.760 pull out of the garage and then lift off the 0:09:32.840 --> 0:09:37.680 driveway and blast off into towards your your workplace, right. No, 0:09:38.040 --> 0:09:40.959 I mean that's really the key here, and it's something 0:09:40.960 --> 0:09:42.880 we're going to talk about in a bit. But the 0:09:42.920 --> 0:09:47.559 problem is so many of these prototypes we've seen so far, well, 0:09:47.679 --> 0:09:50.320 you know, it's it's an airplane and it's a car, 0:09:50.600 --> 0:09:53.200 but it's not really what people are thinking about when 0:09:53.200 --> 0:09:56.520 they think about a flying car. That certainly includes vt 0:09:56.679 --> 0:09:59.520 O L vertical takeoff and landing. It's something that you 0:09:59.559 --> 0:10:03.160 can lead you from your driveway and go across town. 0:10:03.200 --> 0:10:05.880 It's got versatility like a flying car. I think in 0:10:05.920 --> 0:10:07.559 the way we think of as as far as you know, 0:10:07.600 --> 0:10:10.720 the science fiction approach goes means that you can, you know, 0:10:10.800 --> 0:10:12.640 you can go from point A to point B without 0:10:12.640 --> 0:10:16.360 having to go to an airstrip. On either side of it, uh, 0:10:16.400 --> 0:10:20.640 that anyone would be able to operate it easily, because 0:10:20.760 --> 0:10:23.760 you know, if you have to go through you, if 0:10:23.760 --> 0:10:25.160 you have to jump through hoops in order to get 0:10:25.440 --> 0:10:28.400 certification for it, then that's obviously a barrier that it 0:10:28.440 --> 0:10:31.880 would eventually be affordable so that the average person could 0:10:31.880 --> 0:10:33.880 own it. I mean, we look at these science fiction 0:10:33.960 --> 0:10:37.360 futures and everyone's got a flying car. No one's driving 0:10:37.400 --> 0:10:40.440 a vehicle that is on the ground. So therefore, in 0:10:40.520 --> 0:10:43.000 that world, a flying car has to be around the 0:10:43.040 --> 0:10:46.280 same level of affordability as your personal vehicles are today. 0:10:46.640 --> 0:10:49.080 And and furthermore, something that not only flies that well, 0:10:49.120 --> 0:10:51.520 but also drives as fast as you could possibly want 0:10:51.520 --> 0:10:54.640 it to drive. Right, So it's not like it's not like, well, 0:10:54.679 --> 0:10:56.400 on the ground, it's got a top speed of thirty 0:10:56.400 --> 0:10:58.400 months per hour. Yeah, yeah, which is the case of 0:10:58.520 --> 0:11:01.280 lots of these practical examples that we've been talking about 0:11:01.320 --> 0:11:04.199 that are coming out or in prototype stage anyway these days. Right, 0:11:04.720 --> 0:11:09.480 And the extremely simple requirement of it just needs to 0:11:09.520 --> 0:11:14.600 fit the normal dimensions of a car. Right, have wings 0:11:15.000 --> 0:11:17.560 or propellers or something poking out that's going to knock 0:11:17.559 --> 0:11:20.160 other cars windows off as it passes among the You 0:11:20.200 --> 0:11:24.440 can't park it anywhere, right, Yeah, so Tarafuccia is working 0:11:24.520 --> 0:11:27.520 on well, at least they have a concept. It's not 0:11:27.559 --> 0:11:31.440 even a prototype, it's a concept vehicle called t f X. 0:11:31.640 --> 0:11:35.000 So this hasn't gone any further than the design, the 0:11:35.040 --> 0:11:38.200 initial design phase, as far as I am able to determine. No, 0:11:38.400 --> 0:11:40.520 but not at all. If there's any player in the 0:11:40.559 --> 0:11:43.680 game right now, it's probably them. Yeah, if we're talking 0:11:43.679 --> 0:11:47.240 about a vehicle that the average consumer could use, and 0:11:47.240 --> 0:11:49.880 and it's because the t FX answers a lot of 0:11:49.880 --> 0:11:52.160 the questions, or at least is going to, assuming