Your clever Amphicar analogy reminded me of my days driving the US M113 family of "amphibious" tracked vehicles. The concept was "we don't need bridges." Problem: as a boat, the M113 isn't. The tracks power the vehicle on land and water. The vehicle must be checked prior to water operations to include making sure the hull is sealed, the anti-diving plane is in place, and the vehicle must be balanced in a float pool so that the M113 doesn't roll over and sink. The river current must be slow enough so that the M113 can swim across--and the banks must be no steeper than 30 degrees and firm--a slippery muddy exit bank means the M113 won't make it out of the river or lake. US Army standard operations procedures were to prohibit "swimming" the M113 family because there were just too many dangers.
True but my unit swam our Plt. 5 times in one year. 4 -113s & 3-901s. Entered & left off concrete banking. We also so had a -88 w/ a pull me back cable. Definitely not combat capable 😟. "Sky Rage" would achieve a new level of excitement w/ the 2A.....let that sink in.
@@michaelgautreaux3168 Gravity makes weapons out of anything. There was an incident in Germany during the Eighties where American brats (dependents of service members) were tossing cobblestones off an Autobahn overpass at cars driving under them. Someone died and both boys were convicted of murder. Yes, a flying car at its service ceiling could drop all sorts of stuff that would prove lethal--even plastic-tipped pub darts would be lethal when dropped from 3,000 feet altitude. Dropping a full case would be devastating--that's one of the early projectiles used during the First World War. Someone shooting a pistol from 3,000 feet below would be very unlikely to endanger the flying car with the height advantage. Speaking of sinking in, I'm glad that your command took measures to ensure safety. I was told HOW to prepare the M113 for swimming but not allowed to do that. Just in case, I kept a small inflatable boat on my M577A2 and a life jacket (the other soldiers kept using my life jacket as a seat cushion). That boat made a good wash tub.
@@RCAvhstape Amtrack drivers have earned the right to laugh. dropping off the end of an LSD and plunging below the surface is nearly qualifying for a pair of dolphins.
Another great script by Kevin. I think Simon should let him have 3 minutes of daylight outside of the basement. Of course, Simon will have to use the harness, but I think Kevin might enjoy it.
Flying cars will NEVER become common or used until such a time gravity can be nullified. A simple fender-bender would result in debris falling to earth. Soon as antigravity can keep the wreck floating, we will have them! Edit: Posted before Simon said the same thing...
You're all assuming that humans will be flying these. We'll have autonomous vehicles* a lot sooner than we'll have flying cars, and there's no reason they'd let humans do it. *At which point full control is taken over the movement of the population, so huge incentive for governments and corps.
I'd actually argue we already have them. (E.g.: Helicopters) They just happen to require quite a bit of training and are way to expensive for general use and not nearly as useful as people like to imagine. Most of which is not likely to change anytime soon. People just got way to stuck on the image of specificially a car flying, which would be aerodynamic nonsense anyway.
It's because he hates the idea of plebes being able to escape their future megacity prisons, only the 1% can get into the sky. That's why he's such a POS hissy about the topic.
I think we'll eventually have medium to short range flying transportation but it will not be driver controlled but computer guided with each vehicle communicating with all the others to safely reach it's destination without colliding.
Yeah I was about to comment that AI traffic control and safety system monitoring would solve a lot of the critical problems here. They're probably still not actually a great solution, but they would allow people their freedom, which is an important consideration from a market perspective.
If the whole point of a flying car is to avoid traffic it will just never scale and never be practical. For it to scale we have to go back to the concept and f roads all over again defeating the purpose when we could just deal with traffic problems that we have solutions for just without the hassle of individual inefficient cars in the air.
Yep and at that point they would be linked together on a restricted area like a highway for flying cars. However you would need to drive the car to that area and engage the auto pilot.
The problem is in the future you might not own a car. With auto drive becoming a thing and ride apps on your phone you might just hail an Uber flying car. The only people who really need one are those who live in Raul areas where they are too far out and need a truck to go to town to pickup supplies.
I rode in a car-boat a couple times, a co-worker had one in the early 90's. My description? It's like a car in the water, and a boat on land. It doesn't do both very well. He took it to and from work across the inlet every day, but after one round trip, I decided just to take the ferry.
Have you seen any sci-fi movies with flying cars? They get you from your house, and then enters a strict flying pattern with other flying cars, within a automated system that get you close enough to your destination for you car to leave the system. Its not about everyone being able to fly freely around, its about not needing a huge and limited 2D road system for every single little destination. If we make cheap solution, easy manufacturable flying cars, there would be a lot of resources and fauna saved by not building roads everywhere. Are we there yet? Far from it, but as a sci-fi idea? I believe it got a lot of merit.
I completely agree. The arguments in this video are disingenuous. Nobody will be hand flying their car. Centralized traffic control. You type in your destination and sit down, the computers will fly the car to that destination.
Hah, I may not have ever driven an amphicar myself but I still can't get away from hearing my grandpa talk about his dad's from when he was a child. Had an old military surplus amphibious jeep, and we live next to a lake, so he would always take my grandpa and his friends out driving around the lake, then act like the brakes failed while heading towards a boat ramp. Apparently he gave a lot of people heart attacks that way, sounds like it was fun lol
Very clear about the problems about flying cars, thank you. Geek time. The kubelwagen was a WW2 answer to the Jeep and a German developer thought up the schwimmwagen, the amphibious kubelwagen. The same person who created the amphicar.
If flying cars became popular, I'd imagine cars would have to fly in predetermined "air tunnels" to reduce collisions, just as airplanes have fixed flight paths for this very reason. At which case the reason to have a flying car becomes voided; instead of congestion on the ground, you'd have congestion in the air. (Note helicopters do not require flight paths in USA below a certain altitude, but I think this would change if the number of helicopters in the air drastically increased to the number of flying cars depicted in movies.)
I remember an article in Popular Mechanics, back in the 90s, that had a legit flying car. But, it was essentially more of a tiny airplane that could fit in a lane on a highway.
@South Coast Inventors Yes! I've watched every video on Brain Blaze, Top 10s, Science of sci-fi, The Why Files, TIFO, Casual Criminalist, Into the Shadows, Cool World, and Janson Media... I'm sure there are a couple more I'm forgetting 🙃 now I'm looking for other channels to binge.
@Cancer McAids Talking about the US and there will never be high speed rail in the US. Planes need a runway I am talking about possible use case it the future that could potentially work.
@@KastorFlux Yes the lifting power of sarcasm exceeds any known gases the same way utilizing all the negative energy in UA-cam is able to propel our space ships to FTL velocities.
@Cancer McAids To fly city to city all you need is a simple light airplane. The problem is that they are too expensive to buy new and nobody wants small airports anywhere near where they live. The popular Cessna 150/152 was called the Commuter and became a popular training airplane. Simple with a 100hp engine. You could save a bunch of time over driving but once you got somewhere you had no car to go anywhere.
Seattle built the Space Needle for the 1962 Worlds Fair because someone thought that we would all live in rotating towers in the sky. 60 years later, you take an elevator to the top to go around in circles while eating a $20 hot dog.
