WEBVTT - Where's My Flying Car? 0:00:04.160 --> 0:00:07.200 Get in touch with technology with tex Stuff from half 0:00:07.240 --> 0:00:15.320 Stuff either everyone, and welcome to tex Stuff. I'm Jonathan 0:00:15.320 --> 0:00:17.720 Strickland and I'm Lauren both of them. And boy, these 0:00:17.760 --> 0:00:21.840 podcasts just fly by, and today we're gonna talk about 0:00:21.840 --> 0:00:25.360 flying cars. I was wondering if I could get a 0:00:25.440 --> 0:00:28.240 chuckle I was getting, I was getting the grin, Okay, 0:00:28.320 --> 0:00:30.960 So I tried try not to encourage him. Guys, it's 0:00:31.000 --> 0:00:35.360 too late. It's I have well passed the age where 0:00:35.440 --> 0:00:38.159 that can ever be changed. So we really did want 0:00:38.159 --> 0:00:40.159 to talk about flying cars. It's one of those subjects 0:00:40.200 --> 0:00:42.479 I can't believe we haven't really talked about on tech 0:00:42.520 --> 0:00:44.879 stuff before. But it's one of those things that, you know, 0:00:44.960 --> 0:00:47.920 it's the typical if this is the future, where's my 0:00:47.960 --> 0:00:50.720 flying car? Where's my jet pack and flying car? Why 0:00:50.760 --> 0:00:53.960 aren't my meals in pill form? It's because jet packs 0:00:53.960 --> 0:00:57.040 and flying cars are really dangerous. Yeah, they're not practical 0:00:57.360 --> 0:01:00.280 very much and at least not yet, and uh, they're 0:01:00.280 --> 0:01:03.800 really tricky to do in a way that is safe, 0:01:04.040 --> 0:01:07.560 you know, even if you're talking about completely automating it. 0:01:07.840 --> 0:01:09.880 And we're gonna talk about some cars where they're taking 0:01:09.880 --> 0:01:12.640 that approach where they're making it as automated as possible. 0:01:13.280 --> 0:01:15.440 It's you know, it's there's a lot of logistics to 0:01:15.440 --> 0:01:18.520 work through. I mean just imagine, like in my neighborhood alone, 0:01:18.880 --> 0:01:21.800 if I had a flying car and it was all 0:01:21.840 --> 0:01:24.760 automated and everything and it could detect other flying cars, 0:01:25.440 --> 0:01:29.280 I still have to worry about things like power lines. 0:01:29.680 --> 0:01:32.000 And we don't have autonomous cars that go on a 0:01:32.040 --> 0:01:35.080 two dimensional plane yet, So I mean adding that third 0:01:35.120 --> 0:01:40.200 dimension is more complicated than it probably sounds. So the 0:01:40.240 --> 0:01:43.360 flying car, I mean, obviously that's been something in science fiction. 0:01:44.160 --> 0:01:47.560 What might surprise you is how old the concept of 0:01:47.560 --> 0:01:50.080 a flying car is. It did not take very long 0:01:50.560 --> 0:01:54.080 after the invention of both cars and planes for someone 0:01:54.120 --> 0:01:57.440 to say, hey, wouldn't it be awesome if a car 0:01:57.640 --> 0:02:01.640 was also a plane. So back in eighteen eighty five, 0:02:01.720 --> 0:02:04.960 that's when you get your first gasoline powered automobile, which 0:02:05.000 --> 0:02:08.480 was invented by a fellow named Carl Friedrich Benz and 0:02:08.919 --> 0:02:11.560 Mercedes Benz. And then in nineteen o three we had 0:02:11.600 --> 0:02:14.040 the first flight of the Wright brothers, right, which, depending 0:02:14.120 --> 0:02:18.359 upon your view of history, was the first you know, uh, 0:02:18.600 --> 0:02:23.400 solid like heavier than air flight. Uh, there's definitely some 0:02:24.160 --> 0:02:28.720 debate there, but in the historical ranks, generally speaking, people 0:02:28.720 --> 0:02:32.280 say n first flight. At any rate, it was right 0:02:32.320 --> 0:02:34.440 around that time. So e eighty five was the first 0:02:34.480 --> 0:02:36.799 gasoline powered automobile. Keep in mind that there were other 0:02:36.919 --> 0:02:42.000 types of automobile, steam powered, electric powered ones, but gasoline 0:02:42.000 --> 0:02:45.799 powered started in the late nineteenth century early twentieth century. 