Open up your mind and say, ahh...

Fly-by-wire control systems are fairly common on modern airliners today. Rather than connecting the flight stick straight to the control surfaces on the wings and tail, the stick communicates with a flight computer digitally, which then makes the actual mechanical movements while automatically compensating for factors like wind speed. It’s a once-removed system of control, but it also allows for less pilot fatigue and more intelligent computer intervention should things go wrong.

Now, Nissan has announced a drive-by-wire system coming to Infinity cars in 2013. Rather than relying on a driver to physically rotate the rack and pinion steering column via the steering wheel, Nissan’s system simply sends steering information to the onboard computer, and the computer handles the rest.

Click to enlarge.

We’re told the system offers the same road feel without additional driver fatigue–the system includes a camera that analyzes car lanes for the driver, reducing a driver’s micro adjustments and compensating for crosswinds without the white knuckles. And no doubt, it will couple well with other, recently announced Nissan tech that will allow the car to self-steer to avoid accidents.

There’s also a level of customization that could change the way a car feels. Today, we expect luxury cars and sports cars to steer a bit differently. Nissan’s system, however, will allow drivers to tweak how tight they like their controls. So drivers could soon define the feel of a car as much as automakers.

But what’s equally interesting is that, with pure digital steering, everything about the traditional car cockpit can be reimagined.

“Theoretically, you could have no steering wheel whatsoever,” a spokesperson tells me. With the steering column out of play, there’s no reason that a touchscreen, gesture interface, even an Xbox 360 gamepad couldn’t be used to steer the car. In the more immediate future, Nissan suggested the possibility of cars customized for left-handed and right-handed people. If the steering column doesn’t need to shape so much of the experience, moving a steering wheel over a few inches is no longer a challenge.

That said, when Nissan’s new drive-by-wire tech launches next year, the wheel will still be connected to the steering column. There are three reasons Nissan could be doing this–current regulations, engineering fail-safes (if drive-by-wire cuts out, the wheel will engage with the shaft) and, of course, consumer expectation–steering wheels work pretty well, and a car without one might not exactly improve on anything just yet. And no automaker wants to tip their hand on the real endgame at play in the industry: cars that drive themselves.

Images: Arrows via Shutterstock

Whether traveling for business or pleasure, no one wants to arrive at a hotel to find expensive Wi-Fi access. Hotels could potentially lose business by charging guests high or hidden fees for Internet. But many establishments — especially luxury lodging — still charge a pretty penny to go online, with little guarantee for a fast connection, either.

According to a recent J.D. Power & Associates study, about 55% of all hotel guests access the Internet during their stays — up 20% from 2006. About 87% of that group is using Wi-Fi.

Although most travelers have come to expect connectivity to be cheap or included, it’s not always the case. The good news is there are ways to avoid paying for Wi-Fi at hotels all together.

Here are a few tips to keep in mind for your next trip.

1. Tether Your Mobile Device

It’s possible to tether your 3G or 4G connection from your smartphone to your computer, but many carriers charge fees to do so. Once you have added the service to your data plan, turn on your phone’s personal hotspot option, located in settings. By setting a password, you will be able to prevent other guests in nearby rooms from connecting to your hotspot.

2. Buy a Wireless Router

Although many hotels charge for Wi-Fi, some provide ethernet cables for you to use free. You can then connect your Apple AirPort Express or similar portable Wi-Fi hotspot device to send connectivity to your laptop and mobile devices.

3. Check the Lobby

It might cost you more to access the web in your hotel room, but some places offer free Wi-Fi in the lobby. To prevent guests from using valuable bandwidth to stream media on sites such as Netflix — which also takes money away from in-room pay-per-view — hotels often restrict free Wi-Fi in rooms, but open it up to guests at no extra charge on the main floor.

4. Find Nearby Connectivity

WeFi has a database of more than 132 million Wi-Fi hotspots worldwide, from small towns to urban centers. The company also has apps for both iOS and Android, so it’s easy to locate the closest Wi-Fi on the go.

How do you avoid paying for Wi-Fi at hotels? Let us know in the comments.

BONUS: 15 Travel Twitter Accounts to Follow

Image courtesy of iStockphoto, courtneyk

Photo: University of Maryland

One of the oldest prizes in aviation is one step closer to being claimed after a team from the University of Maryland flew a human-powered helicopter for 50 seconds yesterday. The students managed the tenuous indoor flight with the Gamera II, beating the team’s previous record of 11 seconds set last summer.

The flight came at the end of two action-filled days of flying, fixing and flying again with numerous hops above the University of Maryland’s basketball court heli-pad.

