Hey, everyone, gather ’round. Listen up, because I have an announcement! An important announcement! Maybe you’ve heard how a gutsy Slovakian company hoping to build and sell a flying car, the Klein Vision AirCar, had a big press event late last month announcing and introducing their production prototype flying car, all at the Living Legends of Aviation Gala, which was attended by such aerospace luminaries as Buzz Aldrin, along with bigshots like John Travolta, Morgan Freeman, and Prince Harry. Maybe Weird Al was there too, it didn’t say.
In response to this announcement, a bunch of media outlets in the past week or so have breathlessly been crowing about the first “mass-produced flying car” that is “preparing to hit the market in 2026″ with an announced price of $800,000 to $1 million dollars. Some are saying it’s the “biggest flying car advancement in half a century,” and sure, at some point all of these things may prove to be true!
But, at this moment, all of these stories and headlines lead me to the announcement I alluded to earlier. As of this moment, I hereby declare that We All Need To Stop Saying Shit About Concept Flying Cars Until The Damn Things Are Actually Real.
This recent round of excited headlines and articles is really driving me batshit, especially the “mass produced” part. Because what the hell are they talking about? Mass produced? There’s what, one of these AirCar 2 prototypes that exist? That number isn’t even plural, by the most generous definitions of the word.
Saying this thing is “mass produced” at this point is pure, unfettered speculative fiction. Maybe they hope it’ll be mass produced, but look at these direct quotes from these articles:
“The world’s first mass-produced flying car is preparing to hit the market in 2026.”
“World’s first mass-produced flying car will go on sale within months – for $1 MILLION”
We have to dial it back, way, way back, when talking about flying cars, because we’ve all been burned too many times before. Remember the Terrafugia Transition or the Pal-V or the Aeromobil 2.5 or the Samson Switchblade or the Uber Taxi or any of those technically impressive flying cars that have appeared in the past decade or so and now are never heard about?
And when it comes to Klein’s claims of mass production that so many outlets have just happily repeated, come on. What do they even mean by mass production, anyway? Remember, they say these AirCar2s will cost between $800 grand and a million, so that alone probably will make these things something other than mass sellers, and that’s not even factoring in the need for flight training or anything like that.
What do homologation rules require to count as a production car? It looks like it’s 25,000 for Rally2 class, which I think is sorta unlikely, Group A rally cars need 2,500 street-legal ones to be built, but Group B is only, what, 200? Does that even count as mass production at that point?
Bugatti capped the similarly-priced Chiron production at 500 units. Does that make it a mass-produced car? Can Klein Vision make that many of these?
All I’m asking is that we, the media that seems to give a shit about flying cars, all agree to stop writing about these damn things until one of them is actually real, as in you can buy it and use it real, and a company is actually producing them in some manner of quantity real.
Will this thing go on sale in early 2026 and actually get built in real numbers? Maybe? I mean, I wouldn’t suggest anyone do any sort of breath holding, just based on the long, long history of flying cars. Remember the one that was a flying Pinto?
We sure do – our partners at Galpin Motors were part of that whole tragic story.
Yes, this Aircar 2 is impressive. It’s sleek and it mechanically can fold its wings away in a reasonably short amount of time and it looks like it drives fairly car-like and flies fairly plane-like and sure, there’s some specs on this thing, but until it’s actually a real thing, I consider all those specs speculative, and, again, I don’t even think we should be talking about any of these damn things because they’re perpetually two years away, and I’m sick of it.
Collectively, the automotive industry has wasted far too many pixels and far too much ink on these pipe dreams, and enough is enough. Put up or shut up, flying car companies. Once people (far richer than me people, but still) can actually buy, fly, and drive these, we can talk about them again.
Until then, nothing. Flying cars have used up all their benefit of the doubt.
I wish all the companies so much luck, and I’ll be delighted to write one of the first non-bullshit stories about a flying car. Until then!
How about a story on the e-Pegasus? They’ve got a contract for 300 of their mythical beings:
https://bepegasus.com/
You need to kick this up a notch and require UFO’s before they can make the claim. anything short of a UFO is just not gonna sell.
If a “flying car” needs to be driven to an airport where a pilot (who may or may not als be the driver) has to calculate weight distribution and fuel load, report their intended route to ATC, then fly to another airport, from whence they can drive to their destination, it’s not a car with rudimentary flying aptitude, it’s a plane with advanced taxiing capabilities.
