In the market for a new form of transportation? Trying to decide between an Agusta A109 and a Pilatus PC-12? Well, forget those, just forget them. Mortgage your house, rob a couple banks, and sell your friends into slavery ’cause a civilian version of the V-22 Osprey is now up for grabs. Called the Bell 609, it’s functionally the same (albeit a lot smaller) than its big brother, sporting the ability to take off and land with the versatility and precision of a helicopter. After takeoff, it can rotate its engines forward to vertical allowing it to fly with the speed and efficiency of an airplane. It’ll seat up to 9 passengers, has an 1100 mile range, and can hit 300 mph at 25,000 ft.
What’s this little toy going to set you back? Unsurprisingly, it’s likely to be somewhere north of $20 million. And considering the uninspiring development record of the original V-22 (which cost $70 million a pop or $115 million fully outfitted, by the way), you might want to set aside a little extra for maintenance. And flight school.
With fancy new airliners from Boeing and Airbus soon to be replacing the world’s commercial fleets, I guess something has to be done with the old aircraft. Converting them to scrap metal or salvaging as many old parts as possible is one approach, but a crafty entrepreneur in Korea has found a way for at least one 747 to stay profitable (even though it will ever fly again) by converting it into a restaurant. I have absolutely no idea how the aircraft was delivered to this location, but given the size of a 747 the restaurant can easily accommodate over 150 tables. One of the engines has even been converted to a daily specials menu so that patrons can decide what to order while they’re waiting to board. Sadly a 747 restaurant franchise is a little grand for my needs, so I’m probably just going to stick with converting an old Cessna into a hot dog cart.
Remember when I was all excited because someone put one of the Tim Burton era Batmobiles on eBay? Well I’m glad the auction was removed because it allowed me to save my money for this Airwolf replica instead. Unfortunately this Airwolf was never affiliated with the TV series, but was created for a helicopter museum in Tennessee. It is pretty accurate though, since it was built on an existing Bell 222A airframe and the side panels, nose panel and other details were all made from the real Airwolf’s specs and plans. In other words, this is probably as close as you’ll ever get to owning one.
Like the series, the helicopter museum is no more, which is why their collection is now up for auction. At the time of writing the latest bid was $38,900, but the reserve hasn’t been met. And if you plan on making your own bid, just keep in mind this is strictly a replica and can’t actually be flown out of your secret mountain base. Also Ernest Borgnine is not included.
Yesterday, in Switzerland, Yves Rossy made the first official demonstration flight of his jet powered personal flying wing. He was dropped from a plane at 8000 feet and spent 5 minutes flying (horizontally!) over the mountains at speeds of up to 186 MPH before parachuting gently to the ground. The wing itself is 8 feet across, and is powered by four Jet-Cat P200 jet turbine engines outputting 50 pounds of thrust each with a flight time of up to 10 minutes. There’s no integrated control system besides a throttle; Yves controls the direction of the wing entirely with his body. The engines enable him to ascend (up to 1000 feet per minute) but don’t bet on being able to take off from the ground all by yourself. Not that you’ll be getting one of these anytime soon… So far, there’s only the one, and no plans to produce more, and even if there were, you can bet you wouldn’t be qualified to use one.
I’ve never flown first class. Not once. I know that if for some reason it ever happens, it’s going to make the rest of my life flying economy that much more depressing. But finally, finally, someone has come up with a seat configuration that looks like it’ll make the whole experience suck not nearly so much. Designed by Thompson Solutions, Cozy Suite seats are arranged on a diagonal, which somehow allows more seats to be stuffed into the airplane, while also offering numerous advantages to the occupants, including lots more privacy and a place to rest your head. You also get 2 more inches of legroom, an average of 2 more inches of seat width, and best of all, the seat reclines by sliding down and forward, having no effect on the seat behind you, which means I’ll be able to relax a little bit without feeling like a total jerk.
