A helicopter was used to lift and then launch this jumbo paper airplane that had a 24-foot wingspan and weighed 800 pounds. It was part of the Great Paper Airplane Project and it successfully completed its maiden flight. It hit a top speed of 98 mph at an altitude of 2,703 feet.

Aeronautical engineers were inspired by the design of a 12-year old Arturo Valdenegro’s paper airplane, which beat hundreds of others in a regional paper airplane distance contest.

Unfortunately, here’s what it looked like after it landed:

[via Ubergizmo]

This straight-from-the-box LEGO Space Shuttle model might not be anything that complicated, but then again I’m impressed that it didn’t rip into pieces as it ascended above the clouds to an altitude of nearly 22 miles. Set to a lovely musical soundtrack by Radical Face (and a little Richard Strauss,) watch this little LEGO Space Shuttle fly high above our planet, through the clouds, and into the stratosphere.

There’s a bit of an edit in the middle of the video, but I presume that’s just because watching the entire journey skyward would have been pretty time-consuming. As a matter of fact, Vinciverse says the model took nearly 2-1/2 hours to hit an altitude of about 35,000 meters (~114,829 feet), propelled by a helium-filled meteorological balloon. The whole flight was captured with a GoPro Hero camera, which was eventually located with a Spot GPS tracker.

[via The Mary Sue via io9]

It was created by the UK-based designers Sash Reading, Heather and Ivan Morison. They’ve dubbed it Three Cubes Collide and it was made from 1,700 3D-printed pieces, which were engineered and fabricated by Queen & Crawford. The kite uses a lightweight and durable fabric called Cuben Fiber to help keep it airborne.

I don’t know about you, but I think this thing is kind of awesome to see in flight. The modular design is supposedly scalable, so regardless of the size you print, due to its lightweight materials and carbon fiber rods, it should float.

What’s next, 3D-printed airships?

[via designboom]

The pilots can now take their charts with them and replace those old paper charts with the digital ones stored the iPad. Weight savings is a big deal for airlines and the paper charts the iPad replaces weight in at 35 pounds. The iPad is only 1.5 pounds, and can be updated with more current data than paper charts.

That seemingly small weight savings is worth $1.2 million per year in fuel, according to seattlepi. The iPad will take off this Friday on American Airlines flights. The iPads will be used first on the Boeing 777 aircraft and will be electronic chart and digital flight manual readers.

These findings basically mean that there is no reason at all for them to force you (or Alec Baldwin) to turn off an iPad while sitting on the runway.

[via ZDNet]

Yves Rossy has been working on his jet-powered wingsuit for a while, and after having added a carbon-fiber wing, with four miniature jet engines, he was able to join some jet aircrafts to fly in formation for a demonstration over the Swiss Alps.

Granted, the jets are flying just above stall speed, and the jetpack is going at full throttle (between 120 and 180 mph), but it’s still cool.

Click to View Embedded Video Clip

The whole thing is accomplished perfectly and he lands safely with a parachute. This guy can really fly. Now, if he could just get up there without a helicopter, he could start fighting crime for us.

[via CNet via Geeky Gadgets]

The 18-foot diameter circle is made from metal of some sort and in the center is a metal box securely wrapped in what appears to be plastic for the utmost safety during flight. The lift is provided by eight different motorcycle engines on their side bolted to the metal frame. Shu has about $3,135 invested in the machine, and this is his fifth model.

So far, Shu, who is a farmer by trade, has had one test flight in the courtyard that appears to have been conducted while tethered to the ground. The craft flew for about ten seconds. Obviously if something went wrong, and Shu fell from the basket he would be chopped into tiny bits by the staggered, whirring propellers – even if he were just a few feet off the ground.

[via BoingBoing]

A fleet of these blimps will be made for Discovery Air Innovations. At a cost of $40 million each, they won’t be cheap. The blimps use a mix of non-flammable helium and air to fly, and their design makes for a soft landing pretty much anywhere. They’ll be able to haul up to 50 tons of cargo each, so it should get pretty useful since the remote parts of the Great White North they plan on using these for have few roads and limited access for vehicles.

These airships will have a maximum speed of 115mph, so they aren’t slow by any means. Assuming the deal closes between the two companies in 2012, the first airships should arrive in 2014.

