Electric Powered Aircraft [Archive]

Longtimer

12th Apr 2019, 17:23

Norway aviation firm orders 60 electric planes tipped to be “Tesla” of flight

Posted on April 12, 2019 (https://thedriven.io/2019/04/12/norway-aviation-firm-orders-60-electric-planes-tipped-to-be-tesla-of-flight/)
2 minute read
byBridie Schmidt (https://thedriven.io/author/bridie/)
https://thedriven.io/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/All-electric-plane-eflyer2-768x432-800x450.jpg (https://thedriven.io/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/All-electric-plane-eflyer2-768x432.jpg)
The Bye Aerospace eFlyer. Source: OSM Aviation
A Norwegian aviation group has ordered 60 all-electric eFlyer2 planes, built by Colorado-based Bye Aerospace, with the intention of training a future generation of pilots in electric flight.

The order was announced on Thursday (overnight, Australian time) by OSM Aviation, which specialises in the training and supply of aircrew and which says the electric aircraft will be used at its flight training centres to qualify pilots. With aviation accounting for around 12% of all global transport emissions (https://www.atag.org/facts-figures.html), the order is a step towards a sustainable future for OSM Aviation and Norway’s goal to shift all short-haul routes to electric flight by 2040.

“We’re proud to take the lead in the future of green aviation.” said OSM Aviation Group CEO Espen Høiby in a statement (https://osmaviation.com/osm-aviation-aims-for-a-green-future/).

“This is the largest order for commercial electric planes to date.
“It’s important that the airline industry steps up to the challenge of developing more environment-friendly transport. At OSM Aviation, we’re committed to pursuing a socially responsible and sustainable business,” Høiby said.

“We’re training the next generation of pilots, and are determined to attract the best candidates.

“We offer a forward-looking education which they can be proud to take part in. This order for 60 all-electric aircraft is a key step in that respect,” said Bjørn Granviken, managing director of the OSM Aviation Academy.

The eFlyer, formerly the Sun Flyer, is a 2-seater electric fixed wing plane that has been described by Bye Aerospace’s Norwegian partner Elfly AS as a game changer for the aviation industry.

“I think [Bye Aerospace] will be the first to mass produce a certified FAR 23 and EASA 23 all-electric airplane,” said Eric Lithun, CEO of Elfly AS in a statement (https://www.byeaerospace.com/bye-aerospace-rebrands-electric-airplane-as-eflyer/).

“This is the game changer of aviation for small airplanes. The Bye Aerospace eFlyer will be the Tesla of the general aviation industry.”

So far, Bye Aerospace say it has received almost 300 orders for the eFlyer2, which completed its first successful test at Centennial Airport, south of Denver, Colorado in February this year and is kitted with electric propulsion from Siemens.

With electric flight offering not only reduced carbon emissions but also noise pollution, as well as superior speed and altitude performance according to Høiby, he says that the electrification of the aviation industry is inevitable.

This opinion is echoed by Ketil Solvik Olsen, former Norwegian minister for transport and communications and now responsible for establishing the OSM Aviation Academy.
“The state-owned Avinor company, which operates most of Norway’s civilian airports, made headlines last year when it piloted test flights with an electric plane,” Solvik Olsen noted in a statement.

“This made more people aware of the potential for green aviation. Now OSM shows that the business community is ready to take charge and move the industry further along this positive trend.”

OSM Aviation joins other short-haul airlines beginning to switch to electric flight , such as Hawaiian Mokulele Airlines which plans to offer converted electric Cessnas for flight by 2021 (https://thedriven.io/2019/02/05/this-california-startup-converting-cessna-electric/).
Link to article: https://thedriven.io/2019/04/12/norway-aviation-firm-orders-60-electric-planes-tipped-to-be-tesla-of-flight/

3Greens

12th Apr 2019, 17:57

Is it powered by a lithium ion battery? I suspect the weight would prevent any decent payload for a serious commercial operation.

