Whitechapel - Really cool personal flying device has lamest name ever ... Sat, 25 May 2013 10:39:22 -0700 http://freakangels.com/whitechapel/ Lussumo Vanilla 1.1.4 & Feed Publisher Really cool personal flying device has lamest name ever ... http://freakangels.com/whitechapel/comments.php?DiscussionID=7618&Focus=215659#Comment_215659 http://freakangels.com/whitechapel/comments.php?DiscussionID=7618&Focus=215659#Comment_215659 Fri, 22 Jan 2010 04:48:47 -0800 Kosmopolit The Puffin

Seriously, you built an electric powered, ultraquiet one-person plane that can land and take off from a suburban backyard and cruise at 100 MPH and you call it The Puffin?

Edited to fix a typo. ]]> Really cool personal flying device has lamest name ever ... http://freakangels.com/whitechapel/comments.php?DiscussionID=7618&Focus=215661#Comment_215661 http://freakangels.com/whitechapel/comments.php?DiscussionID=7618&Focus=215661#Comment_215661 Fri, 22 Jan 2010 04:58:53 -0800 Fan the cruising speed of the Puffin is expected to be 240 kph, with spurts of 480 kph possible": 1000 MPH would be supersonic. ]]> Really cool personal flying device has lamest name ever ... http://freakangels.com/whitechapel/comments.php?DiscussionID=7618&Focus=215663#Comment_215663 http://freakangels.com/whitechapel/comments.php?DiscussionID=7618&Focus=215663#Comment_215663 Fri, 22 Jan 2010 05:10:12 -0800 James Puckett Really cool personal flying device has lamest name ever ... http://freakangels.com/whitechapel/comments.php?DiscussionID=7618&Focus=215672#Comment_215672 http://freakangels.com/whitechapel/comments.php?DiscussionID=7618&Focus=215672#Comment_215672 Fri, 22 Jan 2010 05:56:17 -0800 Oxbrow Really cool personal flying device has lamest name ever ... http://freakangels.com/whitechapel/comments.php?DiscussionID=7618&Focus=215701#Comment_215701 http://freakangels.com/whitechapel/comments.php?DiscussionID=7618&Focus=215701#Comment_215701 Fri, 22 Jan 2010 08:52:27 -0800 JP Carpenter Really cool personal flying device has lamest name ever ... http://freakangels.com/whitechapel/comments.php?DiscussionID=7618&Focus=215711#Comment_215711 http://freakangels.com/whitechapel/comments.php?DiscussionID=7618&Focus=215711#Comment_215711 Fri, 22 Jan 2010 10:26:05 -0800 JoshHechinger
In all seriousness, that thing looks like something out of Challengers of the Unknown or Thunderbirds, and I'm all about tooling around the skies in Jeff Tracy-esque bits of machinery. ]]> Really cool personal flying device has lamest name ever ... http://freakangels.com/whitechapel/comments.php?DiscussionID=7618&Focus=215713#Comment_215713 http://freakangels.com/whitechapel/comments.php?DiscussionID=7618&Focus=215713#Comment_215713 Fri, 22 Jan 2010 10:47:15 -0800 Alastair Really cool personal flying device has lamest name ever ... http://freakangels.com/whitechapel/comments.php?DiscussionID=7618&Focus=215714#Comment_215714 http://freakangels.com/whitechapel/comments.php?DiscussionID=7618&Focus=215714#Comment_215714 Fri, 22 Jan 2010 10:58:56 -0800 costa_k Really cool personal flying device has lamest name ever ... http://freakangels.com/whitechapel/comments.php?DiscussionID=7618&Focus=215766#Comment_215766 http://freakangels.com/whitechapel/comments.php?DiscussionID=7618&Focus=215766#Comment_215766 Fri, 22 Jan 2010 15:48:39 -0800 Kosmopolit
Typo: should have been 100 MPH. ]]> Really cool personal flying device has lamest name ever ... http://freakangels.com/whitechapel/comments.php?DiscussionID=7618&Focus=215769#Comment_215769 http://freakangels.com/whitechapel/comments.php?DiscussionID=7618&Focus=215769#Comment_215769 Fri, 22 Jan 2010 16:02:34 -0800 Kosmopolit
The design of the Puffin was unveiled on January 20 by NASA aerospace engineer Mark Moore, at a meeting of the American Helicopter Society in San Francisco. A one-third scale demonstration model is expected to be finished by March this year, after which time they will concentrate on the transition between cruise flight and hovering.


So it's still vaporware at this point.

The initial range is expected to be only 80 KM/50 miles.

And here's no mention of cost.

Besides those technical problems there are all the social ones:

Do we want drunk drivers sharing the same airspace as passenger jets?

Walls and fences will become pretty much worthy as a form of security

No more topless bathing by the backyard pool.

Even if the technology works these may end up confined to a few specialist niches - the armed forces; couriers, law enforcement, search and rescue etc.

