Wingspan or lift

Lift simply must be greater than the total weight to acheive flight. (Think of lift as the reverse of weight).

To determine the rquired wingsize (in Sq ft) you can use the following formula:

L = (1/2) d v2 s CL

L = Lift, which must equal the airplane's weight in pounds
d = density of the air. This will change due to altitude. These values can be found in a I.C.A.O. Standard Atmosphere Table.
v = velocity of an aircraft expressed in feet per second
s = the wing area of an aircraft in square feet
CL = Coefficient of lift , which is determined by the type of airfoil and angle of attack or pitch angle.

If you know the approx weight of the vehicle you can plug that in as the "L" value and solve for "s".

If I were to design a flying car, I don't think I would use an airfoil. Practically speaking if airplanes could be built with smaller wingspans, they would. The engineers designing small airplanes are tackling the same problem as any would be engineers trying to make cars fly.

Rockets under the car are the way to go!

Think Harrier!

so fishin, I assume we just set the L to a value greater than the weight of the car and then adjust the equation to solve for the sq ft?

Im afraid, were I to be part of this effort, I would not have Jesse James as one of the "brain trust" I hope they had some real engineers here.

Should I wish to fly my car, Id see if I could drive it onto a C5-A

e-Brown, I do not think that your car would fly as much as it woul plummet.
This has got me fired up. How bout lets chip in for one of those mini coopers and we make a high wing plane.

I see a problem that presents itself at the outset. I dont think that the standard auto engine is comfortable if flying upside down. I could be wrong here. I suppose if the engine were fuel injected perhaps that wouldnt be as serious a shortcoming. We must solve this problem or we cannot begin booking longer flights. Think of it

ABLE2FLY AIRLINES.
Dont say no right away, just think about it

Basically, yeah. It's best done on a computer though since everytime you adjust one figure it affects the other numbers and everything has to be recalculated.



C-17 for me. It has better bathrooms than a C-5. lol

This is the point I'm trying to MAKE, that the idea is not psooible with wings of any sort! I say perhaps using the car as the cockpit of a blimp may work better, as Jesse and company have already made a hot-air balloon and it seems to me a blimp is basically a helium ballon with a means of powering and steering itself!

The usually do have "specialists" on the teams!

Not impossible at all. It's been done before.

http://www.strange-mecha.com/aircraft/AC/AC.htm

The "Aero-Car" was circa 1960/9161. With todays technology it would be even easier to build. We have lighter cars with more powerful engines and better materials for making wings from.

Whether it would be practical or nmot is another story but then.. This is Monster Garage we're talking about. "Practial" isn't really one of their concerns.

I foresee a large multi-media campaign, flight attendants who come over and ask "Coffee, tea or DSL line?" and a logo of a flying bunny smoking a cigarette.

Let's get to work right away! :-D

we need a business plan .
We could sit people in various "forums" section.(Art, cooking, politics, rant)
This is gonna be big

The Moller Skycar

IMAGINE, A PERSON WITH THE RUDE PERSONALITY OF THE AVERAGE BMW DRIVER, COMBINED WITH THE YAHOO ATTITUDE OF THE DUKES OF HAZARD FLYING AT 350 MPH OVERHEAD DOING LUMSHEVAKS. I SEE ONLY TROUBLE AND PAIN AHEAD WITH THREE DIMENSIONAL MOBILITY.
WE CAN HOLD ON TO THE TECHNO ADVANCES , BECAUSE , UNTIL WE , AS A SPECIES EVOLVE TO A POINT THAT ACTUALLY MAKES SUCH TRAVEL SAFE AND
FEASIBLE, WE ARE JUST GOING TO BE RACKING UP THE BODY BAGS AT A FASTER CLIP THAN PRESENT.
REMEMBER NOT EVERYONE SHOULD BE A PILOT. I SURE AS HELL DONT WANT ANYONE FLYING INTO MY HOUSE WHEN THEY GET LOADED AND DECIDE TO TAKE A SPIN IN THE SKIES. NOPE, ILL GO ON RECORD TO PRONOUNCE THIS A "REALLY DUMB IDEA"

If we don't get this going soon, how will the species evolve?
I see only growth and opportunity with 3-D mobility.
For example, I might go into the armored roofing business.

JATO. Nothing else is needed.
(hilarious link here)

Obviously, it's time to make the legend a reality!

I tried the formula suggested by fissin and
got 12.5 square feet which will fit easily in
your garage. The v2 is (I assumed) v to the
two power = 16E4 = 160,000 if v is 400
feet per second. That is the stalling speed,
I think, so you will likely want a bigger wing.
L= 1000 pounds, may be possible using
bucky tube construction = carbon nano tubes.
d = 0.001 that was an educated guess.
CL = 1 was also a guess. Neil

The air collision potential is less than one would think. Suppose a large city has an air space 30 x 30 x 1.1 kilometers = 1000 cubic kilometers. If the average spacing is 100 meters in three dimensions, that will be one million sky cars. Even if the city is hosting the olympics, a million simultaneously airborne is very improbable, and 100 meters is much more than 2 dimensional spacing on a busy interstate. The air traffic control can be computerized with manual control locked out, when there is an other aircraft closer than one kilometer. Each car can have fore and aft radar which sends data to the computer which returns a holographic display that show the designated driver all the aircraft near by and in her flight path, even if visibility is zero. In times of heavy traffic all the skycars will fly at an azimuth equal to the altitude in meters ie 180 meters = 180 degrees which is South, 361 meters = 361 degrees which is 1 degree East of due North etc. If you think about that, all air craft at approximately the same altitude are flying in approximately the same direction and the same speed. The speed will be a bit of a challenge for the computer, but doable as the sky cars (which will fit in a typical car garage) will have stalling speeds of about 400 Kilometers per hour and few people will want to go much faster at $ 40 per hour fuel cost. Neil

MISSION ACCOMPLISHED!
http://www.popularmechanics.com/science/aviation/1559477.html

(Can't read the article though--that's what a B&N is for;) )