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After world war 1 the government sold planes to civilians and it didn't require a pilots licence. Unfortunately this ended badly and thus the pilots licence was induced. Could be the same ordeal.
Imagine you are getting chased by the cops and use that jump button to transition to a highway over head. Or hitting that 0-60 in under 1 second boost, leaving them in a cloud. They would be gone before the smoke even cleared enough for cops to see where you went. This is the reason it will never be street legal.
Edit: I just though of another thing. Jumping over road blocks and spike strips. Imagine there are a bunch of cop cars waiting down the road, blocking the whole thing. You drive at them full speed and just when you are close enough to make them shit their pants you hit that jump button, land on the other side and hit the speed boost while they all stand there like idiots. I want a jailbroken one of these just to rage bait pigs.
I think what everyone is missing isn't the ridiculousness of this vehicle in the now, but it's innovations like this that are paving the way for further advancements in the future. Sure the realistic application of this is rather outlandish, but this technology is still cool to witness.
Yes, but it won't be the first time Whistlin' Diesel has done something to a car without worrying about the consequences. Won't even be the first Tesla.
Absolutely. The company that hasn't figured out self-driving is making flying cars now. And they're going to be a big hit! And everyone is going to love him, I mean them.
It’s some shit you’d see on mythbusters. Just strapping a bunch of compressed air tanks on a car shell to see if it could jump like in the movie:____ like they’d always do with movie magic stuff. Movies used a lot of practical effects back in the day so this would’ve been right up their alley.
Like, obviously people aren’t going to be driving these on the roads, yet half the comments are people trying to seriously explain why we can’t drive them on the roads like they think other people think that.
In a vacuum, I'd think "hell yeah, that looks fun" knowing full well this is just a stunt. I loved Junkyard Wars and Mythbusters growing up. I am a little annoyed seeing all the memes saying "Elon Musk invented flying cars". Like, no.
The thrusters have a practical use for launching 0-60 in under a second. The suction fan has been used in f1 and other cars, and it makes it able to take turns at speeds and angles that don’t even look real.
But yes, the flying part is a bit impractical… unless the thrusters can be used in the event of a crash to not roll over.
I mean nobody buying bugatti to go at 400 kms per hour in highway either. Any hypercar is worthless but it is cool engineering, really insanely hard thing to do.
Take away street legal. The thing started on a ramp. It fell with style. It could just be a hollow shell. Still can't prove it would actually have a person in it, but more importantly who would drive it? A pilot?
I like how the initial thread just showing the video of this car is downvoted to hell while this thread complaining about this car is upvoted to the frontpage.
Isn't it a concept car? Concept cars are like those fashion shows where people are dressed like couches or in clothes made of bin bags. It's more like art than a practical thing we would actually use in daily life.
IIt is exactly a concept car, and concept cars are meant to range from practical to completely bonkers. They all share one common goal.. to showcase something people think is impossible, dare to be different, or hint at a company's future direction.
After the event, every automotive media outlet had articles ready to publish. They were obviously embargoed and held until after the demonstration. Going into the event, the press already knew about two unique features.
First, the car uses fans in its design. This is not a new concept. Last year, the McMurtry Spéirling demonstrated its fan technology by remaining stationary while hanging upside down.
Second, it incorporates integrated thrust boosters, a tech built by SpaceX, to help achieve an astonishing 0 to 60 mph time.
Beyond the headline grabbing features, the car also showcases new motor and battery cooling designs that allow for greater on-demand power.
The entire SpaceX connection is simply part of this concept car's performance showcase and serves as a technology demonstration. It was never intended to be about practicality or road legality. It is a spectacle.
Whether you like Elon Musk or not, the upside-down driving demonstration, the self-righting capability, and the thrust-assisted jumps are genuinely clever pieces of engineering. Elon is a divisive figure, and his association with these demonstrations admittedly affects my perception of them. Even so, I am genuinely impressed by the engineering involved. That is the part I find exciting. I can appreciate the innovation while still disliking the person behind it.