that 0:11:52.200 --> 0:11:54.520 it it comes out the way the concept is designed, 0:11:54.920 --> 0:11:56.880 it will answer a lot of these challenges we're bringing 0:11:56.960 --> 0:12:01.400 up right now, assuming that everything works a lot of assumptions. Yeah, well, 0:12:01.440 --> 0:12:03.280 I mean they're they're talking about that vertical takeoff and 0:12:03.360 --> 0:12:06.280 landing um. And they're talking about a lot of automation, 0:12:06.320 --> 0:12:09.360 which is another thing, which is basically the second element 0:12:09.480 --> 0:12:12.240 that the three of us think is pretty important in 0:12:12.320 --> 0:12:16.319 getting this entire flying car thing off the ground. I 0:12:17.760 --> 0:12:20.199 didn't mean to, I tried not. I think it's I 0:12:20.200 --> 0:12:21.800 I do think it's the kind of thing that will 0:12:21.960 --> 0:12:25.199 be required in order for this idea to get any altitude. 0:12:25.400 --> 0:12:27.000 I mean, for this thing to launch, it's going to 0:12:27.120 --> 0:12:29.640 have to be automated. Okay, let's let's break it down, 0:12:29.720 --> 0:12:32.240 all right's free. What are the major concerns with a 0:12:32.280 --> 0:12:34.880 flying car? What are they gonna have? What are the 0:12:34.960 --> 0:12:37.719 challenges they're going to have to answer before it is 0:12:37.760 --> 0:12:40.360 at all feasible for people like you and me. So 0:12:40.559 --> 0:12:44.120 here's one concern, Joe. You know, it takes a lot 0:12:44.160 --> 0:12:47.000 of energy to maintain flight, right, It's not like I 0:12:47.000 --> 0:12:49.319 mean we can look to nature and see that this 0:12:49.400 --> 0:12:51.560 is the case, that it's not something that's a low 0:12:51.720 --> 0:12:56.400 energy kind of activity, even if you have the biological 0:12:57.240 --> 0:13:01.200 design for lack of a better word, to fly, Well, yeah, 0:13:01.240 --> 0:13:03.880 I mean it's hard. It takes more energy to jump 0:13:03.920 --> 0:13:06.880 than to take a step. So in order to get 0:13:06.920 --> 0:13:09.000 a vehicle into the air, it's going to require a 0:13:09.000 --> 0:13:11.440 great deal of energy, which in turn means you have 0:13:11.480 --> 0:13:14.440 to get that energy from someplace. So if it's a 0:13:14.559 --> 0:13:18.679 vehicle that's running on fuel, there are fuel uh considerations 0:13:18.679 --> 0:13:20.640 you have to you have to worry about how much 0:13:20.640 --> 0:13:23.520 fuel do you need to actually get the power that 0:13:23.600 --> 0:13:28.320 you're that's necessary to get into flight and operates safely, right, 0:13:28.440 --> 0:13:31.000 and and the amount of fuel. Okay, let's let's take 0:13:31.040 --> 0:13:35.120 for example, the Tarafugia transition and like a camera Okay, 0:13:35.280 --> 0:13:38.000 you're you're talking for for the transition that that light 0:13:38.120 --> 0:13:42.000 sport craft that they're thinking of releasing like like under 0:13:42.000 --> 0:13:44.440 a thousand pounds and a twenty three gallon tank. A 0:13:44.480 --> 0:13:47.400 camera weighs like three thousand pounds and only has a 0:13:47.440 --> 0:13:50.360 seventeen gallon tank. That's the kind of kind of just 0:13:50.520 --> 0:13:55.120 difference in raw gas power that you're talking about, right, right, Yeah, 0:13:55.200 --> 0:13:58.040 it's I mean, that's you know, it's it's a big concern. 0:13:58.120 --> 0:14:02.480 And so along with just fuel consumption, that adds into 0:14:02.760 --> 0:14:04.400 a couple of other things you have to worry about, 0:14:04.640 --> 0:14:07.200 like emissions, What what kind of fuel are you burning? 