[CBC via Ubergizmo]

Wi-Fi is a must for these Chromebooks, because you can’t do much unless you get access to the cloud with a live Internet connection. There are even Chrome Zone lounges where you can get comfy with your loaner. However, you’ll need to give a credit card deposit if you want to try one.

Chromebooks are being offered on flights between San Francisco, Chicago O’Hare, Boston, Dallas-Fort Worth. There’s a similar loaner program offered at the Ace Hotel in New York City.

[Virgin America via TechCrunch]

Eurocopter has unveiled an awesome helicopter called the X3 Hybrid that combines the elements of a helicopter with elements of a fixed wing aircraft for the best of both worlds. The US Osprey used tilting rotors to take of vertically and then fly at faster speeds. The X3 Hybrid has no complex tilting rotors, this copter has little winglets with propellers on them that pull the helicopter along with lift provided by a conventional rotor.

Another big difference is that this helicopter has no tail rotor. The demonstrator model of the X3 Hybrid helicopter hit a true airspeed of 232 knots or 430 km/hr in straight and level flight for several minutes in testing. The faster helicopter is perfect for search and rescue missions. The characteristics of the helicopter are said to be on par with those of conventional helicopters on the market already.

This unusual single-winged flying machine by Evan Ulrich and a team at of the University of Maryland is designed to mimic the twirling flight path of one of those maple seed pods. Naturally, seed pods twirl down to the ground, and don’t fly upwards, but that didn’t stop researchers from developing this contraption that spins its way skyward:

Click to View Embedded Video Clip

Yikes. While I’m sure the flight physics of this thing are cool for scientific study, there’s no way you’d ever want to fly in something like this. Heck, you’d probably throw up on takeoff, then your pool of vomit would go flying around the inside of the chopper until you landed. That’s a pleasant thought.

Click to View Embedded Video Clip

It took Evan and team nearly 100 prototypes to get one that would fly reliably, and from the looks of the videos, you can see why. At this point, Ulrich sees the commercial opportunities for the seed-pod-copter as a potential way to quickly move satellites into the jet stream, and not for manned flight. Thank goodness for that.

[via NewScientist]

A dude named Yves Rossy has made his jet pack dreams come true, but it’s not like most of the jet packs we see. The Jet Man has a quartet of nozzles fastened to a wing strapped to his back. He flies around hands in front Superman style. You can see how bad-ass his suit is in the video below.

Click to View Embedded Video Clip

The dude jumped from a hot air balloon at 7,874 feet recently in Switzerland over Lake Geneva. After firing up his jet engines, he proceeded to do a couple loops marking the first time he has done aerobatics. After he runs out of fuel he pulls a parachute and floats down. If the folks at the TV studios ever get wise and bring Fall Guy back, they should use this thing in an episode.

[via KOMOnews]

The company has announced that it is booking flights that will launch in 2012 on its Lynx reusable space vehicle. The Lynx looks like a banana with wings to me. The design does give me the chance to say this:“Is that your space ship, or are you just happy to see me?”

A trip on the Lynx will cost you $95,000 (USD), which is a bargain compared to the $102,000 Space Adventures wants and the $200,000 Virgin Galactic needs. You’ll have to give a $20,000 deposit to book your flight and that money gets you a four-day training period and a two-day brief before the flight. I suspect most of that training is to teach you how to avoid vomit in zero g and how to kiss your ass goodbye while weightless.

The helicopter uses a motorcycle’s engine, as well as steel pipes for the frame and wood from an Elm tree for the rotor blades. Wu’s father says that all in all his son spent less than £1,000 (approx. $1,700 USD) to develop the helicopter. Now the helicopter doesn’t look impressive – or safe – but you try building a helicopter with your own hands. I can’t even make a decent sandwich with mine.

Wu also claims that he “used his memories of middle school physics lessons” as well as other “relevant knowledge” acquired via surfing the internet on his mobile phone to build the helicopter. Awesome. What’s not awesome – although it’s probably for the best – is that the Chinese government has forbidden Wu from flying his creation, citing safety reasons. And probably envy.

Edit: I’ve removed the video because the helicopter in it is almost certainly not the one built by Wu. But it gets better: According to the person who posted the video, that other helicopter was also made by a Chinese farmer, Shaorong Chen. What are the chances? Can someone else back this up? And what is it with Chinese farmers and helicopters?

Thanks to Black ICE for the heads up!

