The time two guys bolted a Ford Pinto to a Cessna and called it a flying car
Both engines would fire for takeoff, the car engine would switch off in the air, and after landing you'd unbolt the Pinto and drive home. They planned to sell it for as little as $18,300. On an August 1973 test flight, the base of the right wing strut pulled loose just after takeoff; the pilot set the craft down in a bean field and drove it back to the airport.
- ▪Both engines would fire for takeoff, the car engine would switch off in the air, and after landing you'd unbolt the Pinto and drive home.
- ▪They planned to sell it for as little as $18,300.
- ▪On an August 1973 test flight, the base of the right wing strut pulled loose just after takeoff; the pilot set the craft down in a bean field and drove it back to the airport.
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The time two guys bolted a Ford Pinto to a Cessna and called it a flying car Ellsworth Toohey 5:36 pm Sat Jul 25, 2026 AVE Mizar flying car — Doug Duncan / CC BY-SA 3.0 (via Wikipedia) In 1971 two Northrop-trained engineers in Van Nuys set out to build a flying car called the AVE Mizar, and the design was about as literal as it sounds: they bolted the back half of a Cessna Skymaster — wings, twin tail booms, and a propeller — onto a Ford Pinto. Both engines would fire for takeoff, the car engine would switch off in the air, and after landing you'd unbolt the Pinto and drive home. They planned to sell it for as little as $18,300.
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