A million-dollar 2-seater that’s as long as an S-Class and turns into a 2400lb airplane that fits a third of the people and performs worse than a 1700lb Piper isn’t just a bad proposition, it’s a non-starter.
It’s *far* cheaper AND more enjoyable to drive an actual S-class to the airport, where you get into your actual Piper or Cirrus or whatever, fly to your destination, where a chauffeur is waiting for you in an S-class (the chauffeur was hired with the money you saved on fuel during your flight, not with what you saved from your monthly payment), and you can bring along twice as many people.
I honestly believe you’ll be writing about a flying car before you publish a review of a functional CyberCab.
That being said, they’re both dumb as shit.
I think this rule should be applied to hypercar startups as well.
Except that once in a blue moon a brand new company actually succeeds in building a hypercar. Sure, for every Koenigsegg there’s a hundred Cizetas or Lotecs, but some of them do actually exist.
Unless it makes a cute thrumming noise and folds up into a briefcase which I can then toss onto my desk at work – I’m not interested.
Shouldn’t we at least have single person quadcopters? We need new ways for morons to hurt themselves and then blame someone else for letting them do it.
Given the shitty level of driving on the streets, I proffer a giant FUCK NO to the idea of ‘flying cars’. Jesus what a dumb idea.
As you would need a pilot’s certificate for any type of vehicle of that kind, we can also just begin calling them driving planes.
-And then use the saved space and mental capability for fun stuff about the VW Type 166 Schwimmwagen and the Amphicar! Maybe also the DUKW 😀
A DUKW has always been my dream car, so much more practical than a flying car.
Back in the 70s there was one that you would see parked in San Francisco and in Mill Valley that someone had converted into an amphibious houseboat, with a shingle roof and stained glass windows. It was magnificent.
My fave is the BDRM, a Soviet amphibious armoured car. In ex-Eastern Bloc countries there’s been a few of them converted into mostly expedition and hunting vehicles.
Pretty sure Nissan’s been making flying cars for years now. Altimas fly into buildings, off bridges, over roundabouts, and you can get them super cheap.
Mic drop…
How about we stop talking about flying cars until we figure out how you survive an accident a half mile straight up?
Should we stop talking about regular aircraft too?
Regular aircraft are, statistically speaking, not an issue.
They are more so than flying cars.
Yeah, because they *exist* in a meaningful sense.
Which should then mean someone has already long since figured out how you survive an accident a half mile straight up, right?
Comparing a jet airliner to the current prototype flying cars is a bit like comparing a Bugatti Veyron to that tarted-up 2CV in the Peter Sellers “Pink Panther” movies.
There are more than jetliners up there. How’s the survivability of a mishap in a Piper Cub half a mile up?
I don’t know and I’m not rich enough to have to care.
Same way we never get killed in jet crashes. That single lap belt.
I know this was meant humorously… but, look up the FAA report on how to do airline safety, the one that specifically instructs, among other things, that there needs to be formal protections so that pilots can self-report mistakes, without fear of reprisal.
As much as we jest, the truth is that aircraft travel safety is actually really complex and a really well-thought-out machine.
Except when that safety involves pilot training for a 737 Max.
Airbags.
Really big ones.
Like film stuntpeople use.
Better plan ahead.
Parachutes, the peasants below killed in the crash don’t count.
Glad to know I don’t count. Thanks.
This is great in the world of Gerry Anderson. It would make a nice shuttle to Tracy Island. In the real world, it’s an airplane with folding wings.
Flying cars sound like combo washer-dryers. Sure, in theory they can wash and dry your clothes in one go. But unless you hang your clothes out to dry afterwards, you’ll still be a gross damp, musty mess if you try to use the machine exactly as intended.
We’ve had flying cars for over a century. They are called aeroplanes. Flying “cars” in this context are dumb. They make no sense at all. There is 0 demand for a “flying car” if there was we would all have them. Aviation technology hasn’t advanced since the invention of the jet engine. To make a “flying car” ie a vehicle that you drive to the supermarket and then fly to Honolulu actually viable it needs to have vertical take off. The experience in the sky needs to better (or as good) as a fairly nice private plane and on the road better than a fairly nice car. As it stands all “flying cars” are small and cramped and offer no advantage over driving to the airport and getting into a plane. You can’t take off from your driveway, you can’t land at grandmas house and there’s nowhere to put your stuff. For $800k-$1,0000 you can buy a Range Rover and a small plane. You can even rent your small plane out when you aren’t using it. “flying cars” won’t work until they are actually flying cars – ie levitation or vertical take off. As it stands they are just aeroplanes that you can drive on the road to the airport to then take off on a runway. There is no benefit to this, it doesn’t solve a transport solution.