The prize is the Igor I. Sikorsky Human-Powered Helicopter Competition from the American Helicopter Society and a win earns $250,000. In order to claim the prize a human powered helicopter must lift off the ground, hover for at least 60 seconds, reach an altitude of 3 meters during the flight and stay within a 10-square-meter area.

Yesterday’s 50-second flight was one of more than a dozen over the past two days, including a 35-second flight on Wednesday and a 40-second flight earlier Thursday (video below).

The Gamera II is a far cry from its robust spinning terrapin namesake. Like its fixed wing, human powered cousins, the delicate helicopter is a rather large, yet extremely lightweight aircraft. The entire craft has a width of 105 feet and each of the four rotors has a span of just over 42 feet, 7 inches. But despite the size of the Gamera II, it weighs just 71 pounds. That’s more than 30 pounds lighter than the original Gamera that flew last year, thanks largely to redesigned rotors and an improved truss design.

The design is delicate and an incident on Wednesday had them making repairs and delaying further flights.

Photo: Univeristy of Maryland

Carbon fiber rods and thread are used to create small trusses that in turn make the four large trusses that spread from the cockpit. At the end of each truss is a rotor that is perched just above the ground. With the rotors located close to the ground, the team can take advantage of ground effect, an aerodynamic condition where there’s a reduction in induced drag from the lift generated by the rotors. With the rotors spinning at just 20 revolutions per minute, less than one horsepower is needed to hover at two feet above the ground.

Gamera II is piloted and powered by a pair of students at the University of Maryland. Unlike its predecessor, Gamera II uses both pedals to power with the legs, and a hand crank to add a bit of extra power. The team estimates they gain around 20 percent with the arms over using legs alone.

The University of Maryland team is one of only three groups that has ever achieved human powered helicopter flight. A Japanese team held the previous record with a 19 second flight back in 1994.

More flights are expected today and the team hopes to crack the 60 second barrier. A live stream of the Gamera II in action can be seen on the team’s website.

Photo: NASA

The SpaceX Dragon spacecraft successfully berthed with the International Space Station this morning after a long overnight approach including several unplanned maneuvers. The crew at SpaceX headquarters in Hawthorne, California, concluded a long night of flight demonstrations and troubleshooting by watching astronaut Don Pettit control the station’s robotic arm and grapple the Dragon at 6:56 a.m. PDT.

“Looks like we’ve got a Dragon by the tail,” Pettit said from the station’s Cupola module once the capture was made.

Pettit’s successful capture of the Dragon was greeted by cheers at both SpaceX’s Hawthorne headquarters and NASA’s mission control in Houston. For both SpaceX and NASA the capture moment marks the beginning of a shift in how cargo will be delivered to and from the space station, with the eventual goal of changing how manned flight itself is done to low Earth orbit.

But Dragon’s overnight approach was not without hiccups, demonstrating the true test-flight nature of the mission. A problem with the devices used to guide the Dragon as it approached the station forced an initial retreat. In the end there were a handful of changes made to the initial flight plan, but at 6:49 a.m. PDT, the Dragon sat just 10 meters (32 feet) from the ISS when NASA flight director Holly Ridings gave the command SpaceX had been waiting years to hear: “go for capture.”

Early Friday morning the SpaceX team in Hawthorne completed the approach initiation burn of the Dragon’s Draco thrusters to move the spacecraft roughly 1,000 meters to a point where it could change its alignment relative to the station before performing the first series of demonstration maneuvers close to the ISS. The Dragon spacecraft could be seen on Earth by its flashing strobe light against the night sky.

Once in place at 350 meters, Dragon completed a 180-degree yaw rotation to align itself, and then another short burn was performed to move to the 250-meter point where the demonstrations would begin.

At 2:29 a.m. PDT, the SpaceX team confirmed Dragon was holding at 250 meters (820 feet), but Andre Kuipers, the Dutch astronaut on board the station, noticed the spacecraft was slightly forward of where it was expected to be. NASA engineers in Houston said the position was acceptable.

Sketch of the demonstration maneuvers planned for Dragon near the ISS. Image: NASA

As the ISS and Dragon passed in and out of sunlight orbiting the Earth every 90 minutes, the teams in Houston and Hawthorne prepared for what has long been considered the most challenging and critical part of the mission, demonstrating Dragon can make several different maneuvers in close range to the ISS, with commands being sent from both the ground and from the astronauts on the station.

