Hybrid electric prototypes • FLYING Mag story.

[Garfly]

 

 

https://www.flyingmag.com/story/news/hybrid-electric-prototypes/

 

 

 

 

 

 

[turboplanner]

I'm designing one with an electric motor powered by a fuel cell which uses hydrogen captured from the air it will fly through with solar panels on the upper surfaces, so it doesn't need recharging, but it's just in the design stage at this time.

 

Back in the present there was an effort made last year for a world record in SA in a Pipstrel.

The owner did was he said the aircraft could do and completed the trip.

 

The aircraft had a 35 to 45 minute range, so he had a ground crew towing two generators to recharge the batteries every hour.

That's an expensive way to fly around Australia.

 

[FlyBoy1960]

Solar panels will not work on a conventional sized aircraft flying at low altitudes e.g. below 30,000 feet.

 

The person whose name I can't repeat on this website for reasons unknown did a seminar about 18 months ago at the airfield and went through all of the different types of propulsion systems and power sources for electric aircraft.

 

Putting solar panels on a conventional sized aircraft does not offer enough return to carry the extra weight of the panels, the inverter and charger. So, you are basically reducing the aircraft performance and endurance by adding all of this extra weight that the system cannot produce enough benefit to justify carrying this extra weight and you end up reducing the aircraft endurance and performance significantly.

 

thisThis is why the eflyer from George Bye changed its name from what was originally the solar flyer, it took them a few years but they worked out there was benefit whatsoever in having solar panels on the aircraft and just went to a conventional battery system in the end and ditched the solar panels completely. Why it took them 3 years to work this out was a mystery to everyone but the presenter thinks they didn't purely for publicity reasons because it allowed them to say the aircraft flew by power generated from the sun which wasn't true