new electric aircraft

[jackc]

They should do ONE aircraft, and then fly the wings off it, testing extensively before finally committing. 

[Freizeitpilot]

I suspect the regulator will have a long look, before electric converted aircraft are let loose on the public….and rightly so.

[jackc]

3 minutes ago, Freizeitpilot said:

I suspect the regulator will have a long look, before electric converted aircraft are let loose on the public….and rightly so.

But I wonder IF CASA is able to look at this new technology, in a timely and knowledgeable way.   Regulatory work from them is usually a hurry up AND……wait regime. 🤢

[turboplanner]

3 minutes ago, jackc said:

But I wonder IF CASA is able to look at this new technology, in a timely and knowledgeable way.   Regulatory work from them is usually a hurry up AND……wait regime. 🤢

It's not new technology. Hopefully the RA training aircraft are out there racking up training hours.

Remember they set an endurance record, admittedly by being followed by two car crews with trailer-mounted generators. But range isn't an issue if the proposed operation is withing the aircraft's range and safety margin.

[jackc]

The training use will be limited, number of circuits before recharge needed?  Probably no cross country endorsements? Aircraft limited range will mean no real hire out possibilities.

This will mean far higher hourly training cost.  Not to mention train in electric than add extra hours for training on piston type, to get signed off for RPC..

[turboplanner]

9 minutes ago, jackc said:

The training use will be limited, number of circuits before recharge needed?  Probably no cross country endorsements? Aircraft limited range will mean no real hire out possibilities.

This will mean far higher hourly training cost.  Not to mention train in electric than add extra hours for training on piston type, to get signed off for RPC.

That was more or less what we concluded when we were discussing the aircraft operating in SA at the time.

 

It's consistent with range still being in the Top 4 EV issues when loaded and operating at highway speeds and in country areas.

 

For RA airctraft training I would still look at a 70 kts product, so dramatically less hp consumed per circuit, and legal for 500 foot circuits, so less full power climb, less distance per circuit, more training circuits per hour.

 

Those two things mean lower up front cost as well for the airctraft.

 

Sure, it's not going to be used for cross country training, and qualified students are not going to be hiring it for trips away, but from my experience people who want to do that move almost immediately to something like an Arrow anyway, so it will cost them less to do the cross country training in GA.

[kgwilson]

Electro Aero based at Jandakot near Perth manufacture charging equipment for the aviation industry & have had an electric training aircraft since 2018. It is a Pipistrel Alpha. It has 1 hour endurance & recharging takes 45 minutes & costs about $3.00 in electricity for an hours flying. This was the first in the Southern Hemisphere. The technology is not new & the original Alpha was built in 2015. I believe they created a quick replaceable battery pack at some point which takes about 15 minutes to swap.

 

In 2015 watt hours per kg of a Li-ion battery was less than 200. The latest Li-ion  batteries can achieve 360 WH/kg and the new semi solid state battery from TNE can achieve 720 WH/kg. The same weight of battery using the new tech should provide 3-4 hours endurance for the same aircraft. That is pretty good progress and pretty good endurance for this aircraft.

 

 

[mkennard]

 

[BrendAn]

44 minutes ago, kgwilson said:

Electro Aero based at Jandakot near Perth manufacture charging equipment for the aviation industry & have had an electric training aircraft since 2018. It is a Pipistrel Alpha. It has 1 hour endurance & recharging takes 45 minutes & costs about $3.00 in electricity for an hours flying. This was the first in the Southern Hemisphere. The technology is not new & the original Alpha was built in 2015. I believe they created a quick replaceable battery pack at some point which takes about 15 minutes to swap.

 

In 2015 watt hours per kg of a Li-ion battery was less than 200. The latest Li-ion  batteries can achieve 360 WH/kg and the new semi solid state battery from TNE can achieve 720 WH/kg. The same weight of battery using the new tech should provide 3-4 hours endurance for the same aircraft. That is pretty good progress and pretty good endurance for this aircraft.

 

 

We had a whole thread on this one a few months back. There is also a video on a school in Sweden that uses them and green power to charge them . Pretty limited though.  I think they get 20 minutes flight time plus taxi and take off.

 

Edited April 17 by BrendAn

[Freizeitpilot]

 

Here’s the latest from Friedrichshafen.

Anticipating a certified Bristell and Diamond in 2025. The Bristell looks like the most viable at this stage.

[jackc]

It may be innovative and class leading technical excellence, but at the end of the day it’s what the cost is?  Sure, someone will buy but will enough sell to make them viable?

Its not a good economy to be spending big bucks for something that is not a must have…..

[Freizeitpilot]

It should be said that the first Ute that was ever built probably wasn’t initially commercially viable and required a huge investment by the manufacturers too.

The interview in the video mentions that the total cost of ownership for flying schools for the electric Bristell will be the same or less than the Bristell ICE equivalent, and they see synergy in operating the two types together. There is also an industry expectation of progressively longer battery life over the next few years. At the end of the day, this development is still a long way from being mainstream and the weight and duration of current battery technology still sucks.
GA will require a breakthrough technology to transition completely away from fossil fuel powered aircraft…….but ultimately they have to put their toe in the water somewhere.