Just before 3:00 a.m. PDT, with a short burst of the thrusters, Dragon again began approaching the ISS. Minutes later, with the Dragon 220 meters from the station, astronaut Kuipers sent a command via the UHF communications link and Dragon aborted its approach as expected and returned to the 250 meter hold position. Test one was complete.

Kuipers planned to send a command for Dragon to hold at 235 meters, but problems with Dragon’s on-board thermal camera used for the rendezvous with the ISS kept it at the 250 meter point. After a few minutes the test resumed and Kuipers issued Dragon a hold command at 235 meters, but it happened a bit earlier than planned.

Over the next half hour or so, the teams in Hawthorne and Houston were busy evaluating the data from the on-board sensors to make sure both the station and Dragon agreed on their relative positions before moving any closer, particularly inside the simply named “Keep Out Sphere” that surrounds the ISS at 200 meters.

As time progressed, some questions were raised from the data being analyzed from Dragon’s thermal image sensors and the on-board LIDAR (light detection and ranging) sensors. The two different devices are used to independently measure the distance between the two spacecraft. This information is then used by Dragon’s guidance system as it approaches the ISS. The data provided by the thermal cameras was causing the engineers to further evaluate the sensor.

Dragon was sent to an unplanned hold position at 200 meters in hopes of giving the thermal sensors a chance to obtain better data on the position of Dragon relative to the ISS.

Dragon at 30 meters from the station. Photo: NASA

By 4:20 a.m. PDT Dragon was once again on the move, this time to a position 150 meters from the station. After checking the sensors again, Dragon was cleared to fly to the next hold point at 30 meters. But less than 20 minutes later Dragon was held at 78 meters as SpaceX made some changes to the spacecraft’s LIDAR equipment. At 5:21 a.m. PDT the approach was resumed but just four minutes later SpaceX issued a retreat command, moving Dragon away from the ISS.

Dragon returned to 78 meters while a problem with the LIDAR was analyzed. It turns out the laser used by the LIDAR was receiving stray reflections from the Japanese Kibo laboratory on the station. Over the course of the next half hour, SpaceX engineers analyzed how to resolve the problem with the stray LIDAR signals, eventually deciding to narrow the view of the LIDAR. Essentially they put blinders on the sensors so they could only see straight ahead, where the Dragon was set to be berthed with the station.

Eventually Dragon was given the go-ahead to proceed to the 30-meter point, and then to the 10-meter location where it would be captured by the station’s robotic arm. After rescheduling the planed grapple a few times during the morning, the go-ahead was given for a capture at 7:02 a.m., which would take place in the dark as the two spacecraft passed over Australia. Dragon took roughly 20 minutes to fly the final 20 meters to its final hold position.

The station’s robotic Canada arm approaches Dragon. Photo: NASA

With Dragon in place at 10 meters, NASA’s Holly Ridings sat at her flight director desk in Houston with a purple stuffed dragon toy on the console above her. She anxiously twirled her pen in her hand as she told astronaut Pettit that Dragon was operating on a single LIDAR and should that one fail, the spacecraft would abort.

But in the final minutes, everything went well as Pettit maneuvered the arm towards Dragon. As the end of the arm inched towards the capsule, lights from the ISS bathed Dragon in an orange glow. A few minutes ahead of schedule at 6:56 a.m. PDT, capture was confirmed by NASA, marking the first time a private spacecraft was attached to the International Space Station.

The capture occurred 3 days, 6 hours, 11 minutes and 23 seconds after the Falcon 9 had lifted off from Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Tuesday morning. After another hour and a few reconfigurations of Dragon the robotic arm slowly pulled the capsule towards the station and at 8:52 a.m. PDT NASA confirmed Dragon was firmly attached to the station itself and the robotic arm was no longer holding it in place. After tightening the 16 bolts attaching Dragon to the station’s Harmony module, the ISS officially had its first private spacecraft visitor.

Dragon berthed to the Harmony module on the ISS. Photo: NASA

There are several more steps before the hatch between the ISS and Dragon will be opened early Saturday. Once opened, the crew on board the station will spend several days unpacking the 1,014 pounds (460 kilograms) of cargo on board Dragon. Once empty, the crew will load up Dragon with 1,367 (620 kilograms) of cargo before the spacecraft is released from the station and returns to earth with a splashdown in the Pacific Ocean on May 31.

The SpaceX mission to berth with the International Space Station has successfully passed the first set of demonstrations with NASA. Dragon completed a series of maneuvers early this morning to adjust its orbit as it prepared for the first flyby of the ISS, passing just 2.4 kilometers (1.5 miles) beneath the station. In addition to the maneuvering, a series of tests was completed to confirm Dragon‘s onboard navigation and communication equipment was working properly before moving closer to the ISS on Friday.