KiloB

12th Apr 2019, 18:00

I would be a lot more impressed if there was mention of Horsepower, Battery capacity etc. At the moment this just comes across as a ‘puff piece’.

finncapt

12th Apr 2019, 18:09

There was a live broadcast from Malmi airfield on a Finnish channel, maybe last summer but perhaps the one before, of a chap who flew a circuit in an electric airplane.

I was quite impressed.

Can't remember much more.

BirdmanBerry

12th Apr 2019, 18:40

These guys are currently just round the corner from me at Staverton - https://electro-flight.com/

DaveReidUK

12th Apr 2019, 19:09

I would be a lot more impressed if there was mention of Horsepower, Battery capacity etc. At the moment this just comes across as a ‘puff piece’.

Some figures here: Sun Flyer Rollout - Sustainable Skies (http://sustainableskies.org/sun-flyer-rollout/)

Bye were quoting 65 orders 3 years ago, but AFAIK only one example has flown to date.

horizon flyer

12th Apr 2019, 20:25

KiloB

12th Apr 2019, 21:00

So using their own figures, it has an endurance of about 26 min at 75% cruise, not counting taxi and takeoff!

pattern_is_full

12th Apr 2019, 21:57

I would be a lot more impressed if there was mention of Horsepower, Battery capacity etc. At the moment this just comes across as a ‘puff piece’.

Still under development - first flight just last month - but projected specs (ex AvWeb, by way of wikipedia) seem to be:

- 440 lb payload (subtracting projected EW of 1460 lbs including batteries, from projected GTOW of 1900 lbs)
- 3.5 hours endurance
- 92 kWh total battery capacity, in 6 packs.
- Siemens SP70D motor - max. output 90kW, continuous output 70kW, obviously "throttled" to less than that to obtain projected endurance
- 135 kts max speed
- engine weight 57 lbs
- $3 per hour operating costs

Note the engine and battery suppliers have changed since Dave's 2016 specs.

It flies - remains to be seen how fast, for how long, and how far.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WcNiGzX220Q

BluSdUp

12th Apr 2019, 22:57

OSM are indeed ahead of the pack.
3,5 hrs endurance , now that is good.
Considering the total world pollution from Aviation IS 2% and OSM CLAIMS it is 12% I for one would like dobbelcheck any and all numbers that comes out of that outfit.
Tok litt vell mye Møllers Tran der du.
( "Overdosed slightly on the Codliver Oil " as the add goes in Norway!)

Aviation Pollution is NOT a problem in the world, at 2 %!
If it was 12% I would agree it needs fixing.
It aint broke Why fix it.
Mind you there will eventually be some elec planes around, and training is for sure the place to start.
Need a bit more then 26 min endurance me thinks
Regards
Cpt B

BluSdUp

12th Apr 2019, 23:14

Now that was cool!
Not sure I would fly that thing especially on water!
The wings are to low and close on landing so any roll/bank and I suspect it is game over, but that is the pessimist and the old floatpilot in me.
If put into production it definitely has potential.
Lots of plastic fantastic stuff out there and combined with elec and amfib is indeed cool

ecto1

12th Apr 2019, 23:59

Car battery (varta e44 77Ah) Weight 18 kg. Usable energy stored 2.21MJ. 18 kg Jet A1 or gasoline: 803MJ of usable energy.

Going any fancy battery (lithium ion) will do x2 energy x10 price for the same weight. Best commercial battery in the world x3 energy, x100 price.

I know you don't believe me, but these are the facts. You need roughly 100 times the weight in fuel (because electric engines extract energy from batteries roughly 2x better than piston engines from fuel). So if you load 120kg of gas in your cessna 172 to do a trip, you would need 12000kgs (yes, 12 tons) of batteries to do the same trip. Only now of course you need an A318 to lift the batteries.

To sum it up, if you retrofit an airbus 318 with half a million $ worth of batteries (12000kg) and you find someone to donate two electric engines with enough thrust, you end up with a theoretical range of 57km.

As of today, we produce electricity basically burning stuff. In cars, regen braking and all, you produce the same CO2 with an electric car than with a petrol one. They make a little sense because you take pollution away from city center.

