YC's latest moonshot bet is a startup building a $380K “flying motorcycle”

Re:YC's latest moonshot bet is a startup building a $380K “f... by cousin_it on Friday March 08, 2019 @05:35AM (#19336470)

Since there's no need to keep the aircraft small while it's in the air, my ideal personal flight solution would be a combination of ducted fans for safe vertical takeoff and landing, and large wings that unfold or inflate in flight for much higher efficiency / gliding.

Edit: apparently there's a ton of engineering problems with both ducted fans (stability) and folding wings (unfolding in flight is tricky). No idea if this approach is feasible.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:YC's latest moonshot bet is a startup building a $380K “f... by dmayman on Friday March 08, 2019 @08:25PM (#19343868)

EDFs are really power hungry beasts! You have to use them for takeoff and then transition onto a wing ASAP or you’ll be out of juice at 250w.h/kg No loiter time possible. The issue with folding wings is that they can big stability issues. Probably not unsolvable but not simple.

[ Parent | on HN ]