Over the course of several hours all of the demonstrations went well, according to SpaceX’s lead mission director John Couluris, “all Dragon systems checked out, we look good” he said in a press conference following the flyby. “Dragon‘s go for berthing day tomorrow.”

Image: SpaceX

NASA’s ISS flight director Holly Ridings also said the first set of demonstrations was a success, comparing it to the numerous simulations completed by both SpaceX and NASA together. “Today went really very close to how we had trained it,” Ridings said. “There was no major deviation from our pre-flight plan.”

Today’s maneuvers were just the latest in several steps SpaceX has to make to to successfully demonstrate Dragon‘s capabilities as part of NASA’s Commercial Orbital Transportation System (COTS) before NASA will allow the company to deliver cargo to the space station.

Dragon as seen with its solar panels deployed from the ISS. Photo: NASA

Within hours of Tuesday morning’s launch, Dragon had successfully deployed its solar panels and opened the doors to its guidance, navigation and control sensors and began testing some of this equipment that will be used as the spacecraft approaches the space station.

On Wednesday, Dragon‘s GPS was shown to be working properly and the vehicle’s COTS UHF Communications Unit (CUCU, pronounced cuckoo) which will be used to communicate with the ISS was powered up and running.

In preparation for the maneuvers close to the ISS, some of Dragon‘s 18 Draco thrusters were demonstrated on Wednesday with both a series of short pulses, and a longer continuous burn simulating the vehicle’s ability to abort from its approach to the station.

A diagram of today’s flyby and the rest of the day’s flight as Dragon makes a loop around the ISS. Image: NASA

All of the activities during the first two days took place as Dragon was chasing the ISS in an effort to be in position for today’s flyby. Before the first maneuver, Dragon was in orbit about 60 kilometers (37 miles) behind and 9.5 kilometers (6 miles) beneath the ISS. At 12:58 a.m. PDT, the Dragon team at SpaceX’s headquarters in Hawthorne, California, announced a successful  “height adjustment burn” giving Dragon the vertical push closer to the space station (an orbit further away from the earth).

Forty-five minutes after the height adjustment burn at 1:43 a.m. PDT, Dragon performed a “co-elliptic burn” to effectively allow the capsule to level off at the desired distance beneath the station. Initially the altitude was to be 2.5 kilometers beneath the station, but this was changed to an actual distance of 2.4 kilometers. A few minutes later the crew on board the station sent a command to Dragon that turned on the capsule’s strobe light to confirm the CUCU communication link between the ISS and Dragon.

SpaceX’s John Couluris said Dragon‘s maneuvers around the ISS were successful, and it ended up using 36 kilograms (79 pounds) less propellant during the Draco burns than planned.

Couluris said the extra propellant offers a bit of a cushion if any part of the mission needs to be extended, “if we need to take more time and come back around a second time.”

While Dragon continued to close the distance horizontally to the ISS (remaining 2.4 kilometers beneath the station), SpaceX confirmed the capsule’s relative GPS was operational. The relative GPS is what will be used tomorrow as Dragon begins its approach to the station before laser and thermal imaging sensors guide it in the final meters.

View from inside the ISS’ Cupola where astronaut Don Pettit will grasp Dragon with the robotic arm and berth it with the station. Photo: NASA

As Dragon approached the station, the ISS crew announced it could see it with a traditional “tally ho” while cameras onboard both the ISS and Dragon were able to capture the other.

At 4:26 a.m. PDT, Dragon passed directly beneath the ISS at the prescribed 2.4-kilometer distance before continuing in front of the station as part of the large loop it will fly over the next day before beginning its final close approach early Friday morning.

All of the Dragon operations are being controlled by the SpaceX team at its headquarters in Hawthorne, California. The company’s mission control center is located on the factory floor in a glass enclosure allowing employees to watch the entire mission projected onto large screens.

SpaceX’s Couluris says he has been working with NASA on this mission for more than five years. “We’ve been simulating for almost three years,” he said.

During that time, both teams have rehearsed the mission numerous times. “We have conducted almost 20 joint simulations with NASA” Couluris said, “and over 40 simulations internally here at SpaceX over the four shifts of operators we have working.”

Simulations are a mainstay of the aerospace community with everybody from airline pilots to spacecraft operators developing, practicing and refining all aspects of a flight on computers before flying the real thing for the first time.

“We fly by the mantra of, ‘train like you fly and then fly like you train,’” Couluris said, describing the long hours spent rehearsing. A former naval aviator, Couluris added the mantra is working, “so far the mission has been proceeding just like a regular simulation.”