But in planes, where wheels do not happily cancel the weight penalty at constant speed, the idea is crazy beyond belief. Completely derailed.

Pilot DAR

13th Apr 2019, 02:47

I was hired to conduct a design review toward approval of an electric refit for a 172. The plans had merit, but where it lost traction was that for a half to an hour of flying, there would be a many hour recharge period. Either the aircraft would be out of service for most of the rest of the day charging, or it would be necessary to change out heavy battery packs multiple times; meaning owning several, and then inevitable damage to the airframe handling such a heavy weight in and out or around regularly. The time will come, but right now the investment in a costly aircraft which must sit idle and change hours per minutes of flying is difficult to justify for a working plane.

jimjim1

13th Apr 2019, 04:00

The time will come, but right now the investment in a costly aircraft which must sit idle and change hours per minutes of flying is difficult to justify for a working plane.

I think that the time is now. It seems that the usual limit on recharging time is the capacity of the charger. The batteries can take it Captain.

e.g. for fastest charging in the case of a Tesla you use a DC supply that bypasses the internal Charger(s) in the vehicle. 400 V DC as I recall.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pipistrel_Alpha_Trainer
"It has energy for one flight hour plus reserves, and can recharge in 45 minutes or have its batteries replaced in 5 minutes"

https://electrek.co/2018/11/08/porsche-mission-e-prototype-charging-250kw/
"Porsche claims that the 800V chargers can charge the battery pack to 80% in about 15 minutes (https://electrek.co/2018/05/29/porsche-all-electric-mission-e-prototype-adam-levine/)"

I suspect that you need to slow down for the last bit as the batteries approach full charge.

The deal is done.

Another deal -
Tesla recently bought Maxwell Technologies - "Maxwell claims this could boost battery capacity to 300 Wh/kg, a 20% jump over the best available electric-car batteries." They say it just needs productionised.

This is interesting - Blown wing to reduce stall speed and allow much higher wing loading for cruise efficiency.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Airbus_E-Fan

Also the Pipistrel above "has 277 pounds (126 kg) of LiPo cells (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithium_polymer_battery), however the water cooled electric motor weighs 11 kg". This allows much more power to be available for a short time for a small weight penalty. e.g. At present a twin engine helicopter carries around a spare gas turbine all the time for the case where one engine fails. A spare engine in the Pipistrel would only weigh 11 kg! (Of course perhaps an 80hp gas turbine only weighs 11kg - I am not sure?). There seems the possibility of hybrid aircraft where say gas turbines are used for cruise and electric propulsion added for take-off and landing.

A lot of development going on for sure.

Global Aviator

13th Apr 2019, 04:05

With so many getting into it now an advancements it’s only a matter of time.

Perfdct for its Mission -

https://www.magnix.aero/

ecto1

13th Apr 2019, 09:55

Yeah, dream all you want. BTDT. When you have 400 times less energy per kg, all things considered, no amount of politics will make it a viable alternative for airborne trasport. Period.

You can reduce it to a 40 times worse by using the best batteries, and the best engines and the best engine drivers and then bending the numbers up to their ultimate tensile strength, but there you hit a wall. That 300wh/kg of that fantanstic battery from maxwell (which I totally not believe) means a total 1.08Mj/kg. Gas has 46.4Mj/kg.

Except that the former is ideal conditions and the latter is always. Usual problems nobody tells you until it's too late:

- You cannot extract all the energy from a battery, no matter at which rate you do it.
- You cannot extract any energy from a battery if it is freezing.
- The energy you get from a battery is inversely proportional to how fast you discharge it and how cold it is.
- You may trade energy density at the cost of power density, so never pay attention to a number without the other.
- After each cycle, battery stores less and less energy.

A typical bad case scenario (typical bad load profile, typical bad temperature, typical bad wear...) is several times worse that the ideal. Only you need to guarantee the range in any sort of vehicle in typical bad scenarios. Gas is not affected by any of that, LI-ON is.

Many politicians have been fooled already and many more will, but this is a dead end until somebody invents a 40x better battery.