Personally I would forego the flying car and go more for a handheld device that could open portals to other places - like the Sling Ring from DOCTOR STRANGE - without the risk of the person having to teleport his body. (As a sidenote, you might want to save some on the side for a spacesuit if you want to go hopping across asteroids or the surface of Mars.) Speaking of which, I can't wait for your next episode explaining how scientifically probable something like the Sling Ring actually is!
“Always listen to experts. They'll tell you what can't be done, and why. Then do it.” ― Robert A. Heinlein Btw, if you have a flying "car" then you won't need a regular car. P.S. You know what critics said when the firstmodern railway was introduced for passenger transport? They said that people would suffocate due to the high speed.
There was a great segment in the Jetsons movie (or possibly the show) where George keeps rerouting up to another "road" above the other to avoid traffic and every new route just has more traffic. (Think the sci-fi version of the lane switching scene in Office Space) That scene really killed the flying car idea for me when I was a kid.
I dont watch any of simons "loose" channels where he goes impromptu or vular, so imagine my suprise when I find out simmon calling me an asshole was something I never knew I needed
Really, all flying cars woul AT THE LEAST need to have a mandatory auto-pilot that engages as soon as the car takes off so that it doesn't collide with anything on accident. _Eeeexceeeept:_ 1 - machines are always suceptible to malfunctioning, even the best GPS systems. 2 - plenty of people wouldn't be happy with a controlled speed, *so they probably would try to turn the thing off.* -__- _So yeah... better to have no flying cars at all._
Why bother if we have self-driving cars though? Surely self-self-driving is way less complicated than driving by far - planes today (commercial airlines at least) have tons of auto-pilot and automation involved and they have way more regulations around licensing and usage than driving. Self-driving cars would be amazing - they would be cheaper and simpler than flying for most operations we drive today. As Simon points out, the appeal of flying goes away once more than one or two people have it and you have to deal with everyone having it and all the realities that would have to exist that self-driving or self-flying aren't going to solve - it needs to be perfect and it won't so there are going to be major caveats. Cars are simpler than planes and I guarantee you that people will not abandon the idea of wanting to control their car versus being forced to have a computer doing it even if we know the latter is safer.
We already have flying cars, they're called helicopters and they are about as accessible to the average person as a flying car would be. Imagine the fuel costs.
You make a number of very valid points. But... we make flying cars out of carbon, not fiberglass, and regulation of air traffic is clearly feasible - can we say air planes? - and almost every flying car design I have seen included a ballistic parachute as part of the design package. Yes, no doubt cars will fall on houses, just like airplanes do, and stuff will fall from the sky just as we see happen with airplanes, but ... would you rather a flying car land on your house or an engine from a 747? There is no doubt that flying cars will have to be regulated and controlled but they are coming. We will find a way to transition to this means of travel just like every other method. Now, are alternatives better? Certainly, why not mass transit that actually provides a realistic means for ALL folks to get from point A to point B? Musk has an idea about tube transport - a lot better than buses or heavy rail. Why not use elevated rail, monaerail systems that follow the same roads we already have, including rail road tracks? Houston has spent a fortune on heavy rail, at ground level when it could have had a monorail system in place 30+ years ago. Why? Well, it's called politicians and vested interests and greed. When you put in a ground-level heavy rail a LOT of folks make money off of it, mainly folks that will never ever ride in these trains. So, flying cars.
I just don’t think the average person is capable of basically becoming a pilot. I honestly don’t think most people should drive cars… but flying around in the air able to hurt so many more people, so much quicker… it’s just going to be seriously lethal! Not to mention significantly worse for the planet due to needing more fuel, more speed, etc.
As much as I'd love a flying car in the here and now, I just don't see them being a thing until they can be 100% automated, with the humans sealed inside just being along for the ride. Even the models that have already been developed (like the Aeromobil or the Xpeng) have so many restrictions on where and how they can be operated and by whom, that they're more of just a novelty recreational device (like that water jetpack) than a valid form of transportation.
@@brandonspencer7093 There's nothing closed-minded about it -- humans are reckless and clumsy, as even a brief perusal of accident reports will show. The only way flying cars will ever see widespread use is when that recklessness and clumsiness is completely eliminated and the safety of everyone (drivers, passengers, and passersby alike) can be ensured... and that means automation. While it will likely happen eventually, I'm sorry to say it's not gonna happen anytime soon -- the tech is just not that good yet. Until then, you might want to look into the restrictions imposed on the presence and operation of existing manually-controlled flying cars, such as Aeromobil and Xpeng -- because those restrictions are probably going to be the norm for a whiles.
@Olen Cone fascinating. You really think you know the future and its limitations. The truth will be that flying cars, as we call them now, will be the primary method of transportation for humanity throughout our species lifetime. Using vehicles to travel on the ground will be a novelty in a short time. When battery technology is 10 times better, not far away, more silent drone tech exists, nearly there now, and ai is capable of driver assistance, as it is now, we will begin the shift, forever.
@Olen Cone Also. Humans are not reckless or clumsy. We're perfectly evolved to handle something like this. Our air traffic control systems and flight travel has been nearly perfected. This is not only easy for us to master, it's inevitable. But yes we won't be able to do this with blacks in control of these vehicles but everyone knows that and we have to make some tough choices.
Flying cars are a great idea. But... Remember your crazy neighbor and that adrenaline junky who lives down the street. Do you want them to have a flying car? ;)
Traversing a mile or kilometer by air will always be more fuel costly than traversing the same distance by ground. That's the reality and no getting around it. These days everyone is aware of the cost of fuel. That was not so much the case decades ago.
I think the first actual form it will take will be drone taxis that are autonomously flown, which will be the logical next step after the FAA gives the green light on commercial drones over populated areas for parcel deliveries. Windows don't open so you can't throw anything out. After this it'll progress to selling these drone taxis as personal vehicles (without the option/ability of flying them yourself), and that will be the first form personal flying cars take. Autonomously flown personal taxis. You can't realistically expect the vast general public to learn how to fly, let alone well enough to abide by a massive system of aerial traffic control. For flying cars to be a practical mass market thing, they will have to be autonomous.
Yooo where are all my Boston/New England folks here?!? Boston famously hosts “duck tours” featuring amphibious cars, during the boat portion of which many guides make a point to allow any children on board (including yours truly) to take a turn at the helm!