 

I was told once that it was easy to identify the pioneers in the Wild West - they were the ones with the arrows sticking out of their backs.

[Freizeitpilot]

Flying electric taxis in China

China, China, China……where a ‘one thousand year’ strategic plan can prevail, regulatory approval is swift, community consultation is nil, and return on investment is not essential.  An example - China was an early commercial adopter of (German) magnetic levitation high speed rail over 20 years ago, and now intends to both dramatically expand its footprint and its speed.

I travelled on the Shanghai Maglev train at 420kmh just after it opened, and the fare was the equivalent of $6. They later had to reduce the speed as apparently the shockwave vacuum created by two passing trains was pulling the elevated tracks together. I remember it being a very sudden and dramatic sideways jolt. Safety ? Pffffttt. !!

 

One way or another, I have absolutely no doubt that China will make this e-VTOL ‘low altitude economy’ a reality.  

 

Given the history of high speed rail in Australia, a low altitude economy in Australia probably won’t occur in my lifetime, but it’s still interesting to see where this stuff is headed.

 

[facthunter]

Wonder how it would handle a flock of birds and weird winds. . IF life is cheap, why not?   Nev

Edited May 19 by facthunter

[Freizeitpilot]

Life is pretty cheap on the roads too…..and some days the smog is so thick you can’t see the traffic lights.  But then again, a red traffic light is there to simply offer a vague suggestion anyhow.

[facthunter]

  RED lights?  IF you obey them there's a  good chance the person behind will tail end you. Nev

[Ian]

Firstly let me be clear, I'd love electric planes being a reality, however I don't have high hopes, and I hope I'm wrong.

It breaks down to 3 factors Range, weight and recharge time.

As a private pilot I could cope with a long recharge time however commercial vehicles don't have this luxury.

A breakthrough in low cost batteries is essential to make flying EVs a possibility, and it remains a toy technology. The only cost effective technology I can see is to use aluminium air batteries to provide an energy density near that of liquid fuels. However they're not reachargable. The fuel cycle would be a bit of a logistics nightmare and to complete the cycle would require a lot more aluminium smelters which require 24x7 power not intermittent solar/wind.

Hydrogen is unlikely, it's difficult, dangerous and expensive. Most planes want to burn it in a turbine. If it's cryogenic you won't ever leave any in the tank and less frequently used airports would need to be closed.

Look at the picture in the following link. Most of the passenger section is now devoted to fuel, directly behind the passengers. Doesn't look particularly safe.

https://www.airbus.com/en/newsroom/press-releases/2024-05-innovative-aviation-liquid-hydrogen-project-launched

[Freizeitpilot]

Quick change battery packs can solve the recharge time problem.  There is an Australian company doing that for electric trucks. They can change out a battery pack in around 4 mins.

 

https://www.januselectric.com.au/

 

 

[BrendAn]

3 hours ago, Freizeitpilot said:

Quick change battery packs can solve the recharge time problem.  There is an Australian company doing that for electric trucks. They can change out a battery pack in around 4 mins.

 

https://www.januselectric.com.au/

 

 

Some forklifts have been using a change over battery system for years.

[turboplanner]

59 minutes ago, BrendAn said:

Some forklifts have been using a change over battery system for years.

If it's as easy as that, I would think the SA Training organisation would be doing it, but the last time any PR was released the problem was that they were not getting to the end of a full training session, where a changeover would be feasible.

 

 

[kgwilson]

There are dozens of companies working on electric short haul passenger aircraft. If battery technology gets to the magic 1000 watts per kg they become quite viable for a range of around 1000km. At present the best (semi solid state) batteries out of China come in at 720 watts per kg. CATL already have aviation lithium based batteries batteries with energy density of 500watts per kg compared to the very best EV Lithium NMC batteries of 360 watts/kg. These are mainly aimed at the Vtol commuter market.

 

Battery swap technology is very advanced in China. They already have battery swap stations able to swap out a battery in an EV in under 4 minutes with the largest swappable batteries providing up to 1000km of range.

[Ian]

14 hours ago, kgwilson said:

If battery technology gets to the magic 1000 watts per kg they become quite viable for a range of around 1000km.

I think that you probably mean KWh per kilo.

Breakthroughs are required, sometimes they come, sometimes they don't.

Fuel cells and fusion have been waiting for a breakthrough for almost 100 years and it hasn't come.

 

[kgwilson]

47 minutes ago, Ian said:

I think that you probably mean KWh per kilo.

Breakthroughs are required, sometimes they come, sometimes they don't.

Fuel cells and fusion have been waiting for a breakthrough for almost 100 years and it hasn't come.

 

Watts per kilo is the power to weight ratio. Watt hours to Kg is the energy density so yes that is correct when looking at the amount of energy able to be stored for a given weight in kilograms. If we  manage to get to 1 KWh/Kg (at the pack level) then the battery in my EV would only weigh 64 Kg instead of the 400 Kgs it weighs now.