Two for the Road: Rutan's BiPod Roadable

[beamjockey]

Recently I've been joking, "Burt Rutan can't retire! I don't have my flying car yet!"

Mr. Rutan made me look foolish when the Scaled Composites BiPod was announced.

I can't think of another twin-fuselage roadable airplane. Nor any with a hybrid gasoline-electric drive.

At last report, they hadn't installed the propellers yet, but the BiPod had flown short hops by accelerating on its electrically-propelled wheels.

Comments

[wcg.livejournal.com]

Beautiful.

[tigertoy.livejournal.com]

Rutan hasn't finished his mission until there's an actual product available for purchase at a price that somewhat ordinary people can afford and it's safe enough (somehow) that ordinary people are allowed to use them routinely. (If you have to have a pilot's license, file a flight plan, and take off and land at an airport, it may be a "roadable airplane" but it doesn't count as a flying car.)

[dd-b.livejournal.com]

That looks really cool.

Probably still a bit expensive, and requiring full pilot trainiing, but hey, nothing's perfect!

[purpleranger.livejournal.com]

Okay, now that just looks cool, even in car mode. Don't see much cargo space, though.