I sure hope that flying cars don't happen any time this century. Air traffic controllers are already stressed enough handling well-trained professional pilots. Add asterisk-holes into the mix who can't even be depended upon to fill their gas tank when the big E light comes on, let alone be responsible enough to have a valid driving license, insurance, etc. and the skies will just be absolute chaos! LOL But for the record, I have been a passenger in an amphibious vehicle. I have not however driven one, sadly, and definitely would not own one as a daily driver. LOL
Idea for #IntoTheShadows... Lavender Town Syndrome 😁 So, *that's* what those walls on the road are for! I thought it's something for the windy moments! Silly me... 🤪
I’ve driven an amphibious truck, if that counts. Granted, it was an Alvis Stalwart at one of those “tank” driving places, and the track contained nothing deeper than a really big puddle. But I have technically driven an amphibious vehicle. ;-)
Another Channel in the Whistler universe. Honestly, I just can't keep track of them all. Simon could start his own cable tv provider. Hundreds of his channels playing at once, no repeats 24/7/365 😵💫
Whenever I pictured a flying car, they were always driverless so you would put the address or coordinates you wanted to go to and it would plan the route and get the appropriate clearance from air control or whatever. And I always thought that the reason people wanted flying cars besides no traffic was that a lot of the roads in the US are poorly maintained I’ve even been in a few dirt roads so it would solve some of those issues as well.
@@lilykep that is true and even if the cars did a quick diagnostic check before every flight accidents would still happen because it is hard to make anything 100% safe. I mean even planes fall out of the sky sometimes.
The idea of auto-flying cars sounds cool to normal people, but to devious people and competent risk-analysts, it sounds like an easy way to get away with mayhem/ terrorism. Regardless of where you live, I expect you've heard news recently of various high-level security breaches, where hackers did crazy amounts of damage/ stole vast amounts of data/ etc... Now imagine a nation that HATES the usa. Probably won't take you very long to think of one. Imagine how many people there (or governments) would be happy to dedicate their time and effort to hacking in to this automated system and causing the 'cars' to crash into each other, or into buildings, or into military sites, or into bridges, or into banks, etc... Perhaps you don't live in the USA, though. Perhaps you also don't live in one of the very, very, very, very, very many nations that hate the usa. And perhaps you don't particularly care if that sort of thing happens in the usa; It doesn't make you happy, but you still don't care that much. Then imagine that there might be criminal groups who see this happening in the usa and after seeing it happen, their eyes turn into dollars-signs, like in old cartoons. They figure that they can do this sort of thing in YOUR country and that they can extort the company who controls the automated system (or government who controls it) by threatening to do the same thing as what happened in the USA, unless their demands (for money) are met. You might think this sounds far-fetched, but this is already happening. Criminal groups are already hacking into the systems of massive corporations and then holding their data or their access for ransom.
Quite entertaining as usual Mr Whistler, however I believe that with the eVTOL aircraft development that is happening around the world at the moment I'm not sure you're 100% right. I think that reasonably quiet, multi-rotor electric air taxi and air bus services will be very successful in the future. If the companies running these services (eg Uber) can make it cost comparable to complete a journey using air taxi/bus technology it will be a game changer and may even become the dominant form of medium distance transportation throughout the developed world. I do agree on the premise that if everyone has a "flying car" there will be no advantage to what we have now.
I noticed he never mentions the possibility of all flying cars being self piloted. Which I think is the preferred method. That would get rid of potential Sky Rage or driver error.
Making them self driving doesn't address any of the infeasibilities inherent to a flying car. Autopilot doesn't do all of the things that self driving is expected to do (collision avoidance through external sensors). All autopilot must do is free up the pilot's hands for better resource management, the pilot is still carrying out all of the responsibilities expected of them they just don't have to hand fly the aircraft for the entire flight.
You are so right. I have been saying this to my friends even though they do not like it. The issue is it cost more fuel to fly a car than to drive it. Second is they would be really dangerous. People struggle keeping the non-flying car from getting in a wreck. Imagine you lose power for some reason. There is no coasting off to the shoulder you would just fall and die.
flying cars wouldnt be allowed unless there was a global automated traffic control system. and honestly that's the way it should go for cars on the ground too. by removing the person out from behind the wheel, you also remove the assholes from cocking things up for everybody else. greedy assholes are what time it for us now. automated driving would mean that travel would be nearly seamless. fun would be the days where those assholes would wait for the last second to merge for purposely not leave room so somebody else can merge, causing a bottleneck. with an automated traffic control system controlling every car, the vehicles would just seamlessly merge into the correct Lanes and would barely even have to slow down. that's what would have to be in place before flying cars could be put into action.
When I was living in Hawaii I was out at the airport. A Robinson helicopter was coming in to land, and I saw something peculiar about it. As it got closer I saw there was a bicycle attached to each landing skid. It landed, and the men got out, unhooked the bikes and rode off to work. I later learned they lived on the North Shore and used this set up to avoid traffic. At the time there was only one, two lane road into Honolulu from the north side of the island. Flying cars, yeah, only for the rich!
Im glad he brought up the fiberglass body. In texas we had state emissions inspections and i was an inspector. Cars would come in that were clearly unsafe for the road but didnt violate the emission regulation so i couldnt do shit about it, recommend x y and z and send them off… eventually a kid with no funds will inherit grandpas flying bmw and not be able to afford the maintenance and try flying it… flying cars are terrifying if you pay even the slightest bit of attention on the hwy
Why ?? automated radar collision avoidance systems would enable you to being alerted to and be safely moved onto a new heading whenever another air vehicle got to within 500 meters. It's not pie in the sky tech I'm referring to..
Then, given the mess that are flying cars, why not make them only for Emergency Medical Services and/or their equivalent? I mean, it could speed up responses to the necessary locations, no? Especially if there aren't any Helis available at the time?
You should tackle the auto matrix one day. On this channel you can tie it in to I, Robot. Or, since it might be in the works, maybe mega or side projects? Or, you know, run your channels how you want. I’ll probably watch either way lol.
If you think Miami and San Fran is bad, you ain't seen nothing! Just come to Toronto where we have traffic jams 24 hours a day. And at some points, highways 24 lanes wide. I had an uncle who had an amphi-car. It was amazing!
I actually have driven an amphibias car, in my home town of Branson MO. We have a tourist attraction called ride the ducks, where you ride an amphibious car out to the lake and then into and around the lake, and when I was a kid the driver let me come up and drive around the lake for a bit
The biggest reason for traffic is is city planning. They stick all of the houses in one spot and all of the offices and industry in another. You have to drive to work. The problem is people do not want a factory in their backyard. Offices buildings block the sky line so people don't want that either. It is because we want to live in the suburbs that we have to deal with traffic. Canada played with the idea of multi purpose buildings where the shops and offices are in the same building as the residences but it did not work.
People can't even keep from crashing into each other on a basic tracked road that are clearly marked. It would just look like miles intercepting each other and debri all over the place.
There's a very expensive way to make flying cars: get the idea of using Room temp super conductors like in the hoverboards described in an earlier episode. Though the problems described there are greatly magnified to this scale.
maglev trains don't even work economically, let alone maglev cars. when you hear high speed rails, they're usually using actually rails with maximum speed of 400 km/h rather than maglev with maximum speed of 600 km/h but significantly consume more energy.