0:02:45.800 --> 0:02:48.480 You get the Right Brothers. So how long did it 0:02:48.520 --> 0:02:50.880 take before someone came up with an idea of making 0:02:50.960 --> 0:02:57.359 up car slash plane? Seventeen fourteen years after the Right 0:02:57.440 --> 0:03:03.160 Brothers flew, someone says, clearly, two things can be combined. Right, 0:03:03.280 --> 0:03:06.280 this is the chocolate and peanut butter of the technological age. 0:03:06.320 --> 0:03:11.440 They must become one. And that person was but Glenn Curtis. 0:03:11.480 --> 0:03:14.960 He created the Curtis auto Plane. Then the names of 0:03:15.000 --> 0:03:18.280 these things, by the way, are my favorite that they 0:03:18.320 --> 0:03:20.640 really only get better. Yeah, it's sort of like what 0:03:20.800 --> 0:03:23.720 you encounter when you when you look at steampunk, where 0:03:23.720 --> 0:03:27.600 people come up with the most creative uh, goofy goofy 0:03:27.720 --> 0:03:32.240 like like multi collaborate names. So the Curtis auto Plane 0:03:32.760 --> 0:03:36.320 wasn't really a true flying car in what we would 0:03:36.360 --> 0:03:38.800 think of today, right, it didn't look like a car 0:03:38.960 --> 0:03:41.800 that could suddenly take off and you wouldn't he have 0:03:41.880 --> 0:03:44.160 Doc Brown say where we're going, we don't need roads, 0:03:44.200 --> 0:03:46.080 and then you have the big Back to the Future 0:03:46.160 --> 0:03:48.560 music come up. It's it looked more like a plane 0:03:49.320 --> 0:03:53.680 that you could sort of drive around if you needed to. Um. 0:03:53.760 --> 0:03:56.720 So it was a plane, a small plane, relatively small 0:03:56.760 --> 0:04:00.760 plane with a forty foot wingspans about twelve you very much. 0:04:01.360 --> 0:04:05.080 And it had a rear mounted four bladed propellers, so 0:04:05.160 --> 0:04:06.760 the propellers on the back of the plane and so 0:04:06.960 --> 0:04:08.800 have on the front of it, which is fairly common 0:04:08.840 --> 0:04:10.880 in a lot of the designs we'll be talking about today. 0:04:11.480 --> 0:04:13.960 Um and uh. But but it never really flew, now, 0:04:14.240 --> 0:04:16.400 it just kind of hopped off the ground a couple 0:04:16.400 --> 0:04:19.040 of times, never really caught flights. So if you ever 0:04:19.080 --> 0:04:20.960 watch any of those kind of like a toddler going 0:04:21.000 --> 0:04:23.520 and flying and they started jumping really hard. Yeah, if 0:04:23.520 --> 0:04:26.280 you look at any of those old timey movies where 0:04:26.440 --> 0:04:30.280 people were working on the early early versions of airplanes, 0:04:30.400 --> 0:04:32.720 and you see lots of planes that get a little 0:04:32.760 --> 0:04:34.839 bit off the ground and then immediately come right back down, 0:04:35.240 --> 0:04:37.800 that's kind of what this thing did. It never never 0:04:37.880 --> 0:04:40.000 attained true flight. To be fair, at the time, I 0:04:40.000 --> 0:04:42.799 think that a lot of especially kind of hobbyist created 0:04:42.839 --> 0:04:46.120 planes exactly we're just you know, we're really just hopping. 0:04:46.360 --> 0:04:49.440 So that probably wasn't terrible for no, for a first 0:04:49.480 --> 0:04:51.760 attempt at making a car that was also a plane. 0:04:52.000 --> 0:04:55.960 Not bad, not great, but not bad, And it would 0:04:56.000 --> 0:04:59.679 take another twenty years before someone would create something similar, 0:05:00.279 --> 0:05:02.600 at least according to all the research I was doing. 0:05:02.640 --> 0:05:06.480 There probably were other people, hobbyists, mechanics, engineers who are 0:05:06.560 --> 0:05:09.200 trying to do the sort of thing, but not all 0:05:09.240 --> 0:05:12.520 of their attempts have been recorded for posterity's sake. But 0:05:12.760 --> 0:05:19.800 in seven Waldo Waterman created the aerobile or aerobill or 0:05:20.000 --> 0:05:24.640 aerobilly anyways, it was. It was a student baker, which, 0:05:24.960 --> 0:05:27.120 as we all know from the Muppet movie is a 0:05:27.160 --> 0:05:32.159 bear's natural habitat, so student aker not. If you were 0:05:32.200 --> 0:05:33.840 to look at a picture of a student baker, I 0:05:33.960 --> 0:05:35.880 don't think the first thing that you would think is 0:05:36.240 --> 0:05:38.240 that looks like that sucker could fly through the air. 0:05:39.520 --> 0:05:43.560 And yet Waldo Waterman was determined, Yeah, this one was 0:05:43.640 --> 0:05:47.880 that was a three wheeled car, but the wheels were detachable. Yeah, 0:05:48.080 --> 0:05:50.880 well I had detachable wheels and a rear mounted propeller, 0:05:51.080 --> 0:05:55.040 and it never ended up getting uh sufficient funding. The 0:05:55.080 --> 0:05:58.279 wings itself were also detachable. That's also a very common 0:05:58.360 --> 0:06:00.680 thing and a lot of these early designs where you know, 0:06:00.800 --> 0:06:03.520 you would take all the parts that you didn't need 0:06:03.680 --> 0:06:06.080 off for it to be a car, and then once 0:06:06.120 --> 0:06:08.479 you got to wherever, them in a very large trunk 0:06:08.520 --> 0:06:11.159 and run. Yeah, or a trailer that you would tow 0:06:11.320 --> 0:06:14.240 behind the car get to wherever you're going, like whatever 0:06:14.279 --> 0:06:16.920 airstrip you're going to put your plane together, Yeah, you'd 0:06:16.920 --> 0:06:19.040 actually have to assembol it and then it would be 0:06:19.120 --> 0:06:20.720 a plane. So it was, which is something that is 0:06:20.839 --> 0:06:22.800 very worrying for me. I have to say, guys, I 0:06:23.080 --> 0:06:26.240 I personally do not have the kind of engineering background 0:06:26.400 --> 0:06:28.920 to really feel comfortable flying in something that I have 0:06:29.080 --> 0:06:31.640 just built. Can you imagine looking into the trailer and 0:06:31.680 --> 0:06:34.040 you're seeing like three or four just random nuts and 0:06:34.080 --> 0:06:37.200 bolts in there and think that's good enough? Uh? You 0:06:37.279 --> 0:06:39.799 know it's because it could be like going to Ikea, 0:06:39.920 --> 0:06:42.200 Like you put your furniture together and you're like, it's 0:06:42.200 --> 0:06:44.200 always a few spare bits, and you're like, well, you 0:06:44.320 --> 0:06:46.480 didn't say there were spare bits, but I could have 0:06:46.600 --> 0:06:48.840 sworn I followed the instructions. Yet that was sort of 0:06:48.920 --> 0:06:52.920 what these early flying cars were like too. So really, 0:06:53.040 --> 0:06:55.839 you're gonna notice while we talk about this, for these 0:06:55.920 --> 0:06:58.000 early ones, it's going to sound more and more like 0:06:58.560 --> 0:07:01.520 it was a plane that could bend into a vehicle 0:07:01.680 --> 0:07:04.720 that could travel on Rhods. That's the case for most 0:07:04.800 --> 0:07:11.560 of these early ones. Robert Edison Fulton Jr. A distant 0:07:11.680 --> 0:07:14.600 relative to another Fulton. We talked about in how steam 0:07:14.760 --> 0:07:18.480 engines were the steamboat the steamboat Fulton. Yeah, so steamboat 0:07:18.560 --> 0:07:21.160 Fulton was not. He was not a direct descendant of 0:07:22.040 --> 0:07:26.280 Robert Fulton, the steamboat engineer. Uh. Robert Fulton, I believe 0:07:26.400 --> 0:07:29.920 had one son who never had any kids, but several daughters. 0:07:30.320 --> 0:07:33.119 But obviously you wouldn't have last name Fulton through that line, 0:07:33.200 --> 0:07:36.960 So we're talking like a cousin distantly related in that sense. 0:07:37.200 --> 0:07:40.440 But still his dad was a friend to a certain 0:07:40.520 --> 0:07:45.200 Thomas Edison, which is why ed had had the Edison 0:07:45.280 --> 0:07:48.280 in his name. Um, yeah, I would guess that if 0:07:48.320 --> 0:07:51.080 it were Robert Nicola Fulton, we would all be just 0:07:51.680 --> 0:07:58.720 fawning over him because of Tesla's and I know we 0:07:58.800 --> 0:08:01.760 both lost some geek c there I think anyway, His 0:08:02.040 --> 0:08:08.040 version was an aluminum body car that had detachable fabric 0:08:08.120 --> 0:08:11.400 wings to turn it into a light plane, and it 0:08:11.520 --> 0:08:14.440 also had a detachable propeller that would serve as propulsion. 0:08:14.560 --> 0:08:18.080 And they built four prototypes but it never went into production. 