Lazzarini I.F.O.

I.F.O.
Lazzarini Design Studio
Rome, Italy
www.lazzarinidesignstudio.com

Pierpaolo Lazzarini founded the Lazzarini Design Studio in June 2010 in Rome, Italy, after spending many years working in the automotive industry. His freelance designer who employs team of designers, engineers and dreamers who believe in different design approach, using past designs to influence contemporary designs. The design studio creates concept art for the automotive, yachting, architecture, consumer products and aerospace industries. 

Lazzarini Design Studio caters to the manufacturing world bringing ideas from the concept phase, to modeling, animation, programming, and engineering, using high quality 3-D renderings and video. The studio imagines the future design of flying aircraft. The Lazzarini Design Studio's motto is, "Think about the future, never forget the past."

The Identified Flying Object (I.F.O) is the name of the studio's electric vertical takeoff and landing (eVTOL) aircraft which looks like a UFO from scientific fiction movies from the 1940s and 1950s. The I.F.O. is a design concept for a two passenger multicopter made of carbon fiber for light weight and strength which has eight electric propellers and motors for propulsion. 

The studio envisions the top speed of this aircraft to be 193 km/h (120 mph) and having a maximum flight time of 60 to 70 minutes. The passenger compartment has a diameter of two meters (over 6.5 feet) which is surrounded by the propeller disk which is 4.7 meters (over 15 feet) in diameter holding eight electric propellers and their corresponding electric motors.

Entering the cabin can be done with a ladder, where the passengers climb in over the propeller disk. Or the aircraft can extend its four retractable landing legs and the lower part of the passenger compartment lowers on a pulley and the passenger can enter or leave, from the bottom of the aircraft.

The aircraft has two parts, the passenger compartment and the flat disk holding the electric propellers. Both components can separate if necessary, in an emergency situation or during maintenance. In an emergency situation, if all propellers fail, there is a ballistic parachute that jettisons above and the propeller disks ejects from the passenger compartment. 

The Lazzarini Design Studio is seeking investors to help start the construction of prototypes for their multiple hybrid-electric VTOL aircraft designs.

Specifications:

• Aircraft type: eVTOL 
• Piloting: 1 person
• Capacity: 2 people including the pilot and passenger
• Passenger compartment: It is spherical in shape and bottom half of the cabin (with mounted seating) can be lowered to the ground with pulleys for passenger entry and exit
• Maximum speed: 193 km/h (120 mph)
• Maximum flight time: 60 to 70 minutes
• Propellers: 8
• Electric Motors: 8
• Windows: Side windows and a full sunlight providing forward, left, right and top visibility allowing for spectacular views for the passengers
• Landing gear: 6 retractable landing legs
• Safety Features: Distributed Electric Propulsion (DEP), provides safety through redundancy for its passengers and/or cargo. DEP means having multiple propellers and motors on the aircraft so if one or more motors or propellers fail, the other working motors and propellers can safely land the aircraft. The aircraft has a ballistic parachute if all else fails.

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• Video: I.F.O. "The Identified Flying Object", Lazzarini Design, Mar. 22, 2017
• Article: Jet capsule suggests two-seater drone as a sleek carbon body, Design Boom, Mar. 23, 2017