0:14:07.280 --> 0:14:09.880 What sort of emissions are coming out of this car? 0:14:10.000 --> 0:14:14.679 You don't want it to end up being a really, uh, 0:14:14.760 --> 0:14:17.959 the high pollution style mode of transportation because that's something 0:14:18.000 --> 0:14:21.080 that we don't want, right, And and also the expense 0:14:21.120 --> 0:14:22.640 of that kind of fuel. I mean, these days a 0:14:22.640 --> 0:14:25.560 lot of light sport craft can use auto gas rather 0:14:25.640 --> 0:14:29.920 than airplane gas. Um. But it's I mean that's not 0:14:30.000 --> 0:14:33.160 really more and more we're going like, maybe electric engines 0:14:33.200 --> 0:14:35.400 are the way to go because this entire fossil fuel 0:14:35.400 --> 0:14:38.000 thing is an issue. Now. There are some designs that 0:14:38.040 --> 0:14:41.360 have proposed using a hybrid approach where you have some 0:14:41.440 --> 0:14:44.680 fuel for anything that requires a lot of energy, specifically 0:14:44.760 --> 0:14:48.720 taking off and landing. Those tend to require a lot 0:14:48.840 --> 0:14:51.920 of energy to do safely. But then once you reach 0:14:52.200 --> 0:14:55.480 some form of of cruising altitude and speed, switching over 0:14:55.560 --> 0:14:59.960 to electric motors which would allow you to conserve fuel 0:15:00.120 --> 0:15:03.520 that way and also cut down on emissions, depending upon, 0:15:03.560 --> 0:15:06.080 of course, where you get your electricity, because as we 0:15:06.120 --> 0:15:09.280 all know, it's not just a closed system where you know, 0:15:09.480 --> 0:15:12.280 all the electrictity magically comes from a place where pollution 0:15:12.400 --> 0:15:17.160 is just a bad Yeah. I think we should also 0:15:17.160 --> 0:15:21.560 think about the concerns that are involved specifically in vt 0:15:21.680 --> 0:15:25.760 O L and will takeoff and landing um. So one 0:15:25.800 --> 0:15:31.160 of the first things is simply safety. Turns out, vertical 0:15:31.200 --> 0:15:34.040 takeoff and landing is not easy, not just from like 0:15:34.080 --> 0:15:37.360 a fuel consumption standpoint, but it's difficult to do in 0:15:37.480 --> 0:15:41.080 terms of maneuvering of the aircraft. Uh, and it has 0:15:41.120 --> 0:15:43.280 caused a lot of safety problems in the past. That 0:15:43.320 --> 0:15:46.880 the Harrier jumped jet. So that was a vertical takeoff 0:15:46.880 --> 0:15:50.520 and landing jet that was powered by a vector thrust 0:15:50.720 --> 0:15:54.840 turbo fan engine. So basically it sucked air through the 0:15:54.880 --> 0:15:58.160 body of the airplane and could point it downwards to 0:15:58.240 --> 0:16:02.280 lift itself up vertically. But the thing is, um harrier 0:16:02.360 --> 0:16:05.360 jumped jets. While they could take off vertically, that was 0:16:05.440 --> 0:16:09.680 not ideal. It was avoided under all circumstances, except when 0:16:09.720 --> 0:16:12.360 it was absolutely necessary for emergency. I mean, what that 0:16:12.440 --> 0:16:14.680 sounds like to me is that you're you're lighting a 0:16:14.760 --> 0:16:18.600 fire directly underneath yourself and really hoping that the liftoff 0:16:18.640 --> 0:16:20.360 created from it is going to get you out of 0:16:20.400 --> 0:16:23.600 the way of the fire. You're, yeah, it's sort of. 0:16:23.720 --> 0:16:26.800 I mean it's um so it's difficult to do. You 0:16:27.040 --> 0:16:29.360 could take off from like an aircraft carrier that way 0:16:29.440 --> 0:16:31.440 or something like that. I mean, the whole concept was 0:16:31.520 --> 0:16:34.240 so that a jet would be able to take off 0:16:34.240 --> 0:16:37.680 our land anywhere in the in case of nuclear war, 0:16:37.760 --> 0:16:41.280 which would end up you know, targeting military instace exactly. Yeah, 0:16:41.360 --> 0:16:43.200 you could. You could keep these things in a park 0:16:43.320 --> 0:16:45.880 