Both Couluris and NASA’s Ridings reiterated the flight-test nature of the mission, adding that many difficult tasks still lie ahead. And despite all of the rehearsals and simulations there is still plenty that can go wrong with the massively complex systems involved, something SpaceX discovered after a small valve forced an abort of the first launch attempt as the rocket engines ignited on the launch pad.

Coverage of the next series of maneuvers will begin broadcast on our Open Space page beginning at 11 p.m. PDT today.

The crew aboard the ISS watches the launch of SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket Tuesday morning. Photo: NASA

Photo: Terrafugia

There’s a flying car coming to the New York International Auto Show this week. The Terrafugia Transition is a two-seat airplane with foldable wings, four wheels and turn signals. Over the past few years the Massachusetts company has called its creation a “roadable aircraft” and lately, a “street legal airplane.” But ahead of the Transition’s first appearance at an auto show, it’s perhaps more appropriate to simply call it what it is: a flying car.

Terrafugia and its Transition have been around for several years, but until now the company has largely stuck to the aviation community. But Terrafugia co-founder and CEO Carl Dietrich says that looking at the people who have placed orders for the $279,000 vehicle, they thought it would be worth looking outside the aviation world.

“We’ve noticed in our order backlog there are actually a fair number of people who are not currently pilots who are putting deposits down to order a Transition.”

So the company is coming to New York to gauge interest in a flying car from the non-pilot sector of the public, hoping the attraction of a flying car can create a few pilots and most importantly, customers.

Development of the Transition is progressing and last month Terrafugia completed the first flight of the production prototype. Dietrich expects flight testing to continue through 2012 and deliveries to begin next year.

The dream of a flying car has been around for a long, long time. And in recent years we’ve seen a dune-buggy-turned-car that flies like a powered parachute aimed at accessing remote parts of the developing world, and even aerospace guru Burt Rutan explored the concept in his final days at Scaled Composites.

Just today a Dutch company announced the successful first flights of the PAL-V, a single-seat three-wheeler that’s also a gyrocopter. But as is the case with many inventions that try to combine two already matured products, one plus one does not usually equal two.

The PAL-V One from Holland. Photo: PAL-V

The math doesn’t quite work out on the Transition either, though it’s arguably the most serious attempt at producing anything close to a practical flying car. It’s a decent airplane and as a car it can get you from A to B. The biggest challenge is finding the niche that can be served by the Transition which is neither a great airplane nor a great car. Terrafugia’s Dietrich says that marketplace might be people who fall in between the long driving commute or short airplane flight.

“If you’re flying 1,000 nautical miles, you’re probably going to want a higher performance aircraft” he says. “But if you’re flying 100, 200 or 300 miles, this might be ideal.”

With a cruise speed of 105 miles per hour, the Transition is faster than a car, especially considering it can often travel in a straight lines rarely available on the road. But it’s slower than many other Light Sport Aircraft (LSA), many of which fly at speeds closer to 135 mph. And comparing it to other new LSAs, the Transition is at least $100,000 more than most models.

But what Terrafugia believes is the value in the Transition is the convenience of always having the option of driving if the weather or some other issue prevents a safe flight. It’s true that one of the biggest challenges general aviation pilots face is being grounded because of bad weather. Many small aircraft can fly in inclement weather, but it requires more training and often more equipment to do so safely. So Terrafugia is touting the fact that its relatively simple light sport aircraft won’t force you to wait, or have to rent a car, just to finish a trip. Just fold up the wings and continue your journey on the ground.

Of course then you’ll be driving a rather delicate $279,000 car down the road. Little has been said about the cost of somebody backing into your folded wing. Something as simple as a minor fender-bender may be a bit more expensive than simply replacing a bumper.

Terrafugia’s Transition in flight. Photo: Terrafugia

Despite any potential drawbacks, Terrafugia has found a customer base that believes the flying car makes sense. Dietrich says about two-thirds of their existing customers are looking at the Transition as a practical form of transportation to suit their specific needs. Examples include a surveyor who could travel quickly to jobs around the state and a real estate developer who likes the idea of being able to scout new sites from above and give aerial tours to customers. The other third simply see the Transition as a fun vehicle and like the idea of owning a flying car.

For the rest of the population there are plenty of ground-bound vehicles to look at this week in New York and lots of plenty of airplanes to see at shows like Airventure in Oshkosh. So the challenge will be to decide whether or not the $279,000 Transition is a better option than a $100,000 Porsche Carrera plus a $160,000 Flight Design CTLS (leaving some extra cash for those car rentals).