Research
Are Ornithopters a Birdbrained Idea or Smart UAM?
eVTOLs with Flapping Wings – Great, Big Wings (and Little Ones Too!)
When you think “Renaissance Man,” you will likely conjure Leonardo da Vinci. Sculptor-extraordinaire, painter of masterworks, and yes, even a designer for a flying machine centuries before the Wright Brothers cracked the code to modern aviation. Leonardo imagined and sketched flying machines with the pilot prone, standing, and using his arm and leg strength to…
NASA, Wisk, and Alaka’i Form UAM Partnership
As part of its Advanced Air Mobility (AAM) National Campaign (NC), NASA announced on November 16, 2020, that it had signed information exchange agreements with UAM vehicle developers, Mountain View, California-based Wisk and Hopkinton, Massachusetts-based Alaka’i Technologies. The agreements will facilitate the integration of eVTOLs and hybrid VTOLs into the U.S. national airspace. Working with…
AFWERX Shifts UAM Initiative Into High Gear
AFWERX, the U.S. Air Force unit that fosters innovation and connections between private industry, academia, and the military, is recommending more than 250 proposals it received in response to its X20D Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR), Open Topic solicitation regarding its “flying car” subject. The group is on track to be “the largest single cohort…
Public Acceptance of Flying Cars
What's it going to take for UAM to take off?
Developers of flying cars (or eVTOLs, if you will) predict they will have vehicles ready for certification by 2023. Many of them are looking for governments to certify their aircraft by 2025. Some analysts predict nearly 500,000 air taxis around the globe will be ferrying passengers by 2040. After conquering the technological and regulatory challenges,…
CS Group May Make Software for eVTOLs
CS Group works with engine control systems, systems that will also be critical for UAM to succeed
“When once you have tasted flight, you will forever walk the earth with your eyes turned skyward, for there you have been, and there you will always long to return.” – Leonardo DaVinci When the Wright Brothers lifted off at Kitty Hawk, it was a fully mechanical miracle. Today’s aircraft are a thousand times more…
eVTOLs and Flying Cars Not Quite Cleared for Takeoff
But an UAM Traffic Management (UTM) System Is Taking Shape
“Ground control to Major Tom. Ground control to Major Tom.” (David Bowie flashback.) According to its latest reporting, the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) is managing roughly 16.1 million flights annually, averaging about 44,000 flights daily. That’s about 5,400 flights at any given moment. The advent of urban air mobility (AKA advanced air mobility) is…