World’s first electric flying car successfully tested

If all goes according to plan, the extraordinary vehicle could be on the market as early as 2028. According to eVTOL.com, UK-based startup Bellwether Industries has successfully completed the first test flights of its two-seat Volar prototype aircraft in Dubai.

The company said that it will share footage of the test in the coming weeks, and also revealed that the eVTOL vehicle has completed a total of eight test flights. The company has previously published videos and photos of the ominous device during the moored indoor test flights.

Bellwether has so far raised $1 million from investors and their flying car was first unveiled to the public at the Dubai Air Show last month. They are now looking for more backers to build a full-scale prototype.

The Volar eVTOL vehicle is designed to provide intra-city flying car journeys, and the final version will be around 3.2 metres wide, compared to a prototype that was roughly half that size in recent test flights. Volar’s current eVTOL is a two-seater, while the final vehicle will have room for four to five seats.

The Volar aircraft bears similarities to another eVTOL prototype under development, the CycloRotor – both models actually look like flying cars, rather than the multirotor flying taxis that have been shown before, in their design.

“We have a lot of problems with the fact that the vehicle doesn’t look like an airplane, so when people see them, they don’t understand how they can even take off,” said Kai-Tse Lin, co-founder and CEO of Bellwether.

During recent test flights, the remote-controlled prototype climbed to an altitude of 3.9 metres at a speed of about 40 km/h. According to Bellwether’s website, the full-size aircraft will fly at an altitude of about 1 kilometre and reach a top speed of 217 km/h, while battery life after charging is estimated at 90 minutes.

The company is positioning its aircraft specifically as a flying private car, so it will be interesting to see if public urban air mobility really takes off before the company plans to launch the flying vehicle in 2028.

Source: eVTOL.com