0:08:18.760 --> 0:08:25.880 UM and the following year, Consolidated Vaulty developed the convert Car, 0:08:26.520 --> 0:08:29.440 which was a two door sedan with detachable airplane unit. 0:08:29.720 --> 0:08:31.440 So in this case, it's like an entire kind of 0:08:32.080 --> 0:08:35.200 airplane kit that you could fit on top of this car. 0:08:36.040 --> 0:08:38.600 And they had some success, at least, well, they had 0:08:39.400 --> 0:08:42.920 limited early success with their with their tests. Didn't think, Yeah, yeah, 0:08:43.000 --> 0:08:46.920 they had two successful tests. Um, they had two successful tests. 0:08:46.920 --> 0:08:49.360 Improved they could it could fly for about an hour 0:08:49.600 --> 0:08:52.840 and travel it around forty five p seventy two. I'm sorry, 0:08:52.880 --> 0:08:55.559 not forty five. I could travel a total distance of 0:08:55.600 --> 0:08:59.240 forty five miles or seventy two kilometers on a gallon 0:08:59.320 --> 0:09:01.959 of gas. But it was pretty good. Yeah, so to 0:09:03.200 --> 0:09:07.199 flights going pretty slow, but unfortunately the third flight not 0:09:07.400 --> 0:09:11.160 so successful. Yeah, and that that was pretty much the 0:09:11.240 --> 0:09:12.760 end of the project, right. They were trying to get 0:09:12.800 --> 0:09:15.280 some marketing dollars behind it. After the crash. That was 0:09:15.320 --> 0:09:19.439 a complete disaster for them, and it was it was scrapped. 0:09:19.520 --> 0:09:23.920 They decided not to go forward with it. Molten B. 0:09:24.240 --> 0:09:28.800 Taylor builds the Arrow Car, which was actually inspired by 0:09:28.960 --> 0:09:33.600 Robert Edison Fulton Junior's design. It also had detachable wings 0:09:33.720 --> 0:09:36.880 and a detachable tail so they could stash those in 0:09:36.920 --> 0:09:39.640 a in a trailer. Yeah, this is one of those 0:09:39.679 --> 0:09:41.320 that you would put all those parts in a trailer, 0:09:41.400 --> 0:09:44.920 tow it to the airport, then take everything out, assemble 0:09:45.000 --> 0:09:47.920 it on the car. And according to the Wall Street Journal, 0:09:48.320 --> 0:09:51.480 a practiced owner could assemble the Arrow Car from into 0:09:51.600 --> 0:09:56.520 flying form within ten minutes. Ten minutes to turn into 0:09:56.760 --> 0:09:59.480 an airplane. I can't assemble a microwave dinner, and ten 0:10:00.840 --> 0:10:05.000 I don't. I certainly anyone who watched me play Minecraft 0:10:05.080 --> 0:10:07.439 knows ten minutes is not enough time for me to 0:10:07.480 --> 0:10:11.920 assemble anything. This was another tail end propeller yep, and 0:10:12.120 --> 0:10:14.120 it looks like a mini car and only six were 0:10:14.120 --> 0:10:17.040 ever built. In fact, one of them I think was current, 0:10:17.240 --> 0:10:20.000 was on the market recently for just over like a 0:10:20.080 --> 0:10:24.360 million dollars or something like. It actually looks very quaint 0:10:24.520 --> 0:10:27.599 like it looks like a quaint little antique car that 0:10:27.720 --> 0:10:31.480 for some reason has had an airplane tail merged onto 0:10:31.520 --> 0:10:33.360 the end of it and wings that sprouted out of it. 0:10:34.120 --> 0:10:36.480 So yeah, but if you, if you, you could easily 0:10:36.520 --> 0:10:40.360 imagine removing those and it would look like a little Yeah. 0:10:40.840 --> 0:10:43.040 So this one was more of a car, although again 0:10:43.200 --> 0:10:46.920 you could not, you know, effortlessly convert to flying form, 0:10:47.160 --> 0:10:49.120 which is really what we're going for here, right. We 0:10:49.200 --> 0:10:51.480 want a car that you could drive on the streets 0:10:51.520 --> 0:10:53.640 and then when traffic is getting really badly, you put 0:10:53.640 --> 0:10:56.880 press button and it transforms like in an anime. And 0:10:56.960 --> 0:10:59.160 it would be a while and still will be a 0:10:59.240 --> 0:11:02.600 while before we see something like that. Uh So, nineteen sixty, 0:11:03.440 --> 0:11:07.440 Paul Maler introduces the x M two. Now Maller will 0:11:07.480 --> 0:11:09.960 be well, we'll go ahead and tell Mahler's story. It's 0:11:10.040 --> 0:11:13.559 kind of a disappointing