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Old 25th Feb 2016, 02:04
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riff_raff
 
Join Date: Sep 2007
Location: USA
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Agile,

A couple years back AW (briefly) flew their Project Zero tilt rotor demonstrator aircraft. It was an all electric propulsion system and was basically a test bed for various technologies they were developing, such as electric propulsion motors/controls, electromechanical IBC actuation, etc. The aircraft was unmanned and of limited scale, but to me the most impressive aspects of the project were that it was funded internally and had a very short (6 month) design/build cycle. Would be great to see more of this in the aerospace industry.

Here's a 2013 video with an interview of the project engineering lead. At 2:15 of the video he talks about the problems with energy density of current battery systems.

Here's a US patent application published in 2013 covering the concept that is worth a read if you're interested in electric rotorcraft propulsion systems.
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