The flying car you’ve been waiting for
AirCar prototype that actually deserves its ‘car’ tag makes first inter-city flight in SlovakiaA Slovakian company has built a prototype flying car that can transform from sports car to light aircraft at the click of a button – and it actually makes a decent fist of passing itself off as both modes of transport.
Making its first inter-city flight this week, the AirCar reportedly took off from Nitra and landed 35 minutes later in Bratislava, about 75km away, where it then morphed into a ‘car’ in about three minutes.
Okay, it still looks pretty wacky on the road with its huge rear wing and propeller still visible.
But there’s a high-performance exoticar vibe here that sees the AirCar turn into something more than simply a folded-up aeroplane.
Whether on land or in the sky, each mode of transport is fully functional, with the machine set to be road-legal as well as commuter-certified by European aviation regulators, making it a proper viable transport solution – at least in Europe.
That means unlike electric vertical take-off and landing (eVTOL) vehicles currently being developed by manufacturers including Mercedes-Benz, Hyundai, Uber, Toyota and, in Australia, Alauda, the AirCar can not only fly through the sky but it’ll also land and drive as a regular car would.
A notable difference in this case, however, is that the AirCar is powered by a 160hp (119kW) BMW engine, not an electric powertrain. It also needs a runway to take off and land, as opposed to eVTOLs which operate more like helicopters.
Klein Vision, the company behind the AirCar, is said to have been working on a series of flying car prototypes for the past 30 years and currently has around 40 air hours under its belt.
This particular outing, which saw the machine cruise at around 90 knots (167km/h), was its 142nd landing.
The company says the light aircraft has flown to 8200ft (2500m) and made 45-degree banking turns during testing, using its “simple fixed-pitch propeller”. It also comes fitted with a ballistic parachute, should something go awry.
Klein Vision is currently working on an even more powerful 300hp (224kW) model, which is said to be capable of cruising at 160 knots (296km/h) to a range of 1000km.
Fitted with a variable-pitch propeller, the new one will come with the same certifications to legally travel on land and in the sky.
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