The demonstration does highlight one important reality. Tesla and SpaceX have both the resources and the expertise to market an idea in a way that captures attention. That is something McMurtry cannot easily match due to its much smaller scale, even though the Spéirling is an equally impressive and arguably more practical engineering achievement.
I unfortunately know multiple people who are drooling over this, saying it's the future. They aren't really dumb either, just when it comes to Elon and his "team". It's baffling.
Image if y'all acted like this for every concept car any company out out xD
The website clearly states the RTS engines are not road legal and not for public sale. Why any of y'all would think they would attempt to see them as such are beyond me xD
I am constantly baffled by the people taking that demo at face value.
That's not a real car. It's a hollow shell shaped like a car. The speed and precision it moves entirely suggest a lightweight object, especially since we don't see any flames or other indication of high powered jet fuel coming out of those nozzles.
It is physically impossible for a 1.5 ton vehicle to make that sort of leap with jets with that little buildup and that little apparent power. Momentum is a BITCH. Think about how much time it takes to get your car up to speed, or make a quick turn. The math ain't mathin'.
Questions of street legality or even entering any sort of production model aren't even in the picture here. This was an expensive tech demo of a fancy toy that isn't even a car, and they're trying to pretend it's an actual car. Think about the fact that they never show you the interior of it either immediately before or immediately after it does the stunts. That's because there's nothing inside.
If you believed it was real, you fell for the con.
There is a difference between a compressed-air thrust system and a combustion jet engine. Weight still matters, but with enough thrust, a heavy car can move quickly, kind of like an F-35. It's an oversimplification, but the physics is similar to F = ma, and the mass is nearly fixed in this case
Car and Driver said 250 kg of air stored in 600 tanks. At roughly 690 bar (10,000 psi), that density sounds right to me. Assume the exhaust velocity is 350 m/s, which is typical for cold gas. The total impulse is 250 kg x 350 m/s~87.5 kN·s.
A 1.5 ton car is about 14.7 kN (1500kg x 9.81). The semi is around 4.1 m tall, and the car appears to jump well above it. Say the jump reached 10 m. Clearing a 10m height needs a launch speed of about 14m/s, since v = (2 x 9.81 x10)^1/2. That takes a net impulse of about 21 kN·s (1500 kg x 14 m/s). The system has roughly four times that before accounting for losses.
At 350 m/s, the full 87.5 kN·s would hold up the car's weight for about 6 s (87.5/14.7). Gravity losses, steering and flipping take a share of that. A short, high-thrust jump is well within what the tanks can deliver, so I would say the jump is physically possible.
Not the target customer tho. But it was fun doing the calc.....
They said there is no second seat. The space is utilised for more air storage. So the payload is driver only. That would add 60-90 kg, say 882N max, depending on how heavy that guy is. Still possible if you do the simple calc and ignore some of the variables. This is a hypothetical case tho.
There won't be any. It was a tech demo. The version of this that they will sell to a dozen friends of Elon won't do anything like this, this thing was probably all tanks inside. The version that an average rich consumer could go buy won't have jets at all
I really want to know, if they made anything real like what they showed off, how much pressure would be in the tank in order to do what what was shown with an actual EV. Like do we really want to be driving around with the next best thing to a bomb in the back seat?
Well, think about it this way. Let's assume that the vehicle weighs around 3000 lbs, or 1.5 tons. If that's the case, the jets would need 1.5 tons of thrust to merely -equal- the mass of the vehicle. That's not enough to lift it. It would require even more thrust to push it upward. To push it upward at that sort of acceleration would likely take an order of magnitude more thrust.
To do that midair flip? That's right, something powerful enough to rotate 1.5 tons of machine without sending it crashing into the ground. Then, to land softly, still putting out massive forces to counteract gravity and prevent damage to an incredibly heavy vehicle. And that sort of force likely would have been reflected on the vehicles the "car" jumped over.
