Personal Flying Machine Contest Gets 600 Entries (fastcompany.com) 61
"A giant egg equipped with rotors and 'Transformers'-style robots are among some of the creative designs submitted in a $2 million dollar contest to dream up new ways of flying," reports CNN.
"GoFly, a $2 million competition to design personal flying machines backed by Boeing, has announced its first round of most promising designs out of 600 entries from around the world," writes harrymcc . "Proposed vehicles need to fly for at least 20 miles, at 35 miles an hour; many of the ideas look a bit like airborne motorcycles." Fast Company reports: "There's been a convergence of all of these breakthrough technologies that makes this the first moment in time where we have the ability to make people fly," says Gwen Lighter, who dreamed up the GoFly prize, recruited Boeing to bankroll it, and now serves as CEO. Many of the advances come from the world of drones -- "high-efficiency motors, high-capacity batteries, and cheap navigation and stabilizing technologies that keep even newbies on course and out of danger....
Their prototypes have to achieve vertical takeoff and landing (called VTOL), eliminating the need for an airport runway... The craft have to be small enough to fit within an 8.5-foot circle, and they have to be safe and manageable for anyone to operate -- "not just engineers or daredevils... GoFly's Lighter emphasizes that safety is a key requirement in judging. She says that whatever wins will be well on the way to meeting requirements of the FAA -- and regulatory bodies in other countries -- for mainstream operation. FAA staffers (in a non-official capacity) are even among GoFly's expert advisors.
Best of all, every participant -- even those who win the prize money -- "are free to take their innovations anywhere. They retain all intellectual property rights."
"GoFly, a $2 million competition to design personal flying machines backed by Boeing, has announced its first round of most promising designs out of 600 entries from around the world," writes harrymcc . "Proposed vehicles need to fly for at least 20 miles, at 35 miles an hour; many of the ideas look a bit like airborne motorcycles." Fast Company reports: "There's been a convergence of all of these breakthrough technologies that makes this the first moment in time where we have the ability to make people fly," says Gwen Lighter, who dreamed up the GoFly prize, recruited Boeing to bankroll it, and now serves as CEO. Many of the advances come from the world of drones -- "high-efficiency motors, high-capacity batteries, and cheap navigation and stabilizing technologies that keep even newbies on course and out of danger....
Their prototypes have to achieve vertical takeoff and landing (called VTOL), eliminating the need for an airport runway... The craft have to be small enough to fit within an 8.5-foot circle, and they have to be safe and manageable for anyone to operate -- "not just engineers or daredevils... GoFly's Lighter emphasizes that safety is a key requirement in judging. She says that whatever wins will be well on the way to meeting requirements of the FAA -- and regulatory bodies in other countries -- for mainstream operation. FAA staffers (in a non-official capacity) are even among GoFly's expert advisors.
Best of all, every participant -- even those who win the prize money -- "are free to take their innovations anywhere. They retain all intellectual property rights."
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Rush hour becomes dodge hour. Or failed-rotor hour.
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Why, when I hear about a "personal flying machine", does this episode of South Park cums to my mind?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
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"Can anyone explain why I or anyone else should care about personal flying machines?"
Saves some wear and tear on the land when I go prospecting. Will allow me to get to higher elevations with greater ease. You can avoid most of the land-based traffic!
Re:Simple question (Score:5, Informative)
There are many obvious possibilities. Besides the simple excitement of personal flight, even quite expensive devices would be invaluable for remote survey work, for emergency work above the reach of ladders among taller modern buildings, and floodplain emergency work when roads or entire towns are unapproachable due to flooding.
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There are many obvious possibilities. Besides the simple excitement of personal flight, even quite expensive devices would be invaluable for remote survey work,
A job better-handled by UAV.
for emergency work above the reach of ladders among taller modern buildings,
Do you imagine that there's a lot of this? Better solved with helis which can carry more than one person.
and floodplain emergency work when roads or entire towns are unapproachable due to flooding.
Also better solved with helis.
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Does any existing unmanned aerial vehicle have the mission flexibility of a human pilot? Especially in difficult circumstances, such as near fire or with much of the potential landing areas flooded? While unmanned drones or tethered vehicles have become effective. And putting good hands on a drone, or the ability to assess terrain or set priorities for other personnel, seem quite difficult. Is it cheaper to provide a flying platform, or to design new technologies to support the flexibility of a human crew?
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Aww, I was excited to see another reply and then found out it was a lazy troll. How tedious
Re: Simple question (Score:1)
"Can anyone explain why I would need/want..." is exactly what everyone said when the Wright brothers were tinkering around with planes and when Henry Ford was marketing automobiles at the start, and for innumerable other inventions, etc.
I agree that there may be no need to the average person now, but pushing technology can significantly influence the future for the better.
Re: Simple question (Score:2)
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Rescuing people from high buildings and mountain searches. If you had a drone that could carry a single person or unravel a zip-line to carry people from one high-rise building to another. Maybe just a nylon cord so that a zip line could be hauled up.
We still haven't fully explored the oceans. A single sonar system can scan a range between 1000 and 10,000 meters. Oceans are 1000 miles wide. Just 1000 drones working autonomously underwater (hydrodynamics are similar to aerodynamics) and we could scan an enti
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If you are seriously not interested in PFMs, then you are not a nerd, and you are on the wrong website. Go back to Pinterest.
Now, to get back on topic, what material is everyone else using to 3D print propellers?
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There is a dude on hackaday that 3d printed props. But they're just terrible, fat and brittle.
Practical 3d printed props. Titanium...printer is pricy.
