Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!ginosko!gem.mps.ohio-state.edu!apple!bionet!ames!amdcad!military
From: portal!cup.portal.com!mmm@apple.com
Newsgroups: sci.military
Subject: Re: Jet Engines
Message-ID: <27447@amdcad.AMD.COM>
Date: 23 Sep 89 18:45:36 GMT
Sender: cdr@amdcad.AMD.COM
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Approved: military@amdcad.amd.com



From: portal!cup.portal.com!mmm@apple.com
djm@castle.edinburgh.ac.uk (D Murphy) says:
 
> I remember seeing some years ago (on a BBC `new inventions' program called
> "Tomorrow's World") a new slant on the `man in a can' approach to flight.
> Basically they had a large dustbin with a cowling at the front housing
> one of these engines vertically. This provided enough thrust to lift a
> man, and movement was governed by the `pilot' leaning forward, backward
> or side-to-side. I've heard nothing more about it.

This sounds like the "flying pulpit" developed by Williams, maker of the
cruise missile engines.  Somewhat similar work is being pursued by Moller,
in Davis, CA.

Moller has been experimenting with "flying saucers" for at least two decades.
You may remember seeing pictures of a large saucer he built in the 1960's
with two large downward-directed fans.

More recently, he built a craft which REALLY looks like the popular image
of a flying saucer.  It's disc-shaped, with a seat for the pilot in the
center.  Around the periphery are eight large ducts, each containing a
fan driven by a small Wankel engine.

About four years ago, a picture of Moller sitting in his saucer hovering
a few feet above the ground appeared in the San Jose Mercury-News.  Almost
immediately, (so I've been told by someone in contact with the project)
the military showed up and brought the whole thing under the cover of
secrecy.