somewhere or whatever, you know, wouldn't it wouldn't have to 0:16:45.920 --> 0:16:48.160 be But as it turned out, it was really hard 0:16:48.200 --> 0:16:52.360 to do. Yeah, and so that was considered an accident 0:16:52.440 --> 0:16:56.120 prone aircraft. There were a lot of incidents involving the 0:16:56.160 --> 0:16:59.800 Harrier family and it was basically a dangerous aircraft. There's 0:16:59.840 --> 0:17:04.560 an other one, more recent, the bel V twenty two Osprey, 0:17:04.720 --> 0:17:07.760 which also has a reputation for being unsafe. Yeah, it 0:17:07.840 --> 0:17:10.840 has a very controversial safety record. So it had an 0:17:10.840 --> 0:17:16.880 early test period between two thousand, there were four osprey crashes. Uh, 0:17:16.920 --> 0:17:20.760 and together those killed a total of thirty people. And 0:17:21.200 --> 0:17:24.600 so the the airplane has been redesigned and so oh sorry, 0:17:24.680 --> 0:17:27.679 let me explain. The osprey is a tilted rotor, so 0:17:27.760 --> 0:17:31.080 that's a different method of vertical takeoff and landing. What 0:17:31.080 --> 0:17:33.959 what that is is you imagine like a prop plane 0:17:34.080 --> 0:17:37.440 has two propellers out on the wings. Now a normal 0:17:37.480 --> 0:17:41.480 plane those would just be forward facing to generate forward 0:17:41.520 --> 0:17:43.480 thrust and that would that would lift a plane once 0:17:43.480 --> 0:17:46.119 you get enough velocity on a runway. But the way 0:17:46.160 --> 0:17:49.119 of the twenty two osprey works is they start off 0:17:49.160 --> 0:17:53.119 pointing up helicopter wings themselves tilt up so that the 0:17:53.119 --> 0:17:56.320 propellers are facing like helicopter rotors. Yeah, so it uses 0:17:56.359 --> 0:17:58.280 that to lift up off the ground and then it 0:17:58.320 --> 0:18:03.280 can convert into horizontal plane flight as it's coming into 0:18:03.280 --> 0:18:07.520 the air, so like the like the shield Hell Carrier. Yeah, 0:18:07.600 --> 0:18:11.240 so there it did get a redesign, and it has 0:18:11.760 --> 0:18:14.520 at least on paper, been safer since then. But I 0:18:14.560 --> 0:18:19.520 know there's still controversy, was like how these accidents are classified. 0:18:19.600 --> 0:18:24.880 There's also a scandal about officers military officers um asking 0:18:25.000 --> 0:18:28.040 for maintenance records to be falsified so that it would 0:18:28.080 --> 0:18:31.919 give the osprey a more favorable maintenance record and make 0:18:32.000 --> 0:18:36.239 it look less prone for accidents mistakes. Yeah, essentially, what 0:18:36.280 --> 0:18:39.280 I've read is that some people allege that things that 0:18:39.400 --> 0:18:42.280 may have been problems with the airplane have been classified 0:18:42.320 --> 0:18:46.359 as pilot errors to be but we we don't know, 0:18:46.520 --> 0:18:49.800 I mean, to be fair, anything that's involved with you know, 0:18:49.920 --> 0:18:54.240 a one or two rotor aircraft is incredibly challenging to fly. 0:18:54.400 --> 0:18:56.960 I mean helicopters. You'll you'll hear pilots who have flown 0:18:57.000 --> 0:19:00.800 both airplanes and helicopters talk about how helicopter ers are 0:19:01.240 --> 0:19:04.199 really tricky, Like it's it's not something that's easy to 0:19:04.240 --> 0:19:06.520 pick up, even if you're an accomplished pilot with a 0:19:06.760 --> 0:19:12.760 with an airplane and so one way that these flying cars, 0:19:12.840 --> 0:19:15.399 if they are ever made, could maybe get around that 0:19:15.560 --> 0:19:19.000 is by having multiple rotors to add more stability. You know, 0:19:19.080 --> 0:19:22.240 with a two rotor system, it's it's definitely less stable 0:19:22.400 --> 0:19:26.159 that you see. Some