Wizofoz

13th Apr 2019, 10:02

If they are interested in utilising an electric aircraft and considering the number of lakes in Norway. I believe a better fit would be this Norwegian amphibian.

Home (http://equatoraircraft.com/index.html)

….Except the e-flyer exists and has flown- the amphibian is just one more "paper aeroplane",

Wizofoz

13th Apr 2019, 10:07

msjh

13th Apr 2019, 10:29

ecto1

13th Apr 2019, 10:44

I believe that electric flight could be privately explored for research purposes. And probably we need test pilots, and we need to train them and this may be a good plane to do it. So far so good, as long as I don't pay.

But I don't swallow the "almost there" mantra, nor that this aircraft is the TESLA of general aviation. I don't agree if you say training for gas flight is better done in an electric trainer (I'm not sure you said that, I'm sorry if you didn't).

And specially not that electric flight offers "superior speed and altitude performance". It makes me sad to see that people manipulates the truth with such impunity. If cessnas necessitated superior speed and altitude performance, regardless of the rest of factors such as price or measuring endurance in hours or minutes, they would simply use a couple cylinders more and 10 times less fuel.

nolimitholdem

13th Apr 2019, 10:47

If you get 400 times less energy per kg, how do Teslas manage to work?

I believe this was covered nicely in post 12:

As of today, we produce electricity basically burning stuff. In cars, regen braking and all, you produce the same CO2 with an electric car than with a petrol one. They make a little sense because you take pollution away from city center.

But in planes, where wheels do not happily cancel the weight penalty at constant speed, the idea is crazy beyond belief. Completely derailed.

A Tesla is not a commercial vehicle whose purpose is to carry payload for profit. It only has to meet a (fairly small in comparison) payload threshold to carry it's driver, few passengers and a small bit of luggage.

And it absolutely does not "work" from an economic perspective, judging by Tesla's financials.

But it's a nice way to signal ones green virtue, if you have a hundred grand lying around. Just don't speak too loudly of the environmental horror that li-ion batts on that scale represent.

ecto1

13th Apr 2019, 11:10

If you get 400 times less energy per kg, how do Teslas manage to work?

Because in cars, the penalty for overweight is zero at constant speed, and very little at variable speed if you compare with a solution without generative braking*.

Drag (the main reason you need energy to commute) is proportional to frontal area, which is not affected by how many kgs of "energy storage" you move about (in cars). Weight is cancelled "for free" by the wheels.

But in planes, weight is balanced with lift, and lift needs wings, and wings produce drag (proportionally). So every new kg of weight need either more wings or more AOA, both producing drag proportionally. In addition, more wings are also more kgs, in a non-linear way (think of the base of the eiffel tower), which contributes to the problem.

*Model S has 540 kgs of batteries, more or less equivalent to 1.35 kgs of fuel, 1.83L of diesel and a range of 400km. You can have a x3 because batteries are very good expensive Li-IO, x2 of electric vs thermal motor at ideal conditions and then an additional x2 due to generative braking (plus you get a bonus of almost ridiculous acceleration if you install the motors and electronics you need for powerful regenerative braking). So, in ideal conditions, it carries the equivalent of 22L of diesel fuel. My car (same size and weight) uses 6.0 l of diesel each 100 km, pure thermal, so there you have it: 400km. In ideal conditions. But there are reports of much much shorter trips depleting the batteries, as it is no surprise for me.

DRDR

13th Apr 2019, 11:20

The idea is to get cheaper rates for flight training. Nobody is talking about long range electric flight (yet).

Although someone is talking about electric VTOL supersonic flight already:

https://youtu.be/A1FUjPBC2rY

Just wait until he get's some time off from SpaceX, Tesla, The Boring Company and whatever else he is doing at the moment...

msjh

13th Apr 2019, 11:35

Because in cars, the penalty for overweight is zero at constant speed, and very little at variable speed if you compare with a solution without generative braking*.

Drag (the main reason you need energy to commute) is proportional to frontal area, which is not affected by how many kgs of "energy storage" you move about (in cars). Weight is cancelled "for free" by the wheels.