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Can anyone explain why I or anyone else should care about personal computers? How does this story affect anyone at all? I'll be censored to -1 without a doubt, but someone needs to ask the tough questions and inquire as to why this matters. Why would anyone need a personal computer? This effort would be far better invested into improving already proven technologies like the abacus. I'll be censored to -1, and that will stand as evidence that people would prefer to bury my question instead of answer it. It will show that I am right and that this story doesn't matter in the least.
Fixed that for you, it's a common typo.
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Can anyone explain why I or anyone else should care about personal flying machines?...
It's a sensible question. Let me fly in the face of sth.
/. is news for nerds, stuff that matters. /. category.
/. community. Even if it's just one nerd.
/. cares. Someone else.
Airplanes are technology, a bona fide
Airplanes have a lot of fans in the nerd communities.
Therefore, a personal flying machine contest does matter to some in the
ipso facto, someone on
Me.
I confess, I've gone to Air Shows to see the warbirds of old, and to watch the Blue Angles do their thing. Even got a ride in a
Re: Simple question (Score:1)
Non of this will be practical until a more concentrated form of energy storage is discovered. The jet pack, which was invented in the 60â(TM)s, is the best design ever for this but once again generating thrust is and has been the problem. Large fan blades are more efficient but not practical in this application.
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IMO, the most practical personal vehicle would be a car first and a flying machine second. It would spend 90% of the time on the ground and 10% of time in the air, using the air as a way to fly over traffic jams and traffic lights. If you start from that assumption instead of the other way around, the power requirements become a lot more manageable.
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If you start from that assumption instead of the other way around, the power requirements become a lot more manageable.
Unfortunately, you basically have to make it all out of carbon fiber in that case, because otherwise there's no way to get both crash safety and the light weight you're looking for.
It makes a whole lot more sense to have your self-driving car detour to an air terminal, where it can give up its power to charge flying vehicles. Then it can charge all night while it's cheap, and drive in a platoon to get you in the morning.
v-22 osprey and drones (Score:1)
1) Computer controlled flight is a computationally simpler problem, than driving down a populated road. So, bigger delivery drones is an outcome.
2) The V-22 Osprey, while a real world, long range, VTOL aircraft, is expensive to maintain, and similar design, which requires less maintenance is desirable.
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This effort would be far better invested into improving already proven technologies like electric cars
Competitions like this are meant to spur innovation from smaller teams of people who might not otherwise develop their ideas into working technologies. A $1 million grand prize is a big deal to those people.
Already proven technologies already have companies investing billions into them and thousands of people working in R&D. $1 or $2 million more or less in funding isn't going to make any significant difference for them.
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Personal empowerment, or the opportunity to sell people the same. Imagine, you're stuck in a traffic jam, surrounded by idiots impinging on your personal space, road rage rising - now imagine you can simply take off and soar away from it all, like the Spinners in "Blade Runner". There's a class of people who would pay a lot of money for that freedom.
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I'd love to be a private pilot.
However, there's lots of cost involved.
Getting your private pilot license, costs $$$ for the ground school, $$$ for the hours needed in the air, and then lastly - let's say I get that license. I don't have $250k (that's probably on the light side) for a plane, so that means I either rent or perhaps buy a share in a plane. Then of course, you gotta keep your skills current. Ain't nobody got time for that unless you fly for your company or have a "reason" to fly enough to no
Parking space (Score:2)
Iâ(TM)ve never seen an 8.5 foot circular parking spot. If it canâ(TM)t fit in a parking spot itâ(TM)s not a flying car. How about a competition for that? It can be built with jet engines. It will be loud as F though.
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Iâ(TM)ve never seen an 8.5 foot circular parking spot.
Look at rooftops, not parking lots.
It can be built with jet engines. It will be loud as F though.
No way. Brushless DC motors are the way to go. Quiet, efficient, and super-reliable.
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'No way. Brushless DC motors are the way to go. Quiet, efficient, and super-reliable.'
ROTFL, the motors may be quiet, but not drone props (even on large applications) :)
Re:Parking space (Score:4, Informative)
Parking space 9' X 18' minimum, US (Score:2)
From a typical US municipal code:
Parking Space Dimensions.
The minimum size of a standard parking space shall be nine feet wide and eighteen feet long. Parking spaces within enclosed garages shall have an interior dimension of at least ten feet wide and twenty feet long. The minimum size of a compact parking space shall be eight feet wide and sixteen feet long
Sizes vary a bit depending on land cost and typical vehicle sizes. In rural Texas, where land is cheap and large pickups are common, parking spaces ar
Modify this! (Score:2)
Seen it before. (Score:1)
Typical Silicon Valley ignorance. All these concepts were invented in the 1950s [youtube.com].
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Agreed. I'm surprised at how often Silicon Valley re-invents old ideas when they stray away from information technology. Probably related to the average age of the workers, who are far to young to remember the last time people talked about maglev trains running in vacuum tubes....
Design Brief 8.5 foot radius (Score:2)
tells you that Boeing & Co are in the game - Personal Aircraft Game.
What they don't know is what competition they are up against ala Elon Musk and SpaceX. Not to repeat that faux pas
they're investing in a game. Show me yours first Game; its money well spent.
Engineering??? (Score:3)
Are any of these real engineered designs - where the main technical challenges of energy storage, power density, noise and safety have been addressed? Otherwise its just like then endless versions of the Moller "sky car", which is beautiful, but which I also remember from the late 80s, without any production models.
People have been talking about flying cars and have flown some test models since the 1930s. Useful "sky cars" in the form of helicopters have existed for well over half a century. What is missing is a solution to the difficult technical issues that make them impractical for mass use (beyond what we have now for helicopters). Pretty fiberglass shapes really doesn't address the basic issue.
Autogyros... (Score:2)
I don't get it... this has already been done.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
The rules state a 30 ft circle take-off zone.