We have flying cars. They are called helicopters. They are dangerous, expensive and impractical for most uses. Just like the fictional flying cars... or Hyperloop
OK so...as someone with experience with flying cars, a lot of his points either don't apply or aren't caught up with the latest technology. There are somewhere around 80-100 companies around the world developing some version of "flying cars" (though some aren't really cars at all, they're more like single-person helicopters). The main reason a flying car would be useful is for long-distance transportation. A person can drive to the airport, take off, fly to the nearest airport to their destination, land, then drive to their final destination. No waiting hours in the airport for the flight to come be ready to board, no panicking about missing connecting flights, no renting cars. Anywhere a Cesna or similar-sized aircraft could fly, a flying car could fly. Also, a lot of current designs focus on being small enough it can fit into a garage, so storage would be the same as a regular car. The closest designs to commercial viability require a pilot's license, so that's likely the first market that will see them. It's a lot harder to get a pilot's license than it is to get a driver's license. It's also expensive to own and maintain an aircraft. Small aircraft may be more dangerous than large commercial aircraft (mostly due to the requirements of experience to get each license), but they're far safer than cars. For instance, in 2017 there were 1,316 accidents and 346 deaths for small aircraft. There are 1.3 million deaths on average worldwide per year due to motor vehicle accidents. In addition, if the aircraft had the same safety features as cars (e.g. crumple zones, airbags, etc.), some of those deaths could have been prevented. Yes, it's not commercially viable now, but if/when a company decides to put the capital into developing the manufacturing systems and getting through the certification, it could be viable on the level that high-end cars are today. The problem isn't the price for the final product. They would cost around what a small aircraft would cost once the company has all the molds, production lines, trains all the workers, etc. The problem is that it's expensive to get both FAA certification (to fly) and FMVSS certification (to drive on the streets). Actually, it's REALLY expensive to get FMVSS certification, considering that it needs a minimum of 8 successful crashes from different angles. If your prototypes are a half-million dollars each (because the manufacturing systems aren't up and running and therefore they're more expensive to build), that is a lot to invest in getting that certification. And that's just if you want to get certified in the US. Other countries have their own safety standards which could require additional testing. That's the biggest hurdle -- not how much it costs once you go to market. Engineering-wise, they're also not generally made out of fiberglass. Carbon Fiber panels are stronger and lighter than fiberglass, especially if you line up the layers correctly so they aren't all in the same direction. They have headlights (as required for the ground portion), but it's only tiny privately-owned airports that only operate during the day that don't have runway lights...which a pilot wouldn't be landing at night at anyway. There are engine designs which can disengage the propeller and switch the power to the wheels. There are also designs which could be fuel-driven in the air and have a smaller electric motor for ground transportation. There are designs which are fully electric, and it's a matter of switching which turning shaft is getting the power (wheels or propeller). I admit, I'm a bit disappointed. I'd been hoping to hear about the latest developments in the field, not a rant about why flying cars are dumb. Simon's videos are usually really good, but this one doesn't seem well-researched.
Okay I ABSOLUTELY LOVE all of Simon's content and this video included. However this is now a faaaavorite, just because of his mounting anger over the ridiculousness of the topic. 🤣🤣🤣
Jules Verne wrote a book MASTER OF THE WORLD where the villain invented a vehicle that was capable of converting from a fast car to a vertical take off and landing aircraft, to a speed boat and then to a submarine. With this amazing vehicle, he would blackmail the world's leaders. Ultimately, he flew his invention into a hurricane where it crashed and he died.
Hamburger earmuffs... wait... let's think about this... "Warms your ears until you're hungry, then you can eat them!" Are you sure this isn't brilliant?
If they are completely autonomous, I think they could be feasible. That would avoid a lot of these problems (although, bits falling off might still be an issue), but that would at least take a lot of the human-caused issues out of the equation. I barely trust my fellow humans on our 2d roads (and myself, to be clear), and at least pilots have to go through extensive training, but that's just not feasible to do on a mass scale, except with AI.Ban is probably the
Your clever Amphicar analogy reminded me of my days driving the US M113 family of "amphibious" tracked vehicles. The concept was "we don't need bridges." Problem: as a boat, the M113 isn't. The tracks power the vehicle on land and water. The vehicle must be checked prior to water operations to include making sure the hull is sealed, the anti-diving plane is in place, and the vehicle must be balanced in a float pool so that the M113 doesn't roll over and sink. The river current must be slow enough so that the M113 can swim across--and the banks must be no steeper than 30 degrees and firm--a slippery muddy exit bank means the M113 won't make it out of the river or lake. US Army standard operations procedures were to prohibit "swimming" the M113 family because there were just too many dangers.
True but my unit swam our Plt. 5 times in one year. 4 -113s & 3-901s. Entered & left off concrete banking. We also so had a -88 w/ a pull me back cable. Definitely not combat capable 😟. "Sky Rage" would achieve a new level of excitement w/ the 2A.....let that sink in.
@@michaelgautreaux3168 Gravity makes weapons out of anything. There was an incident in Germany during the Eighties where American brats (dependents of service members) were tossing cobblestones off an Autobahn overpass at cars driving under them. Someone died and both boys were convicted of murder. Yes, a flying car at its service ceiling could drop all sorts of stuff that would prove lethal--even plastic-tipped pub darts would be lethal when dropped from 3,000 feet altitude. Dropping a full case would be devastating--that's one of the early projectiles used during the First World War. Someone shooting a pistol from 3,000 feet below would be very unlikely to endanger the flying car with the height advantage.
Speaking of sinking in, I'm glad that your command took measures to ensure safety. I was told HOW to prepare the M113 for swimming but not allowed to do that. Just in case, I kept a small inflatable boat on my M577A2 and a life jacket (the other soldiers kept using my life jacket as a seat cushion). That boat made a good wash tub.
O can drive an M113.
Marine Corps amtrack drivers laughing at this.
@@RCAvhstape Amtrack drivers have earned the right to laugh. dropping off the end of an LSD and plunging below the surface is nearly qualifying for a pair of dolphins.
Another great script by Kevin. I think Simon should let him have 3 minutes of daylight outside of the basement. Of course, Simon will have to use the harness, but I think Kevin might enjoy it.
Oh
If Kevin ever makes it out of the basement, they won't be able to get him back again. A mere harness won't hold him.
Fetch more papier-mache.
What? Calling people *ssholes is a great script? Okay.
@@Amlaeuxrai I'm not. At least I am trying not to. Cool, I just stay clear of these videos in the future.
Flying cars will NEVER become common or used until such a time gravity can be nullified. A simple fender-bender would result in debris falling to earth. Soon as antigravity can keep the wreck floating, we will have them! Edit: Posted before Simon said the same thing...
There's also the possibility that the majority of people are too stupid to fly a car. Just saying. Cheers.
It's also a missile in waiting, intentionally or not.
@@Hillbilly001
You're all assuming that humans will be flying these. We'll have autonomous vehicles* a lot sooner than we'll have flying cars, and there's no reason they'd let humans do it.
*At which point full control is taken over the movement of the population, so huge incentive for governments and corps.
I'd actually argue we already have them. (E.g.: Helicopters) They just happen to require quite a bit of training and are way to expensive for general use and not nearly as useful as people like to imagine. Most of which is not likely to change anytime soon. People just got way to stuck on the image of specificially a car flying, which would be aerodynamic nonsense anyway.
