April 3, 2012

The PAL-V finally makes its maiden flight

Filed under: Automobiles,Aviation,Technology by Orangemaster @ 7:00 am

Way back in 2007 we had already posted on the flying car, announced by Dutch company PAL-V, and in 2009 we posted about PAL-V finally demoing it and it didn’t fly.

Earlier this year [2009] Pal-V promised a demonstration of its technology, it disappointed the collected international press by showing a gyroscope and a Carver, but not the hybrid that everybody has been waiting for these past years.

And since third time’s the charm, here below is the video of the flying car, uploaded just yesterday. The PAL-V can be used in road traffic as well as in the air, offering a choice of driving or flying. It can reach speeds of up to 180 km/h on land and in the air, and should have a normal petrol version and biofuel version. I wonder about licenses, insurances, pundits, and the rest of the fallout, but one thing at a time.

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June 27, 2009

Tricycle car company Carver keels over

Filed under: Automobiles by Branko Collin @ 1:20 pm

Carver Europe, producer of the tricycle car with the same name, has gone bankrupt, reports Algemeen Dagblad (Dutch). The Carver is a cross between a regular car and a motor cycle, of which the cockpit and front wheel can roll (or list if you are nautically inclined)—something the Reliant Robin never quite got the hang of.

CEO Willem Verheul told the paper that there wasn’t enough of a market for the 50,000 euro vehicle: “We were hoping to sell 300 per year, instead we only managed 200.” The ‘s Gravendeel, Zuid Holland based company will lay off nine employees.

One company that is going to be distraught at the news are flying car / vaporware makers Pal-V, who based the design of their eponymous vehicle on the Carver One. When earlier this year Pal-V promised a demonstration of its technology, it disappointed the collected international press by showing a gyroscope and a Carver, but not the hybrid that everybody has been waiting for these past years.

Top Gear’s Jeremy Clarkson once famously said about the Carver: “Absolute, hands-on-heart, I have never had so much fun in a car,” and his side-kick whose name I forget called it “the gadget to end all gadgets.”

(Photo by Wikimedia user Detectandpreserve, some rights reserved.)

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March 22, 2007

Another day, another flying car

Filed under: Automobiles,Gadgets by Branko Collin @ 11:55 am

Flying cars are a thing that overenthusiastic inventors have been promising the world for almost as long as the automobile itself exists. The last of these inventors are the Dutch company PAL-V. They’ve got a hunch that thanks to relaxed regulations and improved technology, their motor-cycle-with-roof cum gyrocopter might just succeed this time around. I especially love their use case. If business were this brisk, you probably would not need a flying car.

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