story. But the x M two 0:11:13.679 --> 0:11:17.120 was the first prototype of his sky car concept that 0:11:17.240 --> 0:11:19.640 one would hover, but he couldn't get it to fly. 0:11:20.320 --> 0:11:23.720 So he would continue to to kind of refine this design, 0:11:24.480 --> 0:11:29.120 and in ninety nine was the first one. Nine he 0:11:29.160 --> 0:11:32.599 introduces the M two hundred X, which could fly in 0:11:32.679 --> 0:11:36.079 an altitude of about fifteen meters or around fifty feet, 0:11:36.600 --> 0:11:39.400 and then He would later introduce the sky car M 0:11:39.640 --> 0:11:42.680 four hundred, which is a vertical takeoff and landing aircraft 0:11:42.760 --> 0:11:47.040 vt o L vertical takeoff or landing really, which could 0:11:47.080 --> 0:11:50.920 reach speeds theoretically of four hundred miles per hour or 0:11:51.000 --> 0:11:55.360 six hundred forty four kilometers power. But the cruising speed, Yeah, 0:11:55.800 --> 0:11:59.559 can you imagine your average motorists controlling a vehicle traveling 0:11:59.720 --> 0:12:03.840 traveling at that speed, I literally cannot have the cruising speed. Now, 0:12:04.000 --> 0:12:05.839 that was the top speed. The cruising speed was three 0:12:06.240 --> 0:12:08.760 fifty miles per us. Oh well that's much a better 0:12:09.440 --> 0:12:12.400 or five hundred sixty three kilometers per hour. Fuel for 0:12:12.440 --> 0:12:17.520 the vehicle included simple, simple household items. The asolene was 0:12:17.640 --> 0:12:22.520 one diesel okay, alcohol okay, kerosene and propane all at 0:12:22.520 --> 0:12:24.480 the same time. Yeah. Well it's you know, because it 0:12:24.559 --> 0:12:28.880 was using some pretty powerful sure which which also yeah, exactly, 0:12:28.960 --> 0:12:31.560 the average voters just has those lying around all right, exactly. 0:12:31.600 --> 0:12:33.559 You know, you can just go to one filling station 0:12:33.600 --> 0:12:35.600 and find all of those. Some filling stations you might, 0:12:35.679 --> 0:12:38.840 but not many had a range of about nine hundred miles, 0:12:38.920 --> 0:12:43.040 which is about hundred fifty kilometers. Is that the same 0:12:43.080 --> 0:12:46.640 as it's car mode range. Uh no, No, it's Kira 0:12:46.679 --> 0:12:48.760 moded hat a mileage of twenty miles per gallon or 0:12:48.920 --> 0:12:51.640 thirty two point two kilometers per gallon. I know, really 0:12:52.040 --> 0:12:55.200 usually do leaders per kilometer, but there's only so much 0:12:55.240 --> 0:12:58.319 conversion I can do. Guys, I have to apologize for 0:12:58.440 --> 0:13:02.160 my American nous. Yeah, but the initial price for the 0:13:02.440 --> 0:13:06.040 M four hundred was quoted to be a millions Macarou's 0:13:06.280 --> 0:13:10.720 one million bucks. But the promises of Mueller never quite 0:13:11.000 --> 0:13:13.199 panned out. So in two thousand three they did a 0:13:13.280 --> 0:13:17.400 demonstration where the M four hundred hovered, but it hovered 0:13:17.640 --> 0:13:19.559 on a tether like it was tethered to the ground. 0:13:19.640 --> 0:13:24.320 It did not fly. Um, so it wasn't really awe 0:13:24.400 --> 0:13:27.600 inspiring or giving a lot of people confidence in the project. 0:13:28.120 --> 0:13:31.160 And in fact, by two thousand nine they still didn't 0:13:31.200 --> 0:13:33.600 have a flying car to show off, and Maller ended 0:13:33.800 --> 0:13:37.480 up filing for personal protection under Chapter eleven as in bankruptcy. 0:13:38.120 --> 0:13:42.160 Turned out apparently the company had spent something like one 0:13:42.320 --> 0:13:46.439 hundred million dollars over forty years trying to get this 0:13:46.559 --> 0:13:49.280 flying car designed to work, and it had not happened. 