"It's called a (*beep*)ing subway"
Such hearty laughter
I don't think I've ever seen Simon this pissed about an idea or a person/event he was commentating about 🤣
I realised that he watched Adam something's UA-cam videos on flying cars and Elon musk interviews based on what he said
He doesn’t even write the scripts, so apparently the author and Simon are on the same pissed page. lol
It's because he hates the idea of plebes being able to escape their future megacity prisons, only the 1% can get into the sky. That's why he's such a POS hissy about the topic.
He was pretty zesty on the hoverboard episode too.
I think we'll eventually have medium to short range flying transportation but it will not be driver controlled but computer guided with each vehicle communicating with all the others to safely reach it's destination without colliding.
Yeah I was about to comment that AI traffic control and safety system monitoring would solve a lot of the critical problems here. They're probably still not actually a great solution, but they would allow people their freedom, which is an important consideration from a market perspective.
If the whole point of a flying car is to avoid traffic it will just never scale and never be practical. For it to scale we have to go back to the concept and f roads all over again defeating the purpose when we could just deal with traffic problems that we have solutions for just without the hassle of individual inefficient cars in the air.
I trust a computer controlled anything less than gas station sushi
Yep and at that point they would be linked together on a restricted area like a highway for flying cars. However you would need to drive the car to that area and engage the auto pilot.
The problem is in the future you might not own a car. With auto drive becoming a thing and ride apps on your phone you might just hail an Uber flying car. The only people who really need one are those who live in Raul areas where they are too far out and need a truck to go to town to pickup supplies.
I rode in a car-boat a couple times, a co-worker had one in the early 90's. My description? It's like a car in the water, and a boat on land. It doesn't do both very well. He took it to and from work across the inlet every day, but after one round trip, I decided just to take the ferry.
This is slowly becoming one of my favorite Whistleverse channels.
Have you seen any sci-fi movies with flying cars? They get you from your house, and then enters a strict flying pattern with other flying cars, within a automated system that get you close enough to your destination for you car to leave the system. Its not about everyone being able to fly freely around, its about not needing a huge and limited 2D road system for every single little destination. If we make cheap solution, easy manufacturable flying cars, there would be a lot of resources and fauna saved by not building roads everywhere. Are we there yet? Far from it, but as a sci-fi idea? I believe it got a lot of merit.
I completely agree. The arguments in this video are disingenuous. Nobody will be hand flying their car. Centralized traffic control. You type in your destination and sit down, the computers will fly the car to that destination.
Hah, I may not have ever driven an amphicar myself but I still can't get away from hearing my grandpa talk about his dad's from when he was a child. Had an old military surplus amphibious jeep, and we live next to a lake, so he would always take my grandpa and his friends out driving around the lake, then act like the brakes failed while heading towards a boat ramp. Apparently he gave a lot of people heart attacks that way, sounds like it was fun lol
Now imagine that, *aerial edition.* XD _Yup. Fun times._
You're not descended from Lyndon Johnson, are you? 'Cause he used to do that...allegedly.
Very clear about the problems about flying cars, thank you. Geek time. The kubelwagen was a WW2 answer to the Jeep and a German developer thought up the schwimmwagen, the amphibious kubelwagen. The same person who created the amphicar.
If flying cars became popular, I'd imagine cars would have to fly in predetermined "air tunnels" to reduce collisions, just as airplanes have fixed flight paths for this very reason. At which case the reason to have a flying car becomes voided; instead of congestion on the ground, you'd have congestion in the air. (Note helicopters do not require flight paths in USA below a certain altitude, but I think this would change if the number of helicopters in the air drastically increased to the number of flying cars depicted in movies.)
I remember an article in Popular Mechanics, back in the 90s, that had a legit flying car. But, it was essentially more of a tiny airplane that could fit in a lane on a highway.
Popular Science and Popular Mechanics both were running articles about flying cars back in the 1960s. Bad idea then, bad idea now.
Every so called flying car is classified as an aircraft, so I think "street legal aircraft" is probably a more accurate term.
I really like and appreciate the more aggressive, sarcastic Simon!
I like how Simon just gave up on bleeping his swear words halfway through the video, and then resumed it towards the end.
There goes our anti-traffic jams hopes & dreams. X-D
God bless humankind.
The cartoon The Jetsons, which prominently featured flying cars was set in the year 2062.
Forty years to go!🛸
I think drone like personal aircraft could def replace automobiles if they find a way to reulate safety.
Watch his eyes when he says, "...and that's absolutely for the best."
You know he's thinking, "...but damn, I still want one."
Current crazy drivers, flying car would be scarier with bad drivers.
Watching this video, pointing at the screen, and shouting "thank you!!" while thinking of past conversations with friends about flying cars
This has fast become my favorite of your channels... and I watch all of them.
Same just worry about running low on things to cover at some point but I guess you can go into more obscure scifi like chicken in The Fifth Element.
@South Coast Inventors Yes! I've watched every video on Brain Blaze, Top 10s, Science of sci-fi, The Why Files, TIFO, Casual Criminalist, Into the Shadows, Cool World, and Janson Media... I'm sure there are a couple more I'm forgetting 🙃 now I'm looking for other channels to binge.
@@BURDYMAN777 Good middle of the road mainstream-esque content.
People can't even fly a DRONE without crashing into anything & you want to give them a flying car??? ....sounds legit to me!🤣🤣🤣
Hambuger earmuffs sound cool and when you get hungry you can eat it....genius...it's what would considered a happy meal
Always thought it would end up to be more like automated VTOL for city to city travel. Basically a more advance Greyhound bus.
@Cancer McAids Talking about the US and there will never be high speed rail in the US. Planes need a runway I am talking about possible use case it the future that could potentially work.
@@KastorFlux Yes the lifting power of sarcasm exceeds any known gases the same way utilizing all the negative energy in UA-cam is able to propel our space ships to FTL velocities.
@@southcoastinventors6583 why will there never be high speed rail in the US apart from poor policy makers?
@Cancer McAids To fly city to city all you need is a simple light airplane. The problem is that they are too expensive to buy new and nobody wants small airports anywhere near where they live. The popular Cessna 150/152 was called the Commuter and became a popular training airplane. Simple with a 100hp engine. You could save a bunch of time over driving but once you got somewhere you had no car to go anywhere.
Seattle built the Space Needle for the 1962 Worlds Fair because someone thought that we would all live in rotating towers in the sky. 60 years later, you take an elevator to the top to go around in circles while eating a $20 hot dog.
Personally I would forego the flying car and go more for a handheld device that could open portals to other places - like the Sling Ring from DOCTOR STRANGE - without the risk of the person having to teleport his body. (As a sidenote, you might want to save some on the side for a spacesuit if you want to go hopping across asteroids or the surface of Mars.) Speaking of which, I can't wait for your next episode explaining how scientifically probable something like the Sling Ring actually is!
Simon, have a Snickers, you always get angry when you're hungry.