As an aside can you imagine what happens when a “flying car” is on its third owner called Jim. Jim thinks he can service it himself. Jim also doesn’t have a pilots license, but Jim is happy to give it a go…
Summed it up nicely.
“To make a “flying car” ie a vehicle that you drive to the supermarket and then fly to Honolulu actually viable it needs to have vertical take off”
From where? There isn’t a single VTOL aircraft in existence that can fly to Honolulu from anywhere except from somewhere else in Hawaiian islands.
That’s kinda my point… when we hear flying cars we think of the jetsons, or the scene from Star Wars where all the “cars” are driving on highways in the sky. What we don’t think of is driving your car to a run way taking off and flying around. The thought of a flying car is giving everyone the ultimate freedom to travel absolutely everywhere. Not what every single concept has failed to give us.
My example could have been the Seychelles or Greenland. It doesn’t really matter…
My point is pretty much all existing small aircraft VTOL or otherwise also fail to deliver on that kind of range. Nobody is flying to Honolulu from the mainland in a Piper Cub or Jet Ranger. That doesn’t keep anyone from buying a Piper Cub or Jet Ranger.
Lets keep expectations kinda realistic:
Enough range for a typical daily commute
Take off and land on local authorized (e.g. straight, flat, no overhead power lines) suburban streets
Easy to learn how to operate for most people
Quiet and comfortable for 2+
Runs on cheap, readily available energy source be it gasoline, diesel, electricity, alcohol, whatever. No plutonium, no antimatter, etc.
At least as safe to operate as a motorcycle. At the very least the machine itself shouldn’t kill it’s users nor bystanders by design flaw. More than that will have to see some compromises.
Have a resting footprint no larger than a conventional car. Fits in a one car garage and a standard parking spot.
Be as serviceable as a typical car.
Be quiet enough to not piss off the neighborhood.
Have a serviceable lifetime at least as long as a semi modern car.
Be priced so a mere millionaire can afford it. At least in the beginning.
So what is the problem that this situation solves? I mean a helicopter solves this issue. A mere millionaire can afford a small electric helicopter…
My point is that until a flying car is better than the alternate. They won’t happen because they aren’t solving a problem. Why was the iPhone so successful? I suddenly had an iPod, a camera, a phone, and a laptop in my pocket that was easy to use and looked good.
I didn’t know that I needed that problem solved. But suddenly there was a device that changed the way we communicate.
Until some genius comes up with a “flying car” that solves the fundamental problem of personalized transportation – ie road congestion and speed limits. All these “flying car” concepts are, are toys for the very rich. But there is no real commercial value in them, otherwise they would attract investment, but as it stands none are a viable commercial product, in the same way amphibious cars have never been successful.
Until some genius comes up with a “flying car” that solves the fundamental problem of personalized transportation – ie road congestion and speed limits.
Some genius did just that with telecommuting and teleconferencing. At least for those fortunate enough to be able to do it.
The daily commute of a LOT of office drones only serve corporate real estate values, businesses that service those cooperate campuses, automakers, auto dealers, auto parts manufacturers and retailers, lunchtime eateries, road maintenance companies, police, energy companies and the tax basis of the municipalities those campuses are located in. Also the egos of middle managers.
If all the people who could do their job remotely just as effectively as in a cubicle did so you’d have a lot less congestion and higher average roadway speeds.Teleconferencing also helps keep people off the roads.
Other genius invented home delivery of goods. One Amazon or UPS truck delivers a lot of stuff so those people can stay at home instead of driving to the store.
The noise and prop wash will prevent that from ever happening on regular city streets. You would blow the mulch and gravel from your neighbor’s yard everywhere anytime you took off or landed. Possibly their roof shingles as well.
That assumes a flying car behaves like a regular aircraft. It’s probably a good assumption but I don’t think its an insurmountable challenge.
Looking at some of these over the years, it might be good to just make this an embargo, so the story is already in the chamber just in case.
We won’t get to these things via making a car turn into an airplane, but by making an airplane turn into a car. Judge the efforts accordingly. And it will have extensive genetics donated by the quadcopter industry.
