The idea is that the part of the plane that does the flying is kept separate from the bit you sit in. There would be a number of configurations enabling this, but I'll just skip that detail for now.

Why? Well the tube people sit in could double as the bus, on the ground; so these tubes - having no cumbrous wings, or explosive fuel payloads - could be driven right into the terminal building for immediate boarding. Instead of a departure lounge, you'd just go to your planes seats, take your place, and wait to be towed away or driven away when the time comes for the contraption to be mated with its wings.

I think I've said enough to suggest the gist of the idea, so I'll leave it thus.
-- skoomphemph, May 01 2014

Been here before Modular_20Passenger_20Aircraft
[bs0u0155, May 01 2014]

Passenger airplane container system https://www.google.com/patents/US6494404
Airplane people pod patent [the porpoise, May 01 2014]

...have you finished?
-- xandram, May 01 2014


Yes, now I have. I have a Twiddler chording "keyboard" which has started to play up. Annoyingly, it often does an "Enter" when I mean to type a "W" or something.

And this evening its behaving better than usual.

Sometimes it does me odd spellings that I miss. I also often do thing like hit "and" when I meant to say "an". Things like extra spaces result from me being too lazy or too irritated to correct miss-hits.
-- skoomphemph, May 01 2014


And the advantage is, instead spending time stretching your legs between the check-in counter and the gate, you get to sit and wait in a cramped metal tube while tarmac grunts bolt wings onto it?
-- the porpoise, May 01 2014


see <link>
-- bs0u0155, May 01 2014


We could start a "Thunderbird 2" category.

Virtual + for "cumbrous".
-- FlyingToaster, May 01 2014


(marked-for-tagline)

" There would be a number of configurations enabling this, but I'll just skip that detail for now. "
-- normzone, May 01 2014


Ah, the Halfbakery! Of course you've been here before. I never really followed the Thunderbirds when TV was finally permitted, here, but I suppose somehow what I did see got stuck under the limines or something.

Some forms of the idea, adapted to the valid objections, might still ... er ... make it fly?

Dump the tube part, for instance, and just extract rows of seats (".. please put your bags on your laps ..." ) You could do this by just upgrading civil airlines to C130s. Imagine little trains of seats emerging out the back, and trundling off down the runway, at the arrivals end.

At the departure end, without the confinment of the tube the seats could be pushed apart, and faced eg outwards WRT the aisle. Passengers could loaf on their seats, nap in them, or get up from them and just stroll around.

Of course things like propulsion systems would have to meet up with their trains on arrival. It wouldn't do to carry little train engines round in the sky.
-- skoomphemph, May 01 2014


From my user page:

" One thing I've found out, over the years, is that, anytime you think that you were the originator of some new idea, ' I was the first to do that, ' you'll find some old fellow who did it around 1895. Every darn time. " Edward Hamilton, 1904 - 1977, in "The Space Opera Renaissance", TOR Books, 2006 "
-- normzone, May 01 2014


Particulaly when it comes to mechanical contraptions, it's a fair bet some clever Victorian thought of it a long time ago. Mind you, finding that out just teaches one respect for heritage.

Similar observations apply to the Thunderbirds creators - even if they didn't try to steam up any of their dreams.

But PO. Hang onto some idea a little longer than is necessary to dismiss it, and you're at least staying out of No-Space, where nothing at all is possible.
-- skoomphemph, May 01 2014


Check out the patented drop-in pod thingy [link]. The passenger pods travel through some kind of demented vending machine style loading chutes down into waiting aircraft frames.
-- the porpoise, May 01 2014


//and you're at least staying out of No-Space, where nothing at all is possible.//

What is this No-Space? Do I occupy it by no knowing what it is?
-- 2 fries shy of a happy meal, May 02 2014


[21] I don't think there'd be much change at all from the passengers' point of view: it's just more efficient for the airlines for certain service area parameters.

The only difference that I can think of is the gates could be much closer together (no wings to deal with), so not as much walking.
-- FlyingToaster, May 02 2014



random, halfbakery