Future of short range commutes?

[Seahawk]

Originally Posted by wdfifteen

I don't know that much about unmanned aircraft. I do remember that a few years ago I stated that they take fewer personnel to operate and was surprised when you said no, they take more.

The ratio is getting better but the FAA mandated a primary pilot and an observer for each airborne UAS for many years. That is slowly changing but when you add mission sensors to the mix, often there are three folks doing what a manned aircraft can do with one or two people.

Maintenance is also a headache.

We were essentially taking people out of the cockpit and putting them on the ground...the studies show that even with autonomy the amount of UAS that can be safely operated by one person remains at two to three in a commercial setting.

Originally Posted by Tim Hancock

I saw a few of the contraptions at Oshkosh.... No way in hell am I going to trust my life to an upscaled large RC drone on a daily commute.

A lot of what you are seeing are very early prototypes and wishful thinking.

The big issues is scalability of open rotor quads and the like. The noise and inefficiency of multiple open rotors, even semi shrouded, is going to be hard to overcome...beating the air into submission, and, as a former helicopter pilot with a shade of 4,000 hours, I do know how that works, is a long way off.

I have zero doubt that they can be made unmanned. The technology behind the unmanned portion is as reliable as a hammer. It just is.

Certifying the designs, power, propulsion, MTBF, VMC, IMC, etc. is going to be very daunting for flying people or packages.

As you know, Tim, the FAA holds all the cards.

[thor66]

re: noise and inefficiency - how about a lifting body?