But in planes, weight is balanced with lift, and lift needs wings, and wings produce drag (proportionally). So every new kg of weight need either more wings or more AOA, both producing drag proportionally. In addition, more wings are also more kgs, in a non-linear way (think of the base of the eiffel tower), which contributes to the problem.

*Model S has 540 kgs of batteries, more or less equivalent to 1.35 kgs of fuel, 1.83L of diesel and a range of 400km. You can have a x3 because batteries are very good expensive Li-IO, x2 of electric vs thermal motor at ideal conditions and then an additional x2 due to generative braking (plus you get a bonus of almost ridiculous acceleration if you install the motors and electronics you need for powerful regenerative braking). So, in ideal conditions, it carries the equivalent of 22L of diesel fuel. My car (same size and weight) uses 6.0 l of diesel each 100 km, pure thermal, so there you have it: 400km. In ideal conditions. But there are reports of much much shorter trips depleting the batteries, as it is no surprise for me.

I'm afraid neither of these arguments convinces me (yet). But I am willing to learn!

I think for the compassion to work you need to compare

the weight of the fuel tank (and bits and pieces like fuel lines, exhaust system, etc) vs weight of the batteries
the weight of the petrol or diesel vs the "weight" of a charged battery vs depleted battery

I appreciate that in a plane you need the engines to produce enough power to generate lift, which is not needed in a car. But I think that 400x figure is substantially too high.

Three years ago, Forbes reported (https://www.forbes.com/sites/quora/2016/04/22/the-carbon-footprint-of-tesla-manufacturing/#37860aa26096) a study by scientists that Teslas (and EVs in general) produce substantially less pollution than ICE cars when all factors are taken into account.

(Incidentally, I photographed a small electric plane at Farnborough (http://www.engineeringnews.co.za/article/electric-flying-2014-08-01) Air Show a few years back.

ecto1

13th Apr 2019, 12:02

I'm afraid neither of these arguments convinces me (yet). But I am willing to learn!

I think for the compassion to work you need to compare

the weight of the fuel tank (and bits and pieces like fuel lines, exhaust system, etc) vs weight of the batteries
the weight of the petrol or diesel vs the "weight" of a charged battery vs depleted battery
I appreciate that in a plane you need the engines to produce enough power to generate lift, which is not needed in a car. But I think that 400x figure is substantially too high.

Three years ago, Forbes reported (https://www.forbes.com/sites/quora/2016/04/22/the-carbon-footprint-of-tesla-manufacturing/#37860aa26096) a study by scientists that Teslas (and EVs in general) produce substantially less pollution than ICE cars when all factors are taken into account.

(Incidentally, I photographed a small electric plane at Farnborough (http://www.engineeringnews.co.za/article/electric-flying-2014-08-01) Air Show a few years back.

These are no arguments, these are facts, painfully learnt by me at work.

There are many more figures that go into the comparison, none of them changing the result.

For example, the weight of a foam filled fuel tank is usually 10% of the capacity, so for a cessna it would be about 12kg. Which equals the battery management system (BMS), roughly, for that power.

If i take into account the average weight of the system during a trip, a x1.5 is instantly granted to the thermal fuel, which you don't need to carry when you are almost empty.

In the advanced electric propulsion world, the figure you shoud use is x100 (x400 is fuel vs standard car battery, x2 / x3 electric motor efficiency vs thermal motor, x2 LI-IOn vs standar car battery). But do remember that if you use x100 you pay over 25000$ to have a equivalent energy storage capacity of 50L of fuel (vs the fuel tank itself at about 500$)

And remember the only reason that topping a battery is cheaper than topping a fuel tank is politics. It doesn't make any sense that the elaborated product (electricity) is cheaper than the base product (gas). In 2014, 66% of world electricity was generated burning stuff. Even if it were any difference in price, it would never ever be greater than x1.5 or something.

I wish electricity was actually cheaper, don't get me wrong, I wish a solar plant or aero generator wasn't so weak in terms of power / $. I hope this changes in the future. It may change.