YES.
What I do know is that this vehicle had to go through a lengthy airworthiness certification process in Slovakia that took ages but it was certified. Getting certified now from the various countries that they want to sell into will possibly be key to getting the funding to start production but it’s way past proof of concept and beyond anything else in its class. If any manufacturer can succeed it will be this company because they actually have a product.
“The 4th-gen prototype has logged 500+ take-offs/landings and 170+ flight-hours.”
Funding is what these dog & pony shows are all about. Nothing more than trying to extract cash from suckers.
I get that if you’re the investor that actually pics the company that is successful at this, you do stand to make a ton of cash. I guess it’s no different than playing the lottery, similar odds anyway. Hopefully everyone goes into it knowing it likely amounts to nothing.
So, how are we feeling about the return of supersonic commercial transport? News on that need to go Boom too?
First of all, we get into these “production car” arguments all the time. Lots of people think there’s some magical figure that sets that, but there isn’t. If it’s built to a set of specifications, repeatable in series, and is road legal somewhere on the planet, then it’s a production car. The Vector W8 is a production car, and they made like 18 of them over four years.
Anyway. As I’ve said before, the closest we’ve come to an actual certified flying car was the Terrafugia Transition. They were founded by MIT people and were very serious, I had several communications with them. They had FMVSS exemptions in hand. I personally saw the thing fly and drive at Oshkosh. They were already doing certification flights for it as a Light Sport Aircraft. They even had investment at the end from Geely, for some unknown reason.
And they were still nowhere near being able to produce and sell the things.
The problem is, NHTSA and FAA regulations are completely at odds with each other. Everything that needed to be in it as a modern automobile meeting current regulations, made it too heavy to be classed as a Light Sport Aircraft without an exemption. And the reason they went that route was because full GA certification is simply too expensive and time consuming (think years of work).
There were also problems getting airbag manufacturers to agree to a defeatable system that wouldn’t go off during a particularly hard landing. There were complications with the producers of stability control systems that had concerns that yaw rate sensors would freak out in midair and cut the engine power. They couldn’t find DOT-legal tires small and light enough for the landing gear, and were trying to get permission to use motorcycle tires instead.
This is as I remember the details when I followed the story over the course of maybe 8 years. I really wanted them to succeed, if for no other reason than I’d get to add surely the world’s strangest road vehicle to the NAPA catalog. I even bought a t-shirt, which I still have.
But I’m being honest when I say if Terrafugia couldn’t make it work, then nobody will.
That’s why we’ll never see anything like a flying car without some huge leap in propulsion. Planes and cars have very different needs and are at odds with each other.
What problem is this solving. You still need to land at an airport. For a shit ton less you can buy a Cessna 172 and keep a CT5-Vsport at every airport you would fly to.
What comes first, this thing or the fusion space booster rocket I heard about going to testing in 2027. It’s more likely I’m dating Elle McPherson in 2027 (and that’s not likely).
“It’s more likely I’m dating Elle McPherson in 2027 (and that’s not likely).”
Your chances are a lot better than they used to be, she spent two years with Andrew Wakefield, the fraudster, anti-vaxer, and disgraced physician who was given the UK medical equivalent of disbarring a lawyer because of his fraudulent unethical research that made people think the MMR vax caused autism.
Which means I found out the answer to “What would make Elle McPherson unattractive to me”.
https://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/OHkAAOSwBvdgzTRN/s-l1200.webp
‘Never feel sorry for a man who owns a *flying car*’
Thanks for that Internet rabbit hole that I went down, er, link.
At the very least wait until the FAA is doing whatever the FAA does to certify an aircraft is airworthy, if anything.
(I mean a real FAA, not the “Okay thank you for buying 1500 Trumpcoins, here’s your certification” FAA)
Kind of analogous to an electronic device becoming “real” when it shows up in FCC testing documentation online.
Just be careful flying it into Newark.
The only flying “cars” that make sense are things like the Pivotal Helix. Part 103 electric Ultralights that are VTOL and fairly easy to fly, if you got $190,000-$260,000 to burn…
If it requires a pilot’s license people are not going to buy it, even proven airplane designs that have been in production for longer than I’ve been alive like the Cessna 182 are over half a million dollars per brand new. The FAA has made making standard category general aviation aircraft too expensive, the only people who buy new production standard category GA aircraft are uber rich folk and training schools.
The FAA sucks to deal with, I don’t call them the Fuck Aviators Administration for nothing.