[via Ananova & DVICE via Inventor Spot]

As in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang Flying Car, except that it uses a nylon “Paramenia Reflex” wing to control its flight. The car is able to fly thanks to its gigantic back-mounted propeller, kinda like Thunder in Thunder in Paradise, except that it’s a car and not a boat. Why is it that I forget a lot of the things that my girlfriend and I talk about, and yet I have neurons to spare to remember Thunder in Paradise? Dammit.

The SkyCar’s capabilities were put to the test earlier this year when Neil Laughton, who I bet has 4 sets of balls, rode/flew the SkyCar from London to Timbuktu in India, a 5,000-mi journey. On the road, the SkyCar can go up to 140 mph. In the air the SkyCar has a take off range of about 490 ft, a cruising speed of 82 mph and a maximum altitude of 15,ooo ft. Here’s CNN’s coverage of the SkyCar prior to Laughton’s epic journey:

Click to View Embedded Video Clip

And now, thanks to ParaJet, any ordinary citizen on the planet can own a flying car, as long as that citizen has $82, 165 (USD) (£50,000) to spare. Check out ParaJet’s website for more details or to pre-order.  A flying car. WOW.

[via LikeCool]

The joystick has a 2-stage metal trigger, an 8-way hat switch, a dedicated POV switch, 6 programmable buttons, a “pinkie shift” button, 3 analog trim controls, and contactless X & Y positional sensors. The throttle’s tension can be adjusted, plus it’s packed with buttons and switches as well: 2 4-way hat switches, 2 rotary analog controls, 12 programmable buttons including the 8 customizable LED-lit ones on the base.

Not to be outdone, the foot pedal also has adjustable resistance control, toe brakes, a retractable carpet lock, and stainless steel treads.

The G940 will be available in the US and in Europe come September for $250 USD. I heard you can program it such that it’ll play by itself.

[via fareastgizmos]

Now, however, we’ve finally heard a whisper of localization. Listings have suddenly turned up with several Australian retailers, so this is a rumor with legs. Will new publisher Atari bring the game to the United States? With the film releasing this month in the U.S. on DVD, it would be a good time to do so… and it would also be a major stealth release, considering there hasn’t been a whisper until now.

Seems like a waste of a beautiful game, if so. If you’re into flight games, it’s worth keeping an ear to the ground on this one. An English-language release would be well worth checking out.

[Aussie-Nintendo via GoNintendo]

A modder going simply by the name of Brett got his hands on an old Black Box (actually, it’s sorta reddish-orange) over on eBay, ripped out its guts, and mounted a fully-functional computer inside the compartment. For some reason, I think that the holes he had to cut for the PC ports and cooling fan might have compromised the integrity of its crashworthiness a little bit.

Oh yeah, and when Brett first cracked open the case, he discovered a healthy dose of fiberglass and asbestos, so you probably won’t want to try this at home unless you want to contract a case of Mesothelioma.

Surprisingly, the interior of the box is so cramped that he could only fit a Mini-ITX motherboard inside, so it’s only got an 800MHz Via C3 CPU under the hood. Still, that should be plenty to perform basic server tasks like serving files, web pages and the like. In keeping with the “Crashproof” theme of the mod, Brett installed a bare-bones install of Slackware Linux, which should stay online indefinitely, assuming the computer itself doesn’t overheat in the cramped quarters of the Black Box case.

You can check out the full build log over on Brettsprojects.

PEGA’s $12.99 Wii Airplane Controller Stand suction cups onto any flat surface, giving you something that approximates a flight wheel on a plain. Just stick your Nunchuk on the one side, and your Wii-mote on the other, and you’ll be taking off and landing like a pro… just as soon as some more flying games comes out.

If only this early prototype flying game had actually made it into Wii Sports…

Click to View Embedded Video Clip

[via Go Nintendo]

The TAM Rocket Belt is a complete rocket pack system which is custom fitted to the exact specifications of the pilot. It can lift a person of up to 300lbs., and has flown to heights over 100 feet in the air. It even includes the equipment necessary to make your own rocket fuel (using highly pressurized peroxide, so it’s not combustible.) They even throw in 10 training flights to make sure you don’t kill yourself before you take it home.

The only downside is that it only holds enough fuel to propel you into the air for about 10 to 15 seconds, so you won’t be going very far.

[via Geekologie]