0:13:50.040 --> 0:13:53.840 Hundred million bucks, So yeah, it was definitely a tough, 0:13:54.000 --> 0:13:57.920 tough story. Now, Maller, while he filed for protection under 0:13:57.960 --> 0:14:02.080 Chapter eleven, the company, Maller International, is still from why 0:14:02.080 --> 0:14:05.319 I understand, still operating in a very limited capacity. So 0:14:05.480 --> 0:14:08.240 the company didn't go away, but Maller certainly had to 0:14:09.000 --> 0:14:12.160 look for some financial protection after after just not being 0:14:12.200 --> 0:14:15.160 able to turn this around. Now that leads us up 0:14:15.440 --> 0:14:17.400 to the last one we're going to talk about before 0:14:17.520 --> 0:14:20.400 our break. Uh. It dates back to two thousand one, 0:14:20.480 --> 0:14:24.560 the Skywriter X two R. So this one is designed 0:14:24.600 --> 0:14:28.720 by Macro Industries Incorporated, and it's another V T O 0:14:29.080 --> 0:14:32.880 L type of vehicle, and this one uses ducted fans 0:14:33.160 --> 0:14:36.480 as propulsion instead of propellers. So, uh, it kind of 0:14:36.560 --> 0:14:39.480 looks like like a casual glance, you would look and say, oh, 0:14:39.560 --> 0:14:42.680 those are turbines, but they're not actually turbines. So it's 0:14:42.720 --> 0:14:46.280 around casing. On the inside of this casing is a 0:14:46.560 --> 0:14:50.000 fan blade and those fans turn and provide the lift, 0:14:50.120 --> 0:14:53.960 and you can tilt the ducts in different directions so 0:14:54.040 --> 0:14:56.080 that you can do the vertical takeoff and landing, or 0:14:56.600 --> 0:14:58.880 tilt them forward so that you get that forward propulsion 0:14:59.160 --> 0:15:01.360 like I like I have her carrier. Yeah, that's a 0:15:01.440 --> 0:15:06.800 little hover carrier thing. According to the website, they were 0:15:07.000 --> 0:15:10.200 the car would have lots of dynamic routing information, so 0:15:10.480 --> 0:15:12.640 it would allow it to plan out a route that 0:15:12.680 --> 0:15:15.880 would keep it clear from the pathway of other flying 0:15:16.000 --> 0:15:19.760 car motorists, because they actually said their goal is to 0:15:19.840 --> 0:15:22.920 make the flying car reality for the average consumer. But 0:15:23.000 --> 0:15:24.560 of course, you know, to you and I, we just 0:15:24.600 --> 0:15:27.000 sit there and think about Atlanta traffic right now. Just 0:15:27.120 --> 0:15:30.400 imagine the traffic that's passing past our building right now. 0:15:30.800 --> 0:15:33.160 Sometimes you guys can hear it. I know you can 0:15:33.840 --> 0:15:36.840 well imagine all of that traffic in the air. That's 0:15:36.920 --> 0:15:40.320 kind of terrifying, completely terrifying. Although by two thousand one, 0:15:40.400 --> 0:15:42.840 certainly we were starting to get into computer systems that 0:15:42.880 --> 0:15:46.920 would at least help you detect some of that, right, 0:15:47.040 --> 0:15:49.200 So the idea is that it would have a lot 0:15:49.240 --> 0:15:52.760 of automated systems to help prevent collisions, to help you 0:15:53.280 --> 0:15:56.200 plan a flight path that wouldn't put you across someone 0:15:56.240 --> 0:15:59.200 else's flight path. Uh, you know, And of course as 0:15:59.320 --> 0:16:03.440 technology advanced, we've got better with like collision detection and prevention, 0:16:03.520 --> 0:16:05.760 that kind of stuff. Automated systems that can take over 0:16:06.080 --> 0:16:09.920 in case a manual accident is about to happen. So 0:16:10.120 --> 0:16:12.040 things have gotten to the point where you could kind 0:16:12.160 --> 0:16:15.640 of see a reality here, but it's one that's kind 0:16:15.640 --> 0:16:18.800 of early. Yeah yeah, And you know, I I heard 0:16:18.840 --> 0:16:21.520 a little bit about this and it sounds like a 0:16:21.680 --> 0:16:24.880 kind of solid plan. Where did this one actually happen? 0:16:25.120 --> 0:16:29.040 They said that the first models of this car would 0:16:29.080 --> 0:16:32.560 be available within five years of the project receiving adequate funding. 