Flying car

courtesy : Flying car

flying electric car

Chinese electric vehicle manufacturer XPeng has released footage of the maiden voyage of its ground-breaking (or just plain whacky) eVTOL, a car that can drive on roads and navigate the airways, propelled by a set of four helicopter-style rotors.

This is not the first VTOL the world has seen, but while most prototype VTOL cars (VTOL stands for Vertical Take-off and Landing) tend to more closely resemble smaller planes with more robust wheels – like this prototype VTOL from Volkswagen – this vehicle truly looks like a car on propellers.

The voyage was unveiled as part of XPeng’s annual 1024 Tech Day, where the company introduces its new products and services and teases some of the technologies it hopes to build in future.

The eVTOL was designed by the company’s urbain air mobility (UAM) division, AeroHT, and is fitted with a distributed, multirotor configuration that lifts it, seemingly effortlessly, off the ground.In the video the car drives out onto the tarmac, its rotors start to turn, and it takes off vertically, flying a few metres hesitantly forward, before descending back to the tarmac.

So, will we all be rolling out of our garages and lifting off to fly to work from our suburban streets any time soon? 

If you live in China, you just might. XPeng says its eVTOL will enter mass production in 2024, which raises a whole host of questions – how will the cars, and their likely non-pilot-trained drivers, navigate aerospace traffic? Will you need a new drivers’ license? What happens if an unheeding bird hurls itself into your windscreen? 

In fact, the VTOL car industry in China is racking up hefty financing (up to $500 million according to one report). But VTOLs are regulated as aircraft, meaning they must undergo totally different safety tests to normal cars.

#non-pilot-trained drivers

#seemingly effortlessly

# helicopter-style rotors

#ISBC