You totally missed bleeping a cuss word love it haha
Hamburger earmuffs? Bahhhh!!! MINE will be on the shelves, while YOU are still dealing with the _Pickle Matrix!!!_
“Always listen to experts. They'll tell you what can't be done, and why. Then do it.” ― Robert A. Heinlein
Btw, if you have a flying "car" then you won't need a regular car.
P.S. You know what critics said when the firstmodern railway was introduced for passenger transport?
They said that people would suffocate due to the high speed.
I love the Passion in this video. And all the swearing
At least with a flying car, while you're flying along you won't see any hitchhikers, unless they're a SKYWALKER.
There was a great segment in the Jetsons movie (or possibly the show) where George keeps rerouting up to another "road" above the other to avoid traffic and every new route just has more traffic. (Think the sci-fi version of the lane switching scene in Office Space)
That scene really killed the flying car idea for me when I was a kid.
I can't even imagine people flying and bumbing in to each other and then falling on someone. This is just nuts. That's why we have helicopters.
Jokes on you, hamburger earmuffs are actually great.
I dont watch any of simons "loose" channels where he goes impromptu or vular, so imagine my suprise when I find out simmon calling me an asshole was something I never knew I needed
If it ever happens, we will have no manual control of them.
We may well soon loose the privilege to manually control cars in some congested areas. We're a menace on the roads!
@@grejen711 We will all be occupants aboard the cruise ship in WALL-E. I just hope they have good smoothies...
Hopefully - many people struggle to drive well in 2D.
My favorite analogy: what is the mortality rate of car accidents? Add 10 feet off the ground and the mortality rate would compound significantly
Really, all flying cars woul AT THE LEAST need to have a mandatory auto-pilot that engages as soon as the car takes off so that it doesn't collide with anything on accident. _Eeeexceeeept:_
1 - machines are always suceptible to malfunctioning, even the best GPS systems.
2 - plenty of people wouldn't be happy with a controlled speed, *so they probably would try to turn the thing off.* -__-
_So yeah... better to have no flying cars at all._
@@MrDibara yeah better to do farming as we all have to die ultimately
I'm loving the sass in this one 😅
Some want a button to press to fly over traffic…Some want an indestructible plow to just ram all the cars up and out of the way😂😂
I think self-driving flying cars that are able to communicate with one another would make the idea of flying cars much more viable.
What if the software failed and causes 9/11 again
Why bother if we have self-driving cars though? Surely self-self-driving is way less complicated than driving by far - planes today (commercial airlines at least) have tons of auto-pilot and automation involved and they have way more regulations around licensing and usage than driving. Self-driving cars would be amazing - they would be cheaper and simpler than flying for most operations we drive today.
As Simon points out, the appeal of flying goes away once more than one or two people have it and you have to deal with everyone having it and all the realities that would have to exist that self-driving or self-flying aren't going to solve - it needs to be perfect and it won't so there are going to be major caveats. Cars are simpler than planes and I guarantee you that people will not abandon the idea of wanting to control their car versus being forced to have a computer doing it even if we know the latter is safer.
Everyone has seen bad drivers and thought "they should not be allowed to drive". Imagine what it would be like if they were able to fly
We already have flying cars, they're called helicopters and they are about as accessible to the average person as a flying car would be. Imagine the fuel costs.
You make a number of very valid points. But... we make flying cars out of carbon, not fiberglass, and regulation of air traffic is clearly feasible - can we say air planes? - and almost every flying car design I have seen included a ballistic parachute as part of the design package. Yes, no doubt cars will fall on houses, just like airplanes do, and stuff will fall from the sky just as we see happen with airplanes, but ... would you rather a flying car land on your house or an engine from a 747? There is no doubt that flying cars will have to be regulated and controlled but they are coming. We will find a way to transition to this means of travel just like every other method. Now, are alternatives better? Certainly, why not mass transit that actually provides a realistic means for ALL folks to get from point A to point B? Musk has an idea about tube transport - a lot better than buses or heavy rail. Why not use elevated rail, monaerail systems that follow the same roads we already have, including rail road tracks? Houston has spent a fortune on heavy rail, at ground level when it could have had a monorail system in place 30+ years ago. Why? Well, it's called politicians and vested interests and greed. When you put in a ground-level heavy rail a LOT of folks make money off of it, mainly folks that will never ever ride in these trains. So, flying cars.
I just don’t think the average person is capable of basically becoming a pilot.
I honestly don’t think most people should drive cars… but flying around in the air able to hurt so many more people, so much quicker… it’s just going to be seriously lethal!
Not to mention significantly worse for the planet due to needing more fuel, more speed, etc.
Dammit, now I want hamburger earmuffs...
hamburger
I want lasagna slippers (:
The soundtrack towards the end of the video sounds like a John Wick nightclub shootout scene .
As much as I'd love a flying car in the here and now, I just don't see them being a thing until they can be 100% automated, with the humans sealed inside just being along for the ride. Even the models that have already been developed (like the Aeromobil or the Xpeng) have so many restrictions on where and how they can be operated and by whom, that they're more of just a novelty recreational device (like that water jetpack) than a valid form of transportation.
I'm fascinated by how closed minded most of you are. Flying cars will be the primary method of transportation soon.
@@brandonspencer7093 There's nothing closed-minded about it -- humans are reckless and clumsy, as even a brief perusal of accident reports will show. The only way flying cars will ever see widespread use is when that recklessness and clumsiness is completely eliminated and the safety of everyone (drivers, passengers, and passersby alike) can be ensured... and that means automation. While it will likely happen eventually, I'm sorry to say it's not gonna happen anytime soon -- the tech is just not that good yet.
Until then, you might want to look into the restrictions imposed on the presence and operation of existing manually-controlled flying cars, such as Aeromobil and Xpeng -- because those restrictions are probably going to be the norm for a whiles.
@Olen Cone fascinating. You really think you know the future and its limitations. The truth will be that flying cars, as we call them now, will be the primary method of transportation for humanity throughout our species lifetime. Using vehicles to travel on the ground will be a novelty in a short time. When battery technology is 10 times better, not far away, more silent drone tech exists, nearly there now, and ai is capable of driver assistance, as it is now, we will begin the shift, forever.
@Olen Cone Also. Humans are not reckless or clumsy. We're perfectly evolved to handle something like this. Our air traffic control systems and flight travel has been nearly perfected. This is not only easy for us to master, it's inevitable.
But yes we won't be able to do this with blacks in control of these vehicles but everyone knows that and we have to make some tough choices.
Flying cars are a great idea.
But...
Remember your crazy neighbor and that adrenaline junky who lives down the street.
Do you want them to have a flying car? ;)
Traversing a mile or kilometer by air will always be more fuel costly than traversing the same distance by ground. That's the reality and no getting around it. These days everyone is aware of the cost of fuel. That was not so much the case decades ago.
I think the first actual form it will take will be drone taxis that are autonomously flown, which will be the logical next step after the FAA gives the green light on commercial drones over populated areas for parcel deliveries. Windows don't open so you can't throw anything out. After this it'll progress to selling these drone taxis as personal vehicles (without the option/ability of flying them yourself), and that will be the first form personal flying cars take. Autonomously flown personal taxis. You can't realistically expect the vast general public to learn how to fly, let alone well enough to abide by a massive system of aerial traffic control. For flying cars to be a practical mass market thing, they will have to be autonomous.