Delta (or DeltaWest or whatever it’s turning into) should begin retrofitting its Boeing 777 and 767 economy classes with Cozy Suites in 2010, which is not soon enough… These seats are better for passengers AND carriers, so let’s all get with the program, shall we?
Although you can’t buy one, the F-117A Night Hawk stealth fighter is perhaps one of the coolest gadgets to be produced in the last few decades. The entire fleet of 52 planes was informally retired on Tuesday in order to free up money for F-22 Raptors and F-35 Lightning IIs. They’re not going to be sold off to museums or scrapped or anything like that; they’ve proven their combat effectiveness and will be held in reserve in case they’re needed again at some point in the future, which is the same thing that happened to the battleship Missouri. Anyway, after the jump, I just thought I’d post some pics of this excitingly chunky, totally badass airplane. Read the rest of this entry »
When it comes to remote control helicopters, I’m a bit of a snob, in that I own one of these and know how to fly it without crashing (most of the time). R/C helis like the one I have allow for the same range of control as a real helicopter: pitch, yaw, roll, and throttle. That’s four axes of control. Most of the little PicooZ helicopters have so far been only two channel: you can go up and down, and left and right (they keep going forward on their own). That, for me, takes away the whole point of flying a helicopter… The ability to hover. The PicooZ Tandem Z and the PicooZ 3 Channel Helicopter are new additions to the PicooZ micro R/C heli lineup, and that third channel adds a forwards/backwards control, letting you hover these little guys. The third addition (the yellow one in the picture) is only two channel, but it’s extra-tiny. Otherwise, the stats on these are about the same: infra-red control, 20 minute charge, 10 minute flight, trim control, LED, made of something crash resistant, and multiple frequencies are available.
You’re looking at about $80 for the Tandem, and $60 each for the other two. Available now from Red5; it’ll probably be under the Air Hogs brand when it shows up in the states.
Isn’t she a beauty? This is Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShipTwo, the solar system’s first commercial passenger spaceship that we know of. It was just announced on Wednesday, along with its mothership, White Knight 2. SpaceShipTwo is designed to ferry 6 civilian passengers and 2 crewmembers 68 miles above the surface of the earth, where they’ll spend a few precious minutes in weightlessness, drinking in the view, before descending back to the ground at a peak force of 6 gravities over 20 seconds. All for just $200,000.
Okay, so the personal jetpack is pretty cool, but I think the personal jet wing is even cooler. Although it can’t (yet) launch you into the air, the four rocket engines (not sure if they’re rockets or jet turbines) bolted onto the carbon graphite wing provide enough thrust to propel the pilot horizontally for 4-6 minutes at 115 mph, at around 8000 ft (after you’ve jumped out of an airplane first). Landings are accomplished via parachute. Yeah, so maybe it’s not quite as practical or versatile as the personal jetpack, but doesn’t it look badass, especially with the folding wingtips? Vid (it’s in French, but you just want to see the thing in action, right?) after the jump. Read the rest of this entry »
The guys at Gizmodo are in Dubai for an air show, and spotted this bit of news. Sheikh Rashid, the ruler of Dubai, just purchased the first unit of the Aerion Supersonic Business Jet. And some jet! Even at $80,000,000 the bird seems to be worth every penny. It’s able to sprint up to 1.6 Mach, and cruise at 1.5 Mach where allowed, which is pretty much only over oceans. At this speed though, an Atlantic crossing is done in just two hours. Over land, it can fly along at 0.98Mach in the USA (due to regulations) at a similar cost-per-mile than competing subsonic private jets; in other parts of the world, where regulations only require no sonic boom to reach ground, it can speed up to 1.1 Mach without a boom. Its twin Pratt & Whitney JT8D-219 engines produce 19,600 pounds of thrust and it has a ceiling of 51,000 feet.
Expect delivery around 2014, and if you’re serious about getting one, you can leave a $250,000 deposit now. Then, you can call me and buy me lunch, you rich bastard.
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