But electric flight? short of battery technology breakthrough, no way.

ecto1

13th Apr 2019, 12:40

By the way, that report previously posted:

https://www.ucsusa.org/sites/default/files/attach/2015/11/Cleaner-Cars-from-Cradle-to-Grave-full-report.pdf

Is flagrantly ignoring HUGE factors:

- The kwh/mi of the whole study are 0.333. TESLA model S and any other EV with some resemblance of range is is 0.38 (it is even recognized in the study). the 80mi range family of cars is another monster. apples vs apples please.
- The charging and discharging efficiency of the batteries is not even there anywhere! We are talking about 90% in both processes combined!

But the ovbious trick is to compare an average fuel powered car with an average EV. If you are concerned about CO2, you don't buy a supercharged V8.

The typical thermal car (full size gasoline) from the study emits about 350g CO2/km (+500/mi) during operation (see for yourself, figure 7, page21). Well, my 200+hp full size sedan (no hybrid) claims 121. I wonder were the rest comes from (they don't say)

Machdiamond

13th Apr 2019, 12:41

- You cannot extract any energy from a battery if it is freezing.

This explains why electric cars have been outselling gas powered cars in Norway for the first time last month (first country in the world to do so). It is a well known fact that Norwegians are hibernating and do not need their car in the winter.

- After each cycle, battery stores less and less energy.

Not true for a well designed battery. See for example this heavy user of Tesla taxi fleet shows a Model X at over 300.000 miles with only 88% battery capacity degradation, and even better, no further battery degradation is observed beyond these initial 12%.
Model X 90D “Deuxy” Achieves 300,000 Miles In Less Than Two Years (https://www.tesloop.com/blog/2018/8/2/model-x-90d-300000-miles-in-two-years)

The rest of your contribution to this thread is on par with the two items above - your belief is based on incorrect information. Maybe you should do a bit more research about electric cars in general and electric planes in particular. For short range applications, it is already reality today even if you do not want to accept it.

NWA SLF

13th Apr 2019, 13:38

It is true that when a person states even one fact that is incredibly false - batteries produce no power when it is freezing - they lose all credibility in anything they say. I live where we have had many days with temps below -40 this winter, C or F, whichever you want to use. My vehicles outside will turn over by battery but will not fire off. Need electrical glow plugs, electrical coolant heaters, and fuel additives in order to go. Granted a battery loses power at the cold temps but at least it provides power while my petroleum engines need boosting. Sure it will take time for aviation to move to electric power but think of an electric motor turning the fan instead of the gas turbine that sporadically spews parts in all directions. Anyone buying hand power tools will realize that corded tools today are rare having been replaced with lithium ion battery powered tools, Recent offerings are chain saws and lawn mowers where one would assume battery weight would be an issue, but instead the reduced size electric motor and continually improved batteries have resulted in lightweight products without the reliability problems of the petroleum powered ones they replace. So maybe you won't be flying a electric powered A319, but I would never say never.

Reacher19

13th Apr 2019, 14:01

Longtimer

13th Apr 2019, 15:03

Top seaplane airline Harbour Air switching to battery-powered aircraft[img]https://www.theglobeandmail.com/resizer/fpjf8UpExITztLDz8X4maUDcTEw=/620x0/filters:quality(80)/arc-anglerfish-tgam-prod-tgam.s3.amazonaws.com/public/BJ3ZJTYKQVBQ5G7FIBXSZIFD54.JPG (https://www.theglobeandmail.com/resizer/fpjf8UpExITztLDz8X4maUDcTEw=/620x0/filters:quality(80)/arc-anglerfish-tgam-prod-tgam.s3.amazonaws.com/public/BJ3ZJTYKQVBQ5G7FIBXSZIFD54.JPG)Greg McDougall, CEO of Harbour Air Seaplanes, at the Vancouver Harbour Flight Centre in Vancouver, on March 25, 2019.
Seaplane operator Harbour Air, which regularly shuttles B.C.'s political class to and from Victoria, is looking to become the first all-electric fleet of commercial planes in Canada – but the company head says passengers have nothing to fear.