Yooo where are all my Boston/New England folks here?!? Boston famously hosts “duck tours” featuring amphibious cars, during the boat portion of which many guides make a point to allow any children on board (including yours truly) to take a turn at the helm!
I sure hope that flying cars don't happen any time this century. Air traffic controllers are already stressed enough handling well-trained professional pilots. Add asterisk-holes into the mix who can't even be depended upon to fill their gas tank when the big E light comes on, let alone be responsible enough to have a valid driving license, insurance, etc. and the skies will just be absolute chaos! LOL
But for the record, I have been a passenger in an amphibious vehicle. I have not however driven one, sadly, and definitely would not own one as a daily driver. LOL
I been in amphibian car many times. Was very useful for my family, our house was on an island, the car was lot better than a boat and a car on shore.
Every day people with a car that can fly would be the worst weapon never intended to be one.
Flying cars would never be fuel efficient enough to meet State or Federal standards.
Idea for #IntoTheShadows...
Lavender Town Syndrome 😁
So, *that's* what those walls on the road are for!
I thought it's something for the windy moments!
Silly me... 🤪
I’ve driven an amphibious truck, if that counts. Granted, it was an Alvis Stalwart at one of those “tank” driving places, and the track contained nothing deeper than a really big puddle. But I have technically driven an amphibious vehicle. ;-)
I'm only 5 minutes in and I already had to check several times to see if I'm watching brain blaze or not. Simon is going wild lmao 😂
This channel should be called: "Taking a Sh1t on Science Fiction"🤣🤣🤣
Another Channel in the Whistler universe. Honestly, I just can't keep track of them all. Simon could start his own cable tv provider. Hundreds of his channels playing at once, no repeats 24/7/365 😵💫
Whenever I pictured a flying car, they were always driverless so you would put the address or coordinates you wanted to go to and it would plan the route and get the appropriate clearance from air control or whatever. And I always thought that the reason people wanted flying cars besides no traffic was that a lot of the roads in the US are poorly maintained I’ve even been in a few dirt roads so it would solve some of those issues as well.
So like an air taxi situation? That sounds cool but there would still be the issue of maintenance problems and things falling out of the air on people
@@lilykep Yep. That’s aviation.
@@lilykep that is true and even if the cars did a quick diagnostic check before every flight accidents would still happen because it is hard to make anything 100% safe. I mean even planes fall out of the sky sometimes.
The idea of auto-flying cars sounds cool to normal people, but to devious people and competent risk-analysts, it sounds like an easy way to get away with mayhem/ terrorism. Regardless of where you live, I expect you've heard news recently of various high-level security breaches, where hackers did crazy amounts of damage/ stole vast amounts of data/ etc...
Now imagine a nation that HATES the usa. Probably won't take you very long to think of one. Imagine how many people there (or governments) would be happy to dedicate their time and effort to hacking in to this automated system and causing the 'cars' to crash into each other, or into buildings, or into military sites, or into bridges, or into banks, etc...
Perhaps you don't live in the USA, though. Perhaps you also don't live in one of the very, very, very, very, very many nations that hate the usa. And perhaps you don't particularly care if that sort of thing happens in the usa; It doesn't make you happy, but you still don't care that much. Then imagine that there might be criminal groups who see this happening in the usa and after seeing it happen, their eyes turn into dollars-signs, like in old cartoons. They figure that they can do this sort of thing in YOUR country and that they can extort the company who controls the automated system (or government who controls it) by threatening to do the same thing as what happened in the USA, unless their demands (for money) are met.
You might think this sounds far-fetched, but this is already happening. Criminal groups are already hacking into the systems of massive corporations and then holding their data or their access for ransom.
Quite entertaining as usual Mr Whistler, however I believe that with the eVTOL aircraft development that is happening around the world at the moment I'm not sure you're 100% right. I think that reasonably quiet, multi-rotor electric air taxi and air bus services will be very successful in the future. If the companies running these services (eg Uber) can make it cost comparable to complete a journey using air taxi/bus technology it will be a game changer and may even become the dominant form of medium distance transportation throughout the developed world. I do agree on the premise that if everyone has a "flying car" there will be no advantage to what we have now.
One of my neighbors had an amphicar back in the 70s. I never saw it go anywhere. Just sat in their driveway for years.
The concept of Flying Cars is very helpful indeed … for spotting idiots and a-holes by their crying for them.
I noticed he never mentions the possibility of all flying cars being self piloted. Which I think is the preferred method. That would get rid of potential Sky Rage or driver error.
Making them self driving doesn't address any of the infeasibilities inherent to a flying car. Autopilot doesn't do all of the things that self driving is expected to do (collision avoidance through external sensors). All autopilot must do is free up the pilot's hands for better resource management, the pilot is still carrying out all of the responsibilities expected of them they just don't have to hand fly the aircraft for the entire flight.
I love the "bloody to the point" video's you make 👍
You are so right. I have been saying this to my friends even though they do not like it. The issue is it cost more fuel to fly a car than to drive it. Second is they would be really dangerous. People struggle keeping the non-flying car from getting in a wreck. Imagine you lose power for some reason. There is no coasting off to the shoulder you would just fall and die.
flying cars wouldnt be allowed unless there was a global automated traffic control system. and honestly that's the way it should go for cars on the ground too. by removing the person out from behind the wheel, you also remove the assholes from cocking things up for everybody else. greedy assholes are what time it for us now. automated driving would mean that travel would be nearly seamless. fun would be the days where those assholes would wait for the last second to merge for purposely not leave room so somebody else can merge, causing a bottleneck. with an automated traffic control system controlling every car, the vehicles would just seamlessly merge into the correct Lanes and would barely even have to slow down. that's what would have to be in place before flying cars could be put into action.
When I was living in Hawaii I was out at the airport. A Robinson helicopter was coming in to land, and I saw something peculiar about it. As it got closer I saw there was a bicycle attached to each landing skid. It landed, and the men got out, unhooked the bikes and rode off to work. I later learned they lived on the North Shore and used this set up to avoid traffic. At the time there was only one, two lane road into Honolulu from the north side of the island. Flying cars, yeah, only for the rich!
Im glad he brought up the fiberglass body. In texas we had state emissions inspections and i was an inspector. Cars would come in that were clearly unsafe for the road but didnt violate the emission regulation so i couldnt do shit about it, recommend x y and z and send them off… eventually a kid with no funds will inherit grandpas flying bmw and not be able to afford the maintenance and try flying it… flying cars are terrifying if you pay even the slightest bit of attention on the hwy
Why ?? automated radar collision avoidance systems would enable you to being alerted to and be safely moved onto a new heading whenever another air vehicle got to within 500 meters. It's not pie in the sky tech I'm referring to..
We already have flying cars. We just call them helicopters.
