HOVER BIKE: Star Wars Technology Brought To Life (Vid & Pics) A hover bike resembling the ones from ‘Return of the Jedi’ has been developed by a US firm, bringing science fiction to life. California-based firm Aerofex created an aerial vehicle with two ducted rotors instead of wheels, which originates from a design abandoned in the 1960s because of stability and rollover problems. The aerospace firm managed to fix the stability issue by creating a mechanical system — controlled by two control bars at knee-level — that allows the vehicle to respond to a human pilot’s leaning movements and natural sense of balance, Innovation News daily reports. “Think of it as lowering the threshold of flight, down to the domain of ATV’s [all-terrain vehicles],” said Mark De Roche, an aerospace engineer and founder of Aerofex. The hover bike does not require special training and could become a useful tool in agriculture, border control and search-and-rescue operations. “Imagine personal flight as intuitive as riding a bike,” reads the firm’s website. “Or transporting a small fleet of first-responder craft in the belly of a passenger transport. Think of the advantages of patrolling borders without first constructing roads.” Aerofex does not plan on initially developing and selling a human version of the hover vehicle and instead plans to use the aerial vehicle as a test platform for unmanned drones. Source: myscienceacademy.org/2012/08/23/hover-bike-star-wars-technology-brought-to-life-video-photos/ C
Posted on: Mon, 26 Aug 2013 21:52:43 +0000
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