But if you could combine this with some really smart and highly secure piloting software and the cost came own enough this really could do all the things that it was claimed the Segway could do. ]]> Really cool personal flying device has lamest name ever ... http://freakangels.com/whitechapel/comments.php?DiscussionID=7618&Focus=215783#Comment_215783 http://freakangels.com/whitechapel/comments.php?DiscussionID=7618&Focus=215783#Comment_215783 Fri, 22 Jan 2010 16:50:07 -0800 SilentObjector Really cool personal flying device has lamest name ever ... http://freakangels.com/whitechapel/comments.php?DiscussionID=7618&Focus=215787#Comment_215787 http://freakangels.com/whitechapel/comments.php?DiscussionID=7618&Focus=215787#Comment_215787 Fri, 22 Jan 2010 17:04:56 -0800 Kosmopolit Really cool personal flying device has lamest name ever ... http://freakangels.com/whitechapel/comments.php?DiscussionID=7618&Focus=215822#Comment_215822 http://freakangels.com/whitechapel/comments.php?DiscussionID=7618&Focus=215822#Comment_215822 Fri, 22 Jan 2010 19:20:34 -0800 zas Badonkadonk personal tank (available through Amazon for the low price of $19,999.95!!!) ]]> Really cool personal flying device has lamest name ever ... http://freakangels.com/whitechapel/comments.php?DiscussionID=7618&Focus=215829#Comment_215829 http://freakangels.com/whitechapel/comments.php?DiscussionID=7618&Focus=215829#Comment_215829 Fri, 22 Jan 2010 20:09:46 -0800 oldhat ]]> Really cool personal flying device has lamest name ever ... http://freakangels.com/whitechapel/comments.php?DiscussionID=7618&Focus=215847#Comment_215847 http://freakangels.com/whitechapel/comments.php?DiscussionID=7618&Focus=215847#Comment_215847 Fri, 22 Jan 2010 22:53:27 -0800 Val A Lindsay II
]]> Really cool personal flying device has lamest name ever ... http://freakangels.com/whitechapel/comments.php?DiscussionID=7618&Focus=215854#Comment_215854 http://freakangels.com/whitechapel/comments.php?DiscussionID=7618&Focus=215854#Comment_215854 Fri, 22 Jan 2010 23:47:15 -0800 DavidLejeune Lerche, but then Wikipedia goes and tells me that some companies were experimenting with that sort of design in the '50s, too.

The Lockheed XFV seems to be the closest one to the Puffin, design-wise. ]]> Really cool personal flying device has lamest name ever ... http://freakangels.com/whitechapel/comments.php?DiscussionID=7618&Focus=215902#Comment_215902 http://freakangels.com/whitechapel/comments.php?DiscussionID=7618&Focus=215902#Comment_215902 Sat, 23 Jan 2010 07:34:02 -0800 Magnulus
I'd LOVE to have a flying car at some point, who WOULDN'T?! However, in a world where so much emphasis is being put on lowering carbon footprints and making transportation efficient, I can't see how this is going to happen any time soon. We've (Not us personally, of course) spent all these resources putting roads all over the fucking place, it's not very likely they'll go any time soon.

However, VTOL public transport isn't an impossible prospect. Once the fuel efficiency and the safety is ironed out, I don't see why we couldn't have Sky High-style buses flying about. Also, the people driving them would have special licenses, just like you'd have to drive a normal bus, so you can be sure they'd be safe drivers, and the airways wouldn't be littered with screaming ape-men cussing each other out for not knowing how to fly.

That having been said, the Puffin really does look quite a bit like the puffin.

I'd recommend checking out James May's Big Ideas for a look through VTOL madness and flying cars. They even mention the Moller Skycar, the poster-child of flying car pipedreams. ]]> Really cool personal flying device has lamest name ever ... http://freakangels.com/whitechapel/comments.php?DiscussionID=7618&Focus=216015#Comment_216015 http://freakangels.com/whitechapel/comments.php?DiscussionID=7618&Focus=216015#Comment_216015 Sun, 24 Jan 2010 01:05:21 -0800 chainsaw.serenade Really cool personal flying device has lamest name ever ... http://freakangels.com/whitechapel/comments.php?DiscussionID=7618&Focus=216085#Comment_216085 http://freakangels.com/whitechapel/comments.php?DiscussionID=7618&Focus=216085#Comment_216085 Sun, 24 Jan 2010 12:41:21 -0800 SteadyUP Really cool personal flying device has lamest name ever ... http://freakangels.com/whitechapel/comments.php?DiscussionID=7618&Focus=216092#Comment_216092 http://freakangels.com/whitechapel/comments.php?DiscussionID=7618&Focus=216092#Comment_216092 Sun, 24 Jan 2010 13:09:45 -0800 JP Carpenter Am I really the only person thinking up designs for The ThunderCock-Eagle?

Yes. Because I am now too busy dreaming of The SEX-HAWK! The INSEMNIRAPTOR! The EJACUVULCAN! The THRUST-PYTHON!

The police will be all over these, especially in the UK where we're all about to be watched 24/7 from orbit. ]]> Really cool personal flying device has lamest name ever ... http://freakangels.com/whitechapel/comments.php?DiscussionID=7618&Focus=216095#Comment_216095 http://freakangels.com/whitechapel/comments.php?DiscussionID=7618&Focus=216095#Comment_216095 Sun, 24 Jan 2010 13:38:32 -0800 James Cunningham
Not too sure about the functionality of lying down while flying, though. It seems like it would give a nasty crick in the neck after an hour or so. Looking at the initial design shows no head support at all, in fact, but that's bound to change if they manage to get to real-world testing. ]]> Really cool personal flying device has lamest name ever ... http://freakangels.com/whitechapel/comments.php?DiscussionID=7618&Focus=216140#Comment_216140 http://freakangels.com/whitechapel/comments.php?DiscussionID=7618&Focus=216140#Comment_216140 Sun, 24 Jan 2010 20:55:27 -0800 DavidLejeune See, the whole area of personal flight is a bit strange to me. Unless they're made fully automatic, you cannot expect the majority of people to be able to fly one safely.I'm pretty sure that the Puffin isn't intended to be a personal commuter vehicle. It seems pretty obvious that it's going to be for licensed couriers (and seriously, how awesome would it be to have one of these things land in your front yard and a guy gets out and hands you whatever it is you just got FedExed. I'd send MYSELF stuff and try to beat the dude home.) and short range aerial reconnaissance for the military. ]]>