of the drones UH and UH 0:19:26.280 --> 0:19:30.119 and even remote controlled drones out there that are for 0:19:30.160 --> 0:19:33.159 consumer use had between four and eight rotors to provide 0:19:33.160 --> 0:19:36.439 that kind of level of stability. Definitely. Uh. Yeah. Another 0:19:36.520 --> 0:19:40.640 concern with the vt O L technology is, as we 0:19:40.640 --> 0:19:44.600 were just talking about fuel consumption, that uh uses more 0:19:44.720 --> 0:19:47.560 fuel than a regular takeoff and that's one of the reasons, say, 0:19:47.600 --> 0:19:50.320 like a Harrier, when it wanted to take off, even 0:19:50.320 --> 0:19:52.800 though it was capable of vertical takeoff, they would do 0:19:53.320 --> 0:19:57.320 a short runway takeoff sometimes just because that used less fuel. 0:19:57.760 --> 0:19:59.960 And then not only that, but it's it tends to 0:20:00.040 --> 0:20:03.679 be really noisy. Yeah, we all aircraft tend to be 0:20:03.720 --> 0:20:08.600 really noisy, and so that's a big problem. Imagine you're 0:20:08.600 --> 0:20:11.040 trying to say, well, okay, I want to pull out 0:20:11.119 --> 0:20:13.719 into my driveway on the way to work in the 0:20:13.760 --> 0:20:17.720 morning and take off. So if you ever heard a 0:20:17.760 --> 0:20:21.960 helicopter takeoff or an airplane you know close, that's what 0:20:22.080 --> 0:20:24.640 your neighbor next door is going to be hearing when 0:20:24.680 --> 0:20:28.199 you do this. Now, hopefully they can. Because it's a 0:20:28.280 --> 0:20:32.119 smaller aircraft, it will probably be less loud than you know, 0:20:32.240 --> 0:20:35.480 like a Boeing taking off or something. Would hope, Um, 0:20:35.520 --> 0:20:38.359 but still, you know, there's always gonna be that one guy. Yeah, 0:20:38.359 --> 0:20:42.320 it's still I can't imagine that they're going to be 0:20:42.440 --> 0:20:45.160 able to make it as quiet as just like a car, 0:20:45.720 --> 0:20:48.240 so and and then and there. You won't. I don't 0:20:48.240 --> 0:20:49.840 think you'll ever have a time where you'll be able 0:20:49.920 --> 0:20:53.080 to just take off directly from your driveway. That's exactly right. 0:20:53.320 --> 0:20:56.359 I think that the idea that you can do that 0:20:56.520 --> 0:20:59.320 is just probably not gonna happen. Now you I can 0:20:59.359 --> 0:21:02.920 imagine we might have vertical takeoff flying cars where you 0:21:03.000 --> 0:21:06.520 don't have to go to the airport and get runway access, 0:21:06.640 --> 0:21:11.040 but you will have say like a launching area, launch 0:21:11.720 --> 0:21:14.000 designated area, because you would you would want to have 0:21:14.119 --> 0:21:16.760 enough clearance on all sides so that you're not worried 0:21:16.760 --> 0:21:20.760 about banging into a house, building, a tree, a power line, 0:21:20.840 --> 0:21:23.240 any of that kind of stuff. Even even Tara Fuji 0:21:23.359 --> 0:21:26.760 is kind of optimistic. Estimate is that it would take 0:21:26.920 --> 0:21:30.560 a hundred feet or thirty meter diameter fifty feet on 0:21:30.600 --> 0:21:33.920 all sides. Yeah, I think that's pretty standard idea of 0:21:34.119 --> 0:21:38.320 you need at least that much just for safety and clearance. Yeah. Yeah, 0:21:38.359 --> 0:21:40.679 So in that case, what you would have is a 0:21:40.760 --> 0:21:45.560 designated spot where your multi rotor, which could become in 0:21:45.600 --> 0:21:47.800 the form of tilted rotors, it could be we we 0:21:47.800 --> 0:21:50.760 haven't even discussed like what form that this would take, 0:21:50.800 --> 0:21:52.760 mostly because we don't have a lot of examples to 0:21:52.800 --> 0:21:54.480 point out that. There are a lot of different proposals. 0:21:54.520 --> 0:21:57.240