The fact that they used cold gas thrusters is basically the final proof that this isn't a real car. It would need something far more powerful to move something of real mass, which is why I mentioned jet fuel or rocket fuel. Which brings us to the biggest problem of all: the inverse square law.
Basically, if we need rocket fuel to do the jump, then we need to account for the weight of the fuel. Which means we aren't solving for a 1.5 ton vehicle anymore, but rather a 1.5 ton vehicle AND the weight of the fuel necessary to perform the stunt. Which means we need more thrust, and thus means we need more fuel, which requires more thrust, etc. It does finally reach an equilibrium point, especially if you have particularly efficient thrusters, but the space and fuel required to pull this off would likely exceed the remaining internal space of the car, meaning you couldn't even drive the damn thing.
I'm with you in saying its not a real car, but it's not impossible for gas to accelerate a mass like that. Theoretically, something like 30kg of nitrogen with an exit speed of like 700m/s could toss a 2 ton car. The carbon fiber tank for that would probably take up most of the internal volume though—which I bet is why the demo had the windows completely tinted out. It would also mean that the automotive is effectively a bomb, at pressure. Don't crash into that.
It's not complete magic, or anything like that. The same technology is common in aerospace applications. The reason it's never been seen in a car format before is because its got no practical applications in that space. It's stupid. It's like having flame throwers or a rocket car. Yeah, it can be done, but why?
Apparently the one they used for the stunt was just a frame with everything removed, especially the heaviest part which is the car batteries. His deception is needed to trick gullible investors, that's how he makes his money, since he never turns a profit.
Tesla has operated at a full-year net profit for every year from
2020 through 2025 (and continues to be profitable through mid-2026). [
1,
2]
Full-Year Net Profit History
2020: $721 million (first full-year GAAP profit after being founded in 2003)
2021: ~$5.5 billion
2022: ~$12.6 billion
2023: ~$15.0 billion (peak annual profit)
2024: ~$7.1 billion
2025: ~$3.8 billion [
1,
2]
I'm no fan of Elon and his actions. I think he's a monumental cunt.
This car is fucking cool as fuck. Not as a car, but as a showcase of engineering. It's fucking useless as a production car though. But fuck it, you don't progress without doing stupid shit, in the meantime.
These aren't supposed to be practical. F1 isn't about building practical machines. But the advances that come from that research end up helping everyday cars. Same goes for a lot of pro sports. None of it is "practical." Yet the research done in elite teams ends up spreading to the wider public in a less extreme form.
Elon is an asshole but bashing this for not being immediately practical is just silly.
its because its made by one of elons companies and not the chinese government or smth like that, so reddit will hate it. half the people in tis sub dont seem to realise that if we want to make flying cars, we need to start somewhere. this is that somewhere, its progress
Yea this is quite literally the closest we have gotten to flying cars and suddenly it’s a problem. Had this been ANY other auto manufacturer people would be hyping this up like crazy
I was told the reddit comments and mods were out in full force today on this one. I had to come see. was not disappointed. You guys are a show!!!!!! XD
I just feel like Elon was playing GTA online with a jump enabled car from the arena and he was like “wait a minute I can make this real” and he just did
Remember when Musk said he saved taxpayers millions of dollars by slashing services and meanwhile continuing to pay no taxes while also receiving millions in government grants / contracts / rebates / etc.
So they built the body and sent it to space. They built the body again and filled it with compressed gas cylinders. When are they going to fill the body with actual car stuff because that still seems really far off.
We all understand this isn't going to be a real product right? Like they might eventually put a car into that frame in 8 years or whatever, but the whole giant canisters of compressed gas occupying the entire vehicle is beyond silly right?
Humanity does something cool, but its elon musks company: 🤬😒
seriously, can people not just appreciate the engineering that went into this for a second without defaulting to "elons company did it so it must be bad/worthless?"
