Peter Moller to build first production flying car: the M200G Volantor

Peter Moller to build first production flying car: the M200G Volantor

www.itwire.com.au

Paul S. Moller, originally from Canada and now living in California, is an engineer and past professor at the University of California, Davis. In the 1970s, he founded Supertrapp Industries to develop a device to quiet engine noise. Moller sold the company in the 1980s so he could pursue his dream to develop a flying car. He has been working for forty years on various hovercraft and flying vehicles. The UFO-looking saucer-shaped craft is now being produced within his Moller International.

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Mod Edit: Removed excessive copy/paste over the 500 character limit.

[edit on 22-7-2007 by UM_Gazz]

This thing really bears a total resemblence to the cliched idea of the "flying saucer", so I guess people should just be aware that such a thing exists, in order to prevent mis-identifications.
Its funny that so many years after the Avro car that some thing like this should pop up, especially from a transplanted Canadian. Is there a link there I wonder?

www.itwire.com.au
(visit the link for the full news article)

It'll have to be idiot proof if it is to be sold to the mass market.


It currently costs the far side of £30K/ $60K US to qualify a commercial pilot, or a couple of grand for a PPL - that isn't going to change overnight to 30 quid for Joe Public to drive around in what is essentially a private aircraft carrying passengers.


However, there may be scope for taxi services between cities using trained pilots (kinda like helicopters only with a much lower operating cost). Whether this achieves that is the question.

Moller has been beating the same horse for years now and has yet to get in the race. If he can actually get this thing off the ground, he will be transporting one person, at road speed, in the ground effect, while running eight engines and burning a load of fuel. It is a cool looking toy, but you can beat that performance with any number of kit helicopters and flying platforms at a much lower fuel consumption. He keeps trying to use brute force to fly instead of coming up with a concept that will work.

Originally posted by Direwolf
Moller has been beating the same horse for years now and has yet to get in the race. If he can actually get this thing off the ground, he will be transporting one person, at road speed, in the ground effect, while running eight engines and burning a load of fuel. It is a cool looking toy, but you can beat that performance with any number of kit helicopters and flying platforms at a much lower fuel consumption. He keeps trying to use brute force to fly instead of coming up with a concept that will work.

this should be banned immediately.

as arab muslin suicide terrorist bombers could easily fly the flying car into a 747 plane over a city killing thousands.

emergency laws should be used to stop this...

i am very worried.

I can't imagine how loud that thing must be. Maybe this is the new Hummer for rich people to drive/fly and annoy the hell out of everybody else.

I agree. This dude has been trying to get this thing literally and figuratively "off the ground" for decades.

No insurance company will write a policy for this thing. We already had a perfectly good, economical commuter airplane with the Piper Cub, and it got insuranced out of existence.

Originally posted by esecallum

this should be banned immediately.

as arab muslin suicide terrorist bombers could easily fly the flying car into a 747 plane over a city killing thousands.

You may be worried, but perhaps you missed the salient points of the story.

This car can only fly at about 10 feet above the ground, and has a capacity to carry no more than 250 lbs. including the operator.
With your thinking we should ban all small aircraft and helicopters just to ensure our safety. What the hell, while we're at it we should ban all forms of transportation due to the fact that they could carry explosives.

Let's face it, more people die from car bombs than any other explosive delivery system used by extremists. I don't think we need to ban the production of automobiles, do you ?


EDIT: From the link above, it looks more like a toy than a viable transportation vehicle.



[edit on 1/8/07 by My Sock Puppet]

I cannot begin to imagine the engineering complications this thing might have. It simply looks like a mechanical nightmare.

I wouldn't fly one and why should the world change for this? I think flying cars are a very bad idea.

Shattered OUT...

news.sky.com...

Just found out about this now, pretty incredible really and thing i'm most amazed about is the price ... Under £45,000 Thought it would be as pricey as hell!

If that flying saucer shown above is the new M200G Volantor, Moller must be getting desperateto go into production with something. He had that thing doing tether tests over 20 years ago. It's basically a skirtless hovercraft.

I recently read that Moller may have some military applications
in the works with larger models.

Flying Car for sale

You won't be buzzing between skyscrapers anytime soon, unfortunately, as the Moller M200G Volantor is restricted to heights of 10 feet. That restriction is for civilian versions only, however, so it is perfectly plausible that greater altitudes can and will be achieved for a military application.

If he has bigger larger models available for military use, then it
can explain some UFO sightings. As there are tons of sightings which
say the object just hovers. But not at great speeds or tight turns.
It is not improbable, just possible.

Also, another note. Since the craft only flies at 10 ft above ground
then it's operation is not governed by the FAA. Which that means to me
that you wouldn't need a pilot's license to operate one.

However, I was a lil concerned about the fuel (Ethanol 70%, Water 30%)
I was assuming that Moller had outgrew the need for any kind of
fossil fuel. Maybe if he had another type power source it might be
more attractable to the public. I think what he has done is a wonderful
idea, I just think his power base could be improved from a better more
eco friendly source. Maybe electric, hydrogen or something else.

reply to post by esecallum


thats an excellent point, but, this model only hovers ten feet of the ground. the only 747 that it would come in contact to would be on the ground, stationary.

He has been working on this for decades. I guess it is a nice way to keep yourself employed on your own projects with investor money.

He's been working on his "flying car" for ages! I remember reading about it when I was in highschool and thinking it was pretty cool. 20 years on and I still think its pretty cool. haha

I really admire the guy though...he has invested a lot of his own personal time and finances into chasing his dream. Some people may scoff at him but I bet people used to scoff at Henry Ford too...and the Wright brothers.

Todays dreams are tomorrows realities.

Ummmm, we've already got flying cars - yeah we've had them since like the early 20th century. They're called aircraft