0:16:33.040 --> 0:16:34.800 As far as they can tell, the project has yet 0:16:34.840 --> 0:16:38.400 to receive what they call adequate funding, So uh, that 0:16:38.560 --> 0:16:41.080 five years is kind of the perpetual five years off 0:16:41.160 --> 0:16:44.200 from now, just like most technological advances are ten to 0:16:44.280 --> 0:16:49.520 forty years away, and it's it's always gonna yeah. Now, 0:16:49.760 --> 0:16:52.560 maybe they'll end up getting enough funding where they'll become 0:16:52.600 --> 0:16:54.400 a real player in the space, but as far as 0:16:54.480 --> 0:16:57.080 I can tell, it's kind of one of those vaporware 0:16:57.200 --> 0:16:59.440 type things. And was this another one that was more 0:16:59.560 --> 0:17:03.000 more like aircraft that drives than a yeah yeah, I 0:17:03.080 --> 0:17:05.159 mean it looks more like a plane than it does 0:17:05.240 --> 0:17:06.919 a car. It looks like it looks like a plane 0:17:06.960 --> 0:17:09.119 that's small enough when everything folds up for it to 0:17:09.200 --> 0:17:12.760 fit into your garage, as opposed to a car. That 0:17:12.880 --> 0:17:15.280 can turn into a flying machine. It looks like a 0:17:15.359 --> 0:17:17.639 plane that can be driven on the roads right, right, 0:17:17.720 --> 0:17:19.080 and not the kind of thing that you'd expect to 0:17:19.119 --> 0:17:22.159 take out onto the highways and drive around in traffic. Right. 0:17:22.440 --> 0:17:24.000 But we do have a few of those that we 0:17:24.119 --> 0:17:26.560 want to talk about, and before we do that, let's 0:17:26.640 --> 0:17:29.760 take a quick break to thank our sponsor. Alright, so 0:17:29.880 --> 0:17:33.720 we're back now. The next car on our list is 0:17:34.000 --> 0:17:38.120 one of my favorites because it's so different from all 0:17:38.200 --> 0:17:40.040 the other ones we've been mentioning so far. Like all 0:17:40.080 --> 0:17:42.720 the ones we've talked about either had some sort of 0:17:43.880 --> 0:17:45.879 v T o L system where they were going to 0:17:46.240 --> 0:17:49.120 hover and take off and then fly forward, right, which 0:17:49.119 --> 0:17:51.280 I'm actually kind of impressed by. I think that that 0:17:51.359 --> 0:17:53.320 a vto L would be a little bit more difficult 0:17:53.359 --> 0:17:56.520 to engineer, and therefore, yeah, it's got some challenges, but 0:17:56.560 --> 0:17:58.520 it would, assuming you could get it to work, it 0:17:58.520 --> 0:18:01.280 would be way easier for your average driver, right, because 0:18:01.320 --> 0:18:03.440 it wouldn't mean that you wouldn't have to go find 0:18:03.840 --> 0:18:06.440 a longer slap in air strip so that you could 0:18:06.440 --> 0:18:08.840 get up to enough speed to get lift and then 0:18:08.920 --> 0:18:12.840 take off. This would allow you to yeah, yeah, you're 0:18:12.840 --> 0:18:15.400 at a standstill, you lift up, you fly off where 0:18:15.400 --> 0:18:16.920 you want to go. And I think you need to 0:18:16.960 --> 0:18:19.200 be at a standstill with some you know, like hundred 0:18:19.359 --> 0:18:21.920 feet of clear space around you, so that you didn't 0:18:22.040 --> 0:18:26.760 you know, destroy surrounding. My precision is amazing. I am 0:18:26.920 --> 0:18:29.640 fully confident I could take off from like a crowded 0:18:29.680 --> 0:18:34.720 parking lot with tiny scratches. Maybe. Uh So we're talking 0:18:34.760 --> 0:18:38.879 about now the Parajet skycr and the Parajet skycar is 0:18:39.119 --> 0:18:41.800 one of my favorites. Parajet, you kind of get the 0:18:41.880 --> 0:18:45.440 feeling here. There's a para sail or a parachute that 0:18:45.680 --> 0:18:49.359 is attached to essentially a dune buggy. So it looks 0:18:49.440 --> 0:18:52.040 like something that came out of Mad Max, right, like, 0:18:52.160 --> 0:18:54.600 you know, you could take this to the Thunderdome in 0:18:54.800 --> 0:18:58.280 style and um, and it has this para sail that 0:18:58.359 --> 0:19:00.520 you can deploy, and on the very back of the 0:19:00.600 --> 0:19:03.399 dune buggy is an enormous fan, So it looks a 0:19:03.480 --> 0:19:08.280 lot like like like one of those Evergladesh kind of 0:19:08.480 --> 0:19:11.359 Archer likes, Yeah, exactly, it'd be one of those. So 0:19:11.480 --> 0:19:13.480 it's a dune buggy with the fan on the back 0:19:13.560 --> 0:19:16.200 and the parasale that you deploy, And the way it 0:19:16.280 --> 0:19:19.040 works is that you would, if you wanted to actually fly, 0:19:19.600 --> 0:19:22.119 you