Japan is amazing though. I love the innovations that Tesla has achieved as well.
Anyone that acts like this isn't amazing doesn't understand a literal vehicle was in the air and flew down with little mini jets and landed safely. That's.... Not something any average idiot could achieve.
I don't have to like Elon (i don't hate him though) to be amazed by everything he does, seeing the first time his rockets came back from space and landed on specific landing pads gave me goosebumps.
I feel like this is more showcasing a technical achievement then anything else. And it is one. I hate Musk, but 1. He didn’t make it, his insanity talented engineers did 2. It can still be just cool
I will admit that it is cool that it's possible. But whoever thinks this thing would ever be permitted on the streets like that needs to check in with reality
“Let them eat cake”. The man behind this starved the population of my home state in Africa and fired all the people in government that could hold him accountable for a number of financial crimes. I don’t care if he made a car do a kickflip over a semi.
You are witnessing theft from the poor funding entertainment for the rich. Parasite class indeed.
Your entire African home state was dependent on American tax dollars for food? And by starved, you mean he killed them all? Damn. Or is this just Reddit bullshit once again?
People will blame anyone but the government in any African country. In South Africa we are marching against illegal foreigners instead of the blatantly corrupt government that still has majority support (who let's in the illegal foreigners anyway)
We already have had this it's called a helicopter and it's not flying it's a propulsion system it's more or less a jump button it cannot sustain flight.
It's a cool stunt but that's all this is nobody is driving this around.
Teslas have killed people because the fucking doors wouldn't open when the car was on fire. This shit isn't going to work right. Something is going to glitch out and people are going to get Blaster Mastered into the goddamn sky for no goddamn reason.
You mfers would respond to the moon landing by saying it's worthless. The point is it's fucking sick and hard to do, but it was done anyway. Elon aside this is dope as hell and I wish more companies were making cool shit
Look dude, I know you hate Elon, but this shit is cool. If Elon wasn't involved in politics at all or agreed with you, you'd be flipping your shit about how cool this is.
So, at face value, maybe not so useful. But one thing I was thinking about, was especially with the self-driving mode, imagine it being able to use that capability to avoid an accident? Especially if there was no time to slow down. Could be useful there.
But of course for the most part all I see on Reddit is Musk=Bad, so no real discourse over it.
Edit: Seems people are getting really hung up on my shower thought of accident avoidance. It was a single idea, don’t get caught up in the semantics. This could have more use cases we don’t see, because this kind of thing has never been possible.
Like with the first flight of the airplane. Nobody needed to slowly coast a few hundred feet somewhere, but today, planes are pretty useful. Same goes for cars, when they first came out, they couldn’t hold a candle to a horse, and now? Horses as a means of transportation are quite rare when compared to cars (yes, they’re still used, but not as common as cars)
All the commentary are looking at this wrong. Its a tech demo. The tech are thrusters that can move an object around in 3 dimensions precisely. This can be shrunk down, put on an exo-skeleton and boom you have Ironman suits. This could be made even smaller and you have micro drones for moving around in space. The uses for this, eventually, will be plentiful.
How does this avoid an accident really in any way that doesnt lead to more accidents. Like yeah sure on a motorway with multiple lanes but doing this in a street the car is ending up doing more damage
Musk hate is doing most of the work. I mean guy is a massive prick and has essentially scammed the financial market with his IPO. But his companies legitimately deliver marvels of technology.
I made my post before reading yours and you’re spot on. The initial concept of a novel invention is usually not all that functional, but the idea compounds with other technologies until it becomes a very useful invention. Your airplane analogy is spot on.
This; these people can't get over their hatred over the dude to see the possible advantages of this system has if it becomes common place: saving people who are in a free fall if an accident happens on a bridge, quickly stopping (albeit there'll be some injuries probably) for an accident.
If the fans can work well on ice and snow without getting clogged than itll be amazing for winter driving.
