“This
is the right time for us to begin thinking about the future of the company
beyond Transition development. We are passionate about continuing to lead the
creation of a flying car industry and are dedicating resources to lay the
foundations for our vision of personal transportation”
Terrafugia's CTO and
CEO Carl Dietrich in a press release on Sunday May 5th 2013
If
you’ve had qualms about being stranded by an All-Electric Vehicle in the middle
of nowhere, imagine if it were flying. But Terrafugia’s apparently undaunted by
this fact and now plans to introduce this very same sweet dream or a beautiful
Nightmare, Beyonce’s Sweet Dream
Style sometime this year, most likely in the Fourth Quarter of 2013!
Terrafugia’s
Flying Hybrid All-Electric Vehicle concept, the four-seater 2013 Terrafugia TF-X, will allow persons to
drive from one location and then fly via a pre-guided pathway by converting to
an aircraft as reported in the article “Terrafugia
to develop vertical takeoff flying car”, published May 6,
2013 7:53 AM PDT by Shara Tibken, CNET
News.
The
concept video for this as-yet-to-be-built 2013 Terrafugia TF-X, below best
explains how they plan to do this as well as Terrafugia’s Official Press Release:
The
company founded by Terrafugia's CTO and CEO Carl Dietrich is based in Woburn,
Mass and is really a VC (Venture Capital) funded Start-up composed of MIT
(Massachusetts Institute of Technology) Engineers who apparently watched The Jetsons (TV Series
1962–1988) far too often.
The
2013 Terrafugia TF-X is the follow-up to their previous model, the 2009
Terrafugia Transition which got approval for the roads by NHTSA (National
Highway Traffic Safety Administration) in July 2011 as stated in the article “Buckle up! Terrafugia flying car
approved for roads”, published July 6, 2011 12:24 PM PDT by
Tim Hornyak, CNET News.
An
indication of the Pedigree of the 2013 Terrafugia TF-X can be seen from the
video of the first flight of the 2009 Terrafugia Transition on March 5th, 2009 at Plattsburgh
International Airport in Plattsburgh, New York.
In fact, the 2009 Terrafugia Transition is
really a test prototype for the 2013 Terrafugia TF-X and was put on Display in
April 2012 at the New York International Auto Show as stated in “Terrafugia's flying car heading to NY
auto show”, published March 1, 2012 3:02 PM PST by Liane
Yvkoff, CNET News.
While
at the New York International Auto Show in April 2012, the Terrafugia took the
2009 Terrafugia Transition on a test flight at the Plattsburgh International
Airport in Plattsburgh, New York, where they’d done a test flight back in 2009
as stated in the article “Terrafugia:
The flying car flies again”, published April 2, 2012 6:48 AM
PDT by Martin LaMonica, CNET
News.
This
vision and real reason for the 2013 Terrafugia TF-X follow-up is best expressed
in the company’s , quote : “By directly addressing congestion and other
transportation challenges currently being faced internationally, widespread
adoption of vehicles like the Transition and TF-X could result in
significant economic benefits and personal time savings”.
The
Transition was a previous model of Terrafugia’s Flying Car, but was more geared
towards Pilots with flying experience. The four-seater 2013 Terrafugia TF-X,
which automatically does the flying for the occupants while in the air along a
pre-set grid, is geared at mainstream everyday man with no flying experience
who’s already able to drive but wants to dodge traffic by flying.
The
basic specs of this flying Car, if it’s anything like the Transition, is as
detailed in the article “Can
your Chevy Volt fly? Terrafugia announces TF-X plug-in hybrid flying car”,
published May 6, 2013 By Stephen Edelstein, DigitalTrends,
would be as follows:
1. Hybrid
Electric Vehicle with Foldable wings
2. VTOL
(Vertical Take-off and Landing)
3. 2
Rotax 912 ULS aircraft engine
4. Runs
on Gasoline
5. 100
km/h Flying speed
6. 65
km/h Driving Speed
7. Price:
US$279,000
Based
on the design of the previous 2009 Terrafugia Transition, the 2013 Terrafugia
TF-X is expected to fly via its two (2) Rotax 912 ULS aircraft engine, which
then switch via an Automatic Transmission to driving the Rear wheels of the
vehicle. But since this is an All-Electric hybrid vehicle, I’m guessing it’ll
be flown by its two (2) Rotax 912 ULS aircraft engine but when on the ground, be
powered by the Li-Ion Batteries. These Li-Ion Batteries may also be trickle
charged by the two (2) Rotax 912 ULS aircraft engine while the Vehicle’s flying
and regenerative braking while on the ground.
Not
so comfortable with this product, especially the fact it’s a Hybrid, albeit it
appear the flying part is Gasoline or Diesel powered. VTOL (Vertical Take-off
and Landing) makes me even more nervous, as that means they’re expensive to
maintain, if the US Navy’s Osprey, also VTOL, is anything to go by as per the article “Osprey debuts at
Marine Helicopter Squadron (HMX) 1”, published May 6,
2013, Navair News. But then there’s the British Harrier
Jet and the F-35, so it’s a workable, albeit expensive concept flight vehicle.
But
they are certainly earnest about flying cars being the future of Vehicular
Transport. It’s apparent that they’ll soon be driving themselves soon as
predicted in my blog
article entitled “Volvo
Testing Autonomous Motor Vehicles in Spain in Live Traffic - EU Project SARTRE
adds self-driving AI with smartphone Control”.
I’m
certainly excited about this upgrade, based on the prior success of the 2009
Terrafugia Transition. I just hope it’s not another pipe Dream and in fact may
be something everyone’ll desire like Christina
Aguilera’s Your Body.
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