Sky Rage? U're forgetting us 2A activists, got any B-17 ball turrets laying 'round? 🤣🤣
Thanx a heap Simon.
Screw the flying car as long as it has a flux capacitor in it.
I just think it looks fun to fly around in a flying car. A helicopter or hot air balloon looks fun too, & at least those really exist...
It's all fun and games until an engineer screams "F* you Simon, they're cool," alone in their garage.
Then, given the mess that are flying cars, why not make them only for Emergency Medical Services and/or their equivalent? I mean, it could speed up responses to the necessary locations, no? Especially if there aren't any Helis available at the time?
Didn't see your reply I asked similar question.
@Cancer McAids Given your joke of a name, your reply is duly noted and subsequently ignored.
Thanks a lot Simon... now i NEED hamburger earmuffs!!
You should tackle the auto matrix one day. On this channel you can tie it in to I, Robot. Or, since it might be in the works, maybe mega or side projects?
Or, you know, run your channels how you want. I’ll probably watch either way lol.
If you think Miami and San Fran is bad, you ain't seen nothing! Just come to Toronto where we have traffic jams 24 hours a day. And at some points, highways 24 lanes wide. I had an uncle who had an amphi-car. It was amazing!
I actually have driven an amphibias car, in my home town of Branson MO. We have a tourist attraction called ride the ducks, where you ride an amphibious car out to the lake and then into and around the lake, and when I was a kid the driver let me come up and drive around the lake for a bit
The biggest reason for traffic is is city planning. They stick all of the houses in one spot and all of the offices and industry in another. You have to drive to work. The problem is people do not want a factory in their backyard. Offices buildings block the sky line so people don't want that either. It is because we want to live in the suburbs that we have to deal with traffic. Canada played with the idea of multi purpose buildings where the shops and offices are in the same building as the residences but it did not work.
People can't even keep from crashing into each other on a basic tracked road that are clearly marked. It would just look like miles intercepting each other and debri all over the place.
HOW DARE YOU SIMON!!!! You people just don’t have the vision to realize that Hamburger Earmuffs are the future!!!
There's a very expensive way to make flying cars: get the idea of using Room temp super conductors like in the hoverboards described in an earlier episode. Though the problems described there are greatly magnified to this scale.
maglev trains don't even work economically, let alone maglev cars. when you hear high speed rails, they're usually using actually rails with maximum speed of 400 km/h rather than maglev with maximum speed of 600 km/h but significantly consume more energy.
We have flying cars. They are called helicopters. They are dangerous, expensive and impractical for most uses. Just like the fictional flying cars... or Hyperloop
Every afternoon at three precisely Simon serenades his writers on his oompah.🤣🤣
OK so...as someone with experience with flying cars, a lot of his points either don't apply or aren't caught up with the latest technology. There are somewhere around 80-100 companies around the world developing some version of "flying cars" (though some aren't really cars at all, they're more like single-person helicopters).
The main reason a flying car would be useful is for long-distance transportation. A person can drive to the airport, take off, fly to the nearest airport to their destination, land, then drive to their final destination. No waiting hours in the airport for the flight to come be ready to board, no panicking about missing connecting flights, no renting cars. Anywhere a Cesna or similar-sized aircraft could fly, a flying car could fly. Also, a lot of current designs focus on being small enough it can fit into a garage, so storage would be the same as a regular car.
The closest designs to commercial viability require a pilot's license, so that's likely the first market that will see them. It's a lot harder to get a pilot's license than it is to get a driver's license. It's also expensive to own and maintain an aircraft. Small aircraft may be more dangerous than large commercial aircraft (mostly due to the requirements of experience to get each license), but they're far safer than cars. For instance, in 2017 there were 1,316 accidents and 346 deaths for small aircraft. There are 1.3 million deaths on average worldwide per year due to motor vehicle accidents. In addition, if the aircraft had the same safety features as cars (e.g. crumple zones, airbags, etc.), some of those deaths could have been prevented.
Yes, it's not commercially viable now, but if/when a company decides to put the capital into developing the manufacturing systems and getting through the certification, it could be viable on the level that high-end cars are today. The problem isn't the price for the final product. They would cost around what a small aircraft would cost once the company has all the molds, production lines, trains all the workers, etc. The problem is that it's expensive to get both FAA certification (to fly) and FMVSS certification (to drive on the streets). Actually, it's REALLY expensive to get FMVSS certification, considering that it needs a minimum of 8 successful crashes from different angles. If your prototypes are a half-million dollars each (because the manufacturing systems aren't up and running and therefore they're more expensive to build), that is a lot to invest in getting that certification. And that's just if you want to get certified in the US. Other countries have their own safety standards which could require additional testing. That's the biggest hurdle -- not how much it costs once you go to market.
Engineering-wise, they're also not generally made out of fiberglass. Carbon Fiber panels are stronger and lighter than fiberglass, especially if you line up the layers correctly so they aren't all in the same direction. They have headlights (as required for the ground portion), but it's only tiny privately-owned airports that only operate during the day that don't have runway lights...which a pilot wouldn't be landing at night at anyway. There are engine designs which can disengage the propeller and switch the power to the wheels. There are also designs which could be fuel-driven in the air and have a smaller electric motor for ground transportation. There are designs which are fully electric, and it's a matter of switching which turning shaft is getting the power (wheels or propeller).
I admit, I'm a bit disappointed. I'd been hoping to hear about the latest developments in the field, not a rant about why flying cars are dumb. Simon's videos are usually really good, but this one doesn't seem well-researched.
Simon, would you consider a video on floating cites and Arcologies?
People are already terrible drivers in two dimensions, we don't need to add a third.
Okay I ABSOLUTELY LOVE all of Simon's content and this video included. However this is now a faaaavorite, just because of his mounting anger over the ridiculousness of the topic. 🤣🤣🤣
4:05 I actually saw one on Lake Michigan in Chicago just a couple years ago.
Jules Verne wrote a book MASTER OF THE WORLD where the villain invented a vehicle that was capable of converting from a fast car to a vertical take off and landing aircraft, to a speed boat and then to a submarine. With this amazing vehicle, he would blackmail the world's leaders. Ultimately, he flew his invention into a hurricane where it crashed and he died.
When I hear flying cars my brain automatically goes to personal spaceship, think your own Millennium Falcon.
Yep, flying cars are a bad idea, but, light weight electric, automated flying taxis will most definitely be a thing, for those who can afford it.
Hamburger earmuffs... wait... let's think about this...
"Warms your ears until you're hungry, then you can eat them!"
Are you sure this isn't brilliant?
We've had flying cars for years but we call them helicopters. Imagine all the flying car stuff but with your neighbor in a helicopter.
If they are completely autonomous, I think they could be feasible. That would avoid a lot of these problems (although, bits falling off might still be an issue), but that would at least take a lot of the human-caused issues out of the equation. I barely trust my fellow humans on our 2d roads (and myself, to be clear), and at least pilots have to go through extensive training, but that's just not feasible to do on a mass scale, except with AI.Ban is probably the
The editor of this show is next level