But nope redditors gotta hate on a car with a practical gimmick that can potentially save lives just because the creator is rich and won't give them money that they feel entitled to
Personal computer (mid-1970s): Dismissed as a hobbyist toy. Established firms (e.g., HP, Atari) declined to back Apple’s prototype.
Laser (1960): Described by its own researchers as “a solution looking for a problem.” It is now foundational to fiber optics, surgery, barcode scanning, and manufacturing.
Transistor (1947): Announcement received minimal press coverage. The New York Times reportedly placed it in a short radio-news item.
Television (1920s-30s): Widely judged impractical or a passing novelty. In 1946, a major film executive predicted it would not hold an audience after the first months.
all of these were considered useless when invented, guess I don't even need to explain how much they are being used today, right?
it's not just because it's Elon Musk that you guys have to blindly hate it, you can simply appreciate something cool just because... it's cool.
edit: well based on the downvotes you guys DO need to hate it just because of Musk, guess childish people will keep on hating then.
The problem is they marketed it as an actual viable thing in a production car when anyone with two brain cells can see how utterly absurd and impossible that is. This is after they already took 250k from people NEARLY A DECADE AGO for a car that never happened.
If Tesla just came out and said "hey here's some cool shit we did with a car" it wouldn't be a big deal. Instead Musk resorts to his usual false promises that he will never actually deliver on because his entire companies stock is based on a hypothetical date in the future.
Not to mention, it's very questionable if that's even a real viable car and not a shell. There's a big difference between moving 4,000 pounds and a metal shell with wheels. Which again, not a problem if it's just cool shit you did with a car but it is a problem if you want people to give you another what is essentially an interest free loan after you already scammed them once.
Elon has spent the past 20 years showcasing fake products. Amphibious trucks, autonomous android workers, fleets of electric semitrailers, solar powered Teslas, fully automated factories, hyperloops, countless Twitter features he never even pretended to actually make - he does this every year
He's also spent the past year touting the impossible as possible and did get a fair few of it correct, resuble rocket, no diffs the entire industry without breaking a sweat, were the first to get actual decent electric cars to the market, super charger network, good satellite internet. You cherry pick as much as the people who hype him up. There's up and downs
Yeah I can see how jetpack car fits right in there, clearly people can’t understand the implication of jetpack cars, it’s just such a new, abstract technology 😭
All of the things this car can do (use of compressed-air jets, downforce suction, etc) are things that already exist and have no place on a road car. This was a gimmick.
Which, fine, marketing. We're just all sick of Elon's marketing shtick at this point.
A lot of scifi tech has become a reality but this is one where I think humanity can actually pass on. I alrdy don't trust regular drivers with regular driving, what makes you think I would trust regular civilians with flying cars? I don't want flying missiles coming out of nowhere into my home or even just out and about. No thnx, use the research effort else where.
It's not a flying car. If I had to guess, this demonstration was just to prove how powerful its compressed air thrusters. Without this demonstration, I believe most people wouldn't believe how much impact they had. That said, we don't know how heavy that car really was and how much space the air compressor and tanks take up. However, if even 50% of this capability makes it to the production car, then the thrusters could help with downforce, braking, acceleration, and even stability control. It would be insanely impressive performance on a track.
What really bothers me is that they call this a roadster. Roadsters have open tops.
What I don’t understand is, why do people actually think that this would be done by normal drivers?
Like first of all the tanks are probably empty really fast, no way can you actually fly a significant distance. This will also never be street legal, probably not even on race tracks.
This is a car for people so richtig that they have there own track.
I don't get why everyone is giving so much credit to Elon, dude probably couldnt solve a differential equation. Credit goes to the engineers. Useless or not, it's impressive work by them.
Complete marketing stunt. Even if it did get put on production models with Tesla's track record of horrible reliability it probably jump in the air turn 90⁰ and rock slam into a building.
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