A childhood dream has come true for the designers of a bike that can fly.
The Czech designers began the project a year and a half ago and have now demonstrated the vehicle’s capabilities, as shown in this video.
Three companies – Technodat, Duratec and Evektor – set themselves the objective to design a practical product and then create its prototype with the assistance of Dassault Systèmes 3DExperience Platform.
The team, led by Technodat’s Ales Kobylik, eventually settled on the multicopter principle for flight, which is made possible by the thrust of six horizontal propellers.
Flying bike technical details:
Total output: 54kW
Drive: 4× main motors 10kW, placed in opposed pairs at the front and rear
2× stabilisation motors 7kW, placed on turnable consoles at the sides of the bike
Propellers: main propellers , diameter 1,200mm, maximum revs 2,200/min, stabilisation propellers, diameter 650mm, the propellers are surrounded by composite casings
Energy: set of Li-Pol accumulators with total capacity 50Ah
Bike frame: welded parts made of light alloy (duralumin)
Dimensions: approx. 3,800mm (length) × 2,500mm (width) × 1,200mm (height)
Weight: 95kg without a pilot
Maximum laden weight: 170kg
Flight time: 5 minutes
Maximum speed: 50km/hour
That’s brilliant! Would I need a pilot’s licence? After all, I can ride an electric bike on the road without a licence. The 75kg available for the pilot might be a problem because I weigh 73kg without clothes.
I wonder the reasons for these inventions sometimes and how come it took 18 months to get to the protoype?
When would you need a bike to fly?
Or am I just lacking a creative mind? Probably!
Dyson should have an interest in this, he is good with fans, bringing products to market with limited use and at very high prices.
I like it !
I like it because they have a sense of fun.
I like it because this world we live in can be fun 😉 it is only limited by our imagination.
Just learn to use your imagination in any way, other than all the news media rubbish that we are drip fed daily.
All that for maximum of 4Km long flight. Try something else!
Perhaps cars also can fly with the four doors opening outwords and twisting down with control from dashboard and multipples of fans fitted on the inside of the doors providing vertical thrust when oppened. Energy for the fans comes from batteries charged while running on the raod and from solar cell roof
Hardly news worthy – you can see this type of craft (minus the bicycle bit) flying down at the local park most Sunday afternoons. The only difference is the size so as to comply with CAA rules!
Noticed no one was risking flying on it! Or maybe they have H&S spoiling the fun!
Not sure if a pure Hex-copter layout would have been better allows better redundancy. On the other hand a tri-copter might be better from a size and ease of folding away.
Wonder if adding a generator taken from the pedals would improve flight time – would be great for mountain bike ‘off roading’ (literally)!
X-Copters are definitely a possibility for the ‘man in the street’ flight vehicles.
@Kevin Very true – although a lot of beer can be wasted!
Excellent!! Although the rider looked like he was scared rigid!!
Tim
very good efforts have brought such impressive developments.How power,weight and cost may be cut down;should be next motto.It is possible.i am sure this news will be brought by your journal.
Not Very Impressive in all honesty.
A rather heavy quadcopter that has a 5 minute range and HUGE safety issues. Even less impressive with a dummy sat on it rather than a pilot?cyclist? flying it.
It looks like a good college project in use of LIPo batteries and motors.
Best to pursue ground transport I suggest.
Excellent! Might get the damn things of the roads and stop holding us all up and getting in our way!
Interesting project, but would have been more interested in the objectives of the sponsoring companies and the engineers – and future development plans. “The Engineer” – a little more depth next time!
Describing it as a bicycle is the scary thing; providing two wheel twits a third dimension in which to ignore all rules and common sense, then blame others for their accidents. “Why not call it a flying horse, then”- “now don’t start !”
Interest turned to disappointment when I read that the power output was 54kw – definitely not man-powered – especially when I thought back to the first man-powered cross channel flight…
Would like to see you bicycle with this monstrosity.
A bike weighing 95 kg, slightly up hill….. whahahahahaaa, poor you.
Not to mention the size.
Sorry, waste of time, money and effort.
Impractical
Big
Clumsy
Round out useless
Please guys, would have liked it more if you used your energy for something more usable.
@theengineer: please remove this as a scientific thing, it’s rubbish