would take the parasale part out, lay it behind 0:19:22.280 --> 0:19:26.280 the car, start up your fan, and then start driving 0:19:26.680 --> 0:19:28.880 and once you hit about thirty seven miles per hour 0:19:29.040 --> 0:19:32.720 or sixty kilometers per hour, you would have enough lift 0:19:32.840 --> 0:19:35.600 there from the para sale to lift off the ground 0:19:35.960 --> 0:19:39.120 and use the fan to control your pitch and your role. 0:19:39.960 --> 0:19:43.320 That sounds so terrifying but wonderful. The videos of this 0:19:43.560 --> 0:19:46.879 thing I absolutely adore. Now, granted again you don't have 0:19:46.960 --> 0:19:50.680 any wings, so it's not like a you know, airplane 0:19:50.800 --> 0:19:53.080 slash car. This is a car that has a pair 0:19:53.119 --> 0:19:55.800 of sale and a propeller on it. That's pretty much 0:19:55.840 --> 0:19:58.280 what you're talking about. And uh, that sounds like it 0:19:58.280 --> 0:20:01.800 would still count as a as a light sport vehicle. Yes, yes, 0:20:01.880 --> 0:20:04.200 you would have to have sport aircraft. You have to 0:20:04.240 --> 0:20:07.119 have a light sport aircraft piloting license to to be 0:20:07.280 --> 0:20:11.440 able to fly this legally. Obviously there in fact, a 0:20:11.480 --> 0:20:12.639 lot of the ones we're going to talk about, the 0:20:12.720 --> 0:20:15.520 earlier ones we were talking about, never really got beyond 0:20:15.600 --> 0:20:18.639 prototype or concept, so it was kind of right, right, 0:20:18.680 --> 0:20:21.280 they never had to think about this kind of thing. Also, 0:20:21.280 --> 0:20:23.119 I'm sure that the regulations of the f a A 0:20:23.320 --> 0:20:25.680 were a lot lighter when the f a didn't exist, 0:20:25.920 --> 0:20:28.600 so there's some probably helped. The next one we'll talk 0:20:28.640 --> 0:20:32.800 about has kind of a very uh blase attitude about 0:20:32.920 --> 0:20:35.600 air regulations, but I'll mention that when we get into it. 0:20:35.680 --> 0:20:37.320 So this one, you would actually have to have a 0:20:37.359 --> 0:20:40.520 pilot's license to operate in flying mode, but a sport 0:20:40.560 --> 0:20:44.280 pilot license, which I believe it's a little different from it. 0:20:44.880 --> 0:20:47.119 They are different classes, just like there are different classes 0:20:47.119 --> 0:20:51.720 of motorist licenses, there are different classes of pilot licenses, right, 0:20:51.800 --> 0:20:55.560 and since a light sport aircraft is I think you 0:20:55.640 --> 0:20:59.239 have visual site rules on that one, so it's right, 0:20:59.359 --> 0:21:00.840 and it's small, and if it can only be a 0:21:00.920 --> 0:21:03.119 one or two seater just the pilot and up to 0:21:03.200 --> 0:21:05.920 one passenger, um you know, max weight of like six 0:21:06.880 --> 0:21:09.680 which is one thousand, three twenty pounds, and a max 0:21:09.720 --> 0:21:11.560 speed of a hundred and twenty nuts, which is like 0:21:11.640 --> 0:21:13.760 a hundred and thirty eight miles per hour or two 0:21:14.000 --> 0:21:16.320 d and twenty two kilometers per hour. So it's going 0:21:16.760 --> 0:21:19.920 relatively by the speed of planes slow rum and so 0:21:19.960 --> 0:21:22.680 it's all you really need is a driver's license and 0:21:23.000 --> 0:21:27.520 ah this this sport pilot certifications. You don't need the 0:21:27.680 --> 0:21:30.320 full medical thing where a doctor approved by the f 0:21:30.440 --> 0:21:32.359 a A comes out and says like, yes, you are 0:21:32.400 --> 0:21:34.920 mentally and physically fit to pilot. Right, you can be 0:21:35.119 --> 0:21:38.040 as unstable as you like, as long as you don't 0:21:38.240 --> 0:21:40.480 because the damage that you'll create a few crash is 0:21:40.560 --> 0:21:43.920 relatively small. Well, the Parajet skycar, it's top speed is 0:21:43.960 --> 0:21:46.440 well within those parameters. Is that a hundred fifteen miles 0:21:46.520 --> 0:21:48.879 per hour or about a hundred eighty five kilometers per 0:21:48.880 --> 0:21:52.080 hour on the ground and in the skair it's fifty 0:21:52.160 --> 0:21:54.680