Certainly not enough magnetos nor leaded fuels capability for an FAA approval.
I actually like Magnetos…
I read the starting price for a new 172 is now around $400,000. I was able to buy a 1/4 share of a used 150 for less than $4,000 in 1997. That and 4 gph on an autogas STC made for the cheapest flying I ever did.
$450,000 starting. I bought my 1964 150D for $16,500 several years back.
Point being that the new production of a single engine piston airplane that has been basically unchanged since 1963 shouldn’t be $450,000.
Mine was a 150G.
Agreed. The avionics in a new 172 are a lot more advanced than anything I flew in while getting my ticket 42 years ago or since then. But electronics aren’t THAT expensive. My guess is that all that extra money is going into a slush fund for when someone does something stupid in one of their planes and then tries to sue the F out of them.
I used to spend almost a morbid amount of time reading NTSB final reports. Trying to learn what not to do. But it really came down to: know your aircraft, its limitations, your limitations and common sense.
I liked the D, had the rear window but still had the manual flaps, I could pull 40 degrees of flaps or drop it all in a second and the straight tail had better handling characteristics.
Your guess is correct. FAA makes them liable for structural failures for 25 years after the airframe is made, so they charge more and put it into a big legal fund.
Metal fatigue is a thing for 99% of aircraft out there. Aluminum suddenly fails after too many cycles, and steel spars are pretty uncommon. What your aircraft could do brand new and what it can do now are 2 very different things.
One of the 150s I learned in had the manual flaps, probably a C or a D, I really liked the feel of those. It’s like, it was telling you “nope, you’re going a little too fast for that.”
I think the analog on this site is a manual transmission.
I had an early Nissan pickup truck, and I once accidentally down shifted to 2nd instead of 4th, off an offramp. Thankfully it was on wet pavement and that rear end going sideways was the clue and a quick stab at the clutch pedal got things stabilized. And saved the drivetrain.
They did feel great, only ever used 40 degrees of flaps once though, damn near had to point the nose straight down to keep from stalling.
The manual flaps are analogous to a manual transmission but I’d say they’re more like the manual transmission on a motorcycle, all linear.
The issue with electric flaps I have other than the fact that they are electric is how slow they are to go up and go down. If you F up on short final or just after takeoff you need instantaneous inputs in most GA aircraft, and the electric flaps are anything but instantaneous.
The less horsepower your plane has the more drastically you have to reduce drag to get any sort of performance bump, and those flaps create a lot of drag. I’m not certain a stock 150 could fly in level flight with 40 degrees of flaps, which makes for a pretty dangerous situation if the electric flaps decide to deploy.
I think the electric ones in 150s only went to 30 degrees. At least in my 150G. But again, it was a long time ago. And I never took a picture of the controls. But I seem to remember they only went to 30. Maybe it was the 152s that only went to 30.
And yeah, a go around was an interesting adventure with only 100 HP (at best) at your disposal. Other than during training, I only had to do it once.
Flying into Ukiah, no tower, the wind was swirling around, so the windsock was not much help. There wasn’t other traffic, so I made a guess which way to land. A gust sent us up 200 feet while I was on short final for 33. And it was a RP approach, which I was never fond of. I went around and got safely on the ground the second try. A C320 came in from the other direction a few minutes later with zero drama.
Amusingly, the return trip to now long gone Natomas, where I got all my instruction, we had a 40 mph north wind, I set down at almost a standstill. I didn’t kill or hurt anyone. And I’m good with that.
Too expensive to do stuff like that anymore.
I think the 152s were limited to 30 degrees but I could be wrong.
Had a time where density altitude reared it’s head, me and an instructor took off for night training, once I got out of ground effect we were managing maybe 10fpm climb, we gently as we could got the plane back to the runway and call it a night.
Besides one instance of opposite direction wind shear on short final the wind never treated me badly, then again a lot of my time was in a Beaver on Straight floats.
Yeah, flying is quite costly especially relative to how impractical for travel it is, it has to be a labor of love, and the FAA really killed it for me.
A Beaver on floats! Wow. I got to sit right seat in a Beaver from Lake Washington up to Victoria, BC.
Once we got there, it was so cool to see Twin Otters on floats coming in and docking. One of those or an A-Star would be my lottery aircraft.
It’s only two years away*!!!
All those breathless Aircar touts can go take a flying leap. Oh wait, they already did.