Build Your Own Flying Saucer

[Renegade]

Grab your screwdriver!

http://blogs.archives.gov/ndc/?p=426

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Recently declassified records from the Aeronautical Systems Division, USAF (RG 342 – Records of United States Air Force Commands, Activities, and Organizations) reveal some surprising, perhaps never-before-seen images:

The above illustration was discovered in the pages of a document titled “Project 1794, Final Development Summary Report” (d.1956) The caption reads “USAF Project 1794”. However, the Air Force had contracted the work out to a Canadian company, Avro Aircraft Limited in Ontario, to construct the disk-shaped craft. According to the same report, it was designed to be a vertical take-off and landing (VTOL) plane designed to reach a top speed of Mach 4, with a ceiling of over 100,000 feet, and a range of over 1,000 nautical miles.

Anyone remember old Popular Science articles about underwater cities and flying cars?

Here's one retro ad:

http://io9.com/5850833/hilariously-optimistic-1954-magazine-article-proclaimed-wed-all-be-piloting-flying-saucers-by-1965

[SeraphimLabs]

Bleh, it's just the Avrocar.

While shaped like a flying saucer, it was intended to be used like a floating jeep.

Had 3 turbofan jet engines powering it.

They could float, but whenever they tried to go more than a few feet up the craft would shake uncontrollably at the ground effect barrier.

[Renegade]

Bleh, it's just the Avrocar.

I don't think anyone actually expected the US govt to really reveal anything remotely interesting. They dusted through an old shoe box, and pulled out a faded black and white picture of a polar bear in a blizzard.

Still, it's kind of fun.

[MilesAhead]

I recently saw a show on History Channel about this. It was pretty funny. The car hovered fairly well across a paved parking lot. It then ventured onto a grassy field.  All kinds of dirt, dust, and grass were thrown into the air.  Much of it was sucked into the engine air intake as it rained down. Back to the old drawing board.

[40hz]

When I was a kid, there used to be this ad in the back of Popular Science (or maybe Boy's Life or Mechanic's Illustrated?) that offered plans for how to build your very own lawnmower powered UFO (i.e. hovercraft). Most of us lusted after getting them but never did. According to a story written many years later by somebody who had, it showed you how to make a 6-foot diameter pine wood frame and canvas disk with an engine in the middle, and a mast on the back to hang onto and "steer" with. The guy described its one and only trial run that ended with it flipping over - and fortunately throwing him a safe distance from the whirling fan blades under it.

No amount of Googling found either that ad or the story. So at first I wondered if I only imagined seeing it. Then I saw this article showing what looks to be the exact same device (except it's metal) as was pictured in that old ad.

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[MilesAhead]

I remember in the early 60s hovercraft and car/aircraft hybrids were popular.  I remember some of the TV celebrities would show off their hybrids either by actually having them there for the TV show taping, or showing a video on their shows.  One had an airplane with detachable wings you could stow in a trailer.  Another had a hover car and he demonstrated driving it off the road right into a lake.  They never quite became the George Jetson convertable briefcase that they seemed to promise though.