Aeroscraft has a retractable cockpit.

A new article in BBC came out about the Aeroscraft that has some facts I was unaware of. Interestingly enough the Aeroscraft has a retractable gondola that holds the cockpit. This explains some design flaws I had thought existed in the Aeroscraft that can now be explained away.

My Sky Tug

I am most definitely an Airship enthusiast. So much so that when no simulator out there has a hybrid Airship to train with, and it should, I take it upon myself to rectify that.

X-plane if you don't know is an aviation simulator that uses blade element theory to figure out how any given object will fly. It has a lot more bugs then Flight Simulator X due to a smaller development team, but what it can do that FSX can't is tell you how any object is going to fly based solely on it's physical dimensions, it's a very nice drafting tool for aerospace engineers, and it's a good simulator for training too.

Usually, I have found, that one dose not need to get into aircraft development in order to fly almost whatever they want in X-plane, as almost every aircraft that one can imagine has been made for X-plane by someone somewhere.

However, I found there to be an exception to this rule, and that's when it comes to airships. There is probably something like 3000 to 10,000 Airship enthusiasts world wide. This is defiantly noticeable when one tries to dig up historical records on airships only to find that barely anyone cares enough to keep these records intact and assembled, save a few museums and even they have trouble getting all the information. Airships are already part of the niche world of aviation enthusiasts, and thus represent a niche within a niche. So if your reading this blog, you can pat yourself on the back knowing that you are a member of this small elite group of airship enthusiasts.

This I do believe will change in time, as the general public starts to realize the potential of emergent airship technology and just how easy these ships are to fly. However in the mean time, pilots need simulators to train with new hybrid airships, and before I made this Sky Tug for X-plane 9.7, the only option was the dynalifter to train pilots in hybrid airship technology. This was good for demonstrating the advantages of the Hybrid Airship concept, but it did not have all the capabilities that airships like LEMV, Sky Tug and the Aeroscraft have or will have, namely VTOL capabilities.

So after a year or so of on and off development I have finally completed my Hybrid Airship to a point where I do consider it complete. It's based on Lockheed Martins Sky Tug concept which I am somewhat in love with when I look at the picture in my last post.

You can download it here:http://forums.x-plane.org/index.php?app=downloads&showfile=20206 (Link Works Again 7/30/2014)

You need X-Plane 9 or 10 to run it, but it will also work with the demo. If your thinking about buying X-plane 10, I would hold off until they fix more of the bugs. It's had a rocky development cycle.

Edit: You can no longer get this airship from the Org as I have been banned, but you can get it here

Edit:The Sky Tug now has it's own website at www.skytug.webs.com

SkyTug Still Tugging Along

I was reading this article that was mostly talking about Aero's is aeroscraft and how that project is coming along nicely. But at the end of the article they had an update about Lockheed Martin's Sky Tug airship that I had thought was full of hot air at this point. Apparently it's still on track to be finished by the end of this year, and start it's FAA certification process.

This is great news as the Sky Tug is completely designed for non-violent, non-Big Brother type Cargo Transportation Missions. It's a peace time going airship which can't really be used for empire expansion or enforcing a police state as effectively as it will excel at reducing the cost of air cargo transportation, humanitarian aid, search and rescue, air cranes, and other peaceful missions.

This, in a way, was a long standing dream of the father of aviation, Alberto Santos-Dumont who envisioned that his technology would bring about world peace by rendering international borders and trade disputes irrelevant. That unfortunately never happened during Dumont's lifetime, but perhaps his dream was more prophecy then fantasy? Who knows what wonders this easy access to the 3ed dimension will bring, world peace?

Only time will tell...

Aeroscraft Update

Interesting story in the Los Angele's times about the Aeroscraft, with video.