A Flying Car...Seriously

Terrafugia, Inc. Moller Skycar How Flying Cars Will Work AeroCycle LaBiche Aerospace FSC-1 Complete listing of roadable aircraft

Since the dawn of aviation, the idea of a "roadable" aircraft, or flying car, has captivated the imagination-intriguing futurists, inspiring dreamers, and spawning a multitude of whimsical and fictional creations — from Chitty Chitty Bang Bang to Blade Runner to The Jetsons.

Beyond science fiction, the challenge of producing a real "dual use" vehicle has been more elusive, frustrating inventors and entrepreneurs over the years. Of nearly 100 published concepts, only a few have ever been built, fewer still ever flown, and not one put into production.

The latest entry is Terrafugia's "Transition," the brainchild of a group of fresh-faced Massachusetts Institute of Technology grad students. Carl Dietrich, Terrafugia chief executive officer and a doctoral candidate in aeronautics, who with partner Samuel Schweighart, also an MIT Ph.D., came up with the idea, which is several years from becoming a reality, and admits that the track record for such vehicles is not good. For one thing, the compromises needed to make a vehicle that is both airworthy and roadworthy have resulted in vehicles that are both bad airplanes and lousy cars. Additionally, even if a vehicle that is technically feasible can be designed, the challenge remains to prove that it is financially viable. Proving to themselves that there was a potential market for a roadable aircraft, the Terrafugia team set about designing its vehicle. Rather than reach for some pie-in-the-sky vision of putting "an airplane in every garage," the group strove to make the Transition simple and practical, settling on a more-or-less conventional aircraft design and relying on available technology and construction techniques.

More information on the Transition will be available online in the next several months. The animation shown on this page is courtesy of the Terrafugia team.

History of the flying car

It's a quest as old as aviation itself: to build an airplane that the average man can both fly and drive. Many have tried. No one has succeeded. Still, the idea endures.

In 1918, the first patent for a flying car was issued to a Felix Longobardi. Longobardi's design was for a vehicle that would convert from a car to an aircraft to a boat. It was never built.

The following year, pioneer aviator Glenn Curtiss received a patent for his "Autoplane." The triplane, built and exhibited at the Pan-American Aeronautic Exposition in New York City's Grand Central Palace, had a 40-foot wingspan. The vehicle was aluminum-bodied and had twin-boom tails, along with small canard wings on the front of the car. The motor under a car hood used a shaft and belts to drive a four-blade prop at the rear of the cab. It never flew more than a few short hops.

In 1926, automotive pioneer Henry Ford unveiled the "sky flivver," a tiny 350-pound, single-seat monoplane. Although not technically a "dual use" vehicle, the prototype aspired to fulfill Ford's dream of building "everyman's" airplane. Three different versions of the craft were flown, but after Ford's friend and pilot Harry Brooks was killed in a crash of one in 1928, Ford withdrew the project. Still, he professed faith in the concept, saying, "Mark my word. A combination airplane and motor car is coming. You may smile. But it will come."

In 1933, the U.S. government got involved in promoting the concept when aviation enthusiast and Bureau of Air Commerce chief Eugene Vidal (father of novelist Gore Vidal) offered government grants to manufacturers of a "poor man's airplane." He promised a two- or three-seat, all-metal machine costing $700, about the price of a Pontiac automobile and $300 to $500 less than any airplane then on the market. Vidal's plan drew angry criticism. Manufacturers of small planes described it as an "all mental" airplane, an unrealistic fantasy that would only destroy the sales of existing aircraft.

California inventor Waldo Waterman took Vidal up on his offer. In 1936, he showed off the "Arrowbile," a tailless airplane with detachable wings powered by a Studebaker car engine. First flown in February 1937, the only flight control device was a control wheel yoke that was suspended in front of the pilot from the cabin ceiling. Fore-and-aft movement of the yoke provided pitch control, and turning the wheel provided coordinated directional control. Brakes and a starter switch were on the floor. But at an estimated price of $3,000, the Arrowbile was way more than the $700 target. Five Arrowbiles were built, but Waterman was never able to put it into production.

In 1950, Robert Edison Fulton's "Airphibian" became the first dual-use vehicle certified by the government. Fulton's two-seat prototype consisted of two basic components: a small four-wheel vehicle and a separate wing and tail assembly. Once on the ground, the passenger compartment could simply be detached from the wings and tail and then driven away. Early promotional brochures and newsreels showed a woman in a white dress and heels detaching and rolling away the tail and wing, or reattaching the propeller with a few twists of a built-in wrench.

Powered by a 150-horsepower, six-cylinder engine, the Airphibian drove at 50 mph and flew at 120. It took off in 800 feet. The same controls could be used for flying and driving, with the wheel used for steering on the ground and in the air, and the foot pedals converting from airplane rudder pedals to automobile clutch and brake pedals. Connecting and disconnecting control cables when converting from flying to driving was cleverly accomplished through a series of interconnecting pushrods that would mate when the two components were linked. All the instruments and electrical elements automatically engaged and synchronized when the flight and road units were locked together. The engine would not start unless the units were properly secured. Fulton logged more than 100,000 miles in the Airphibian, but had to quit the project when his financial backer dropped out.

Following the Airphibian, the most successful roadable aircraft was the "Aerocar." Built in 1959 by Moulton Taylor, who credited his inspiration to having met Fulton and having seen his Airphibian, the Aerocar had a detachable wings and tail section. Five were built and flown (TV celebrity Bob Cummings bought one) but, like Fulton, Taylor could not get the financial backing to put the Aerocar into production.

There have been many just as ambitious but less successful experimental hybrids.

In the 1950s and 1960s, Leland Bryan produced a series of highway-certified folding-wing "roadables" that used their pusher propellers for both air and road power. The project ended when Bryan died in the crash of one in 1974. And in 1973, Henry Smolinski fastened the wings, tail, and aft engine of a twin-engine Cessna Skymaster to one ill-fated Ford Pinto. The wing struts collapsed on its first test flight, killing Smolinski and the pilot.

Currently, in addition to the Transition, there are more than 30 concepts for dual-use vehicles — from the " AeroCycle," a combination motorcycle and aircraft, to the LaBiche Aerospace FSC-1, a dual-use high-performance aircraft and sports car that promises speeds of 290 mph in the air and 180 mph on the ground, to the " Skycar," a vertical takeoff and landing vehicle that uses "powered lift," the same technology used by the military's vertical takeoff and landing Harrier "Jump Jet". In 2004, Boeing revealed its own as-yet-unnamed concept, a dual-rotor-powered vehicle. For a complete listing, visit the Web site.

A large part of the enduring appeal of roadable aircraft, according to Bruce Chadbourne, professor of general aviation marketing at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University, is the technical challenge of combining "two fundamentally incompatible" modes of transportation. That is, the challenge of designing a practical vehicle that is light enough to fly and stable both in the air and on the ground; that can fit into the dimensions needed to travel along roads; that can combine two control systems; and that is useful. The technical challenges can be overcome. A bigger challenge is finding a market for such a vehicle. Even if you could put "an airplane in every garage," the fact remains that, well, Americans love their cars.