World's First Flying Car Factory Begins Production In China 38
Xpeng's flying-car subsidiary Aridge has begun trial production at the world's first dedicated flying-car factory in Guangzhou. Euronews reports: The 120,000-square-meter facility has produced its first detachable eVTOL aircraft for the modular "Land Aircraft Carrier." With an annual capacity of up to 10,000 modules, the factory will eventually assemble one aircraft every 30 minutes. Trial operations focus on process verification, equipment testing, and producing prototypes for airworthiness certification before moving into mass production.
Ooof!! (Score:1, Informative)
Re: Ooof!! (Score:3)
"Compete" with what, that's no flying car, that's an oversized quadcopter drone that can probably stay in the air all of 15 minutes.
Flying Car? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3)
You are correct, they absolutely, positively do not have a flying car. They have a drone that comes out of a cybervan [youtube.com]. And it's six-wheeled to boot, which would be cool in an off road vehicle but absolutely sucks on pavement. I did not bother to look up whether it has rear steering because IDGAF about it even if it does, even though that would be kind of neat. The rest of it is dumb.
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I guess that makes sense, but the wheeled vehicle isn't suited for that at all. In that case they'd have been better off just making a drone-in-a-box with convenient mounting points on the box.
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Re:Flying Bullshit (Score:1)
They are "personal helicopters", period.
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And flying cars have been around for a hundred years. [wikipedia.org] Including production models.
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Agreed. The Seattle Museum of Flight has one of Mort Taylor's Aerocar IIIs on display. This flying car was certified by the predecessor of the FAA in 1956 as airworthy and certified for production, although he never found a manufacturer ready to mass produce them.
Aerocar [wikipedia.org]
Rare, Vintage Flying Car Film Footage [youtube.com]
Re:Flying Car? (Score:4, Interesting)
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Hyphenation is overrated anyway.. (Score:5, Funny)
That's quite a feat, building a flying factory.
Re:quite a feat, a flying factory. (Score:2)
This factory flew. [bbc.com] Go USA!
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Glad I'm not the only one who thought this.
Monty Python Flying Sheep Sketch (Score:2)
Just a joke (Score:3)
eVTOL man-carrying craft (flying taxis and flying cars) are not yet economically viable -- and won't be until we have a whole new generation of batteries with higher energy densities and cycle-lives. At the current cost of operation, these are a solution looking for a problem.
Hell, China can't sell all the EVs it makes so the chances of them selling any of these is....
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Cost is the least of the worries. The idea itself is a total safety nightmare. Just imagine having lines of helicopters criss-crossing above every house in every city. Just from structural fatigue failures alone, thousands would be falling out of the skies and smashing through roofs every day.
The Jetsons cartoon didn't use powered hovering, the vehicles magically floated. Lighter than air would be required. But then wind would become a huge safety issue. There's just no sensible engineering solution
Wait.What? (Score:3)
Thelma & Louise might disagree.
What about safety? Congestion? (Score:1)
One thing about flying cars is, engine trouble could be a pretty big deal, also colisions. Sure there's a lot more space because it's 3 dimensional, but if flying cars really took off, there'd be congestion spots.
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What about...wheels???
NOT flying car (Score:2)
Stop calling these eVTOLs flying cars. A helicopter is more of a flying car that some of them. If something is to be called a flying car you need to be able to drive it on land, on a road. If it can't do that it lacks any aspect of "car".
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I'm okay with the pad-to-pad functionality. For me the most important aspect of what makes a "car" is when it is owned and operated by individual consumers. Otherwise it becomes a bus or taxi.
Safety is the death nail for anything flying. Putting millions of them in one airspace is a safety nightmare. From collisions to bugs to confusion to wear-and-tear, put a mass of then up and you're going to have lots falling from the skies onto the unsuspecting on the ground.
Re: NOT flying car (Score:2)
"Death nail" is not, yet I've seen it used twice in this site in as many days. Annoying.
Been there done that (Score:2)
Supercar was invented in 1960. Move along, nothing to see. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
Can they fly? (Score:1)
Flying Car Factory (Score:2)
A flying factory is quite an achievement, let alone one that produces cars.
Then comes the... (Score:2)
Then comes the Mary Poppins moment when the workers, shining the fully assembled cars, get into them and fly off to freedom...
Like Sherry Bobbins in the Simpsons...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
JoshK.
Oversized drone, no details on flying it. (Score:2)
How long will it be... (Score:2)
... before someone uses one to fly over an airport?
Horror! (Score:2)
That factory is a horror show. They raise flying pigs in captivity and then grind them up with a bunch fiberglass to make flying cars. Guess what noise the horn makes?
You've Seen Us Drive.... (Score:2)
Now watch us fly!
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Oh, man, you are definitely going to hell!
As the Chinese EV market craters ... (Score:2)
flying (Score:2)
Flying car factory. Yeah, sure, that'll be the day when a factory flies.