Greg McDougall, founder of the company that bills itself as North America’s largest seaplane airline, said Monday that “I’ll be the first guy to fly one. I’ll be the test pilot of it.” He was referring to an electric-powered prototype the company will test within months as a prelude to electrifying the fleet within about two years.

By November, the company is planning to be testing a de Havilland Canada DHC 2 Beaver, a six-passenger aircraft equipped with an all-electric motor developed by magniX, a company based in Redmond, Wash. MagniX has been crafting the technology on the ground, but has yet to operate it in an aircraft.

“I wouldn’t put myself in there if I thought there was a problem. I certainly wouldn’t put my loved ones in there if I thought there was a problem – or my passengers," Mr. McDougall said.

“We have to prove a standard of safety that’s equal to or better than what we currently have.”

Mr. McDougall, who founded Harbour Air in 1982 with a pair of small seaplanes, says he is making the shift to keep ahead of the electrification of transportation, and also to reduce the company’s environmental impact.

He said his company is in a unique position to advance the concept of electric flight because its flights are relatively short, with average lengths of about 30 minutes in single-engine aircraft that don’t require as much power or battery capacity as other aircraft.

The company also has flights to and from destinations such as Nanaimo, B.C., and Tofino, B.C., on Vancouver Island as well as Whistler, B.C., , Sechelt, B.C., and Salt Spring Island, B.C., among other locations. They carry about 500,000 passengers a year.

Steve Holding, chief instructor for aviation technical programs at the British Columbia Institute of Technology, said electric flight is being developed but without breakthroughs on the scale Harbour Air is proposing.

“Powering a larger aircraft with batteries is still really a huge technical challenge just because of the weight of batteries required to put out the power to allow a larger aircraft to take off and climb – one I wish we could overcome as quickly as possible,” he said.Roei Ganzarski, chief executive of magniX, agreed on the battery issue. “Battery density is not where we want it to be for long-range flying, similar to where automobiles were seven years ago,” he said in an interview.

However, he said the company has been working on the technology, and electric makes sense for Harbour Air, which would not have to significantly change their operations for electric flight.

Asked about whether he had ever heard of an airline anywhere executing the idea, Mr. Holding referred to a media report from late 2018 about an airline using small aircraft in the Orkney Islands, an archipelago off Scotland’s northeastern coast, looking at the idea.

Like Alberta and Quebec, British Columbia’s legislature is not in the province’s largest city. While Vancouver is B.C’s urban centre, the legislature, and key offices of the civil service, are in Victoria more than 100 kilometres south across the Georgia Strait. That creates a need for movement between the two cities that is met by the ferries, commercial helicopter flights, and by Harbour Air.

The airline, which has a fleet of about 40 aircraft, will eventually face a path of approval from Transport Canada and the U.S. Federal Aviation Agency – flights to and from Seattle are among the dozen routes it offers.

Mr. McDougall said the company has already been in touch with regulators in both countries. He said this shift is not a whim, but a mandate he handed to his executive team. It took off when he made a connection with magniX.“We were already on the pathway of trying to figure this out and then we met the magniX people, who had a common code with us, which was to pioneer this. They obviously have a commercial reason for doing that,” he said.
https://www.magnix.aero/products/ (https://www.magnix.aero/products/)
(https://www.magnix.aero/products/)

nonsense

13th Apr 2019, 16:27

Gas has 46.4Mj/kg.
Except that the former is ideal conditions and the latter is always. Usual problems nobody tells you until it's too late:

How do you propose to extract 46.4Mj of shaft power (not just heat) from a kilogram of petrol?

The latter isn't "always"; it's not even "ideal conditions". You *might* get about half that, more likely 25% to 40%.

The Bartender

13th Apr 2019, 17:30

….Except the e-flyer exists and has flown- the amphibian is just one more "paper aeroplane",

The "paper aeroplane" flew last summer...
https://youtu.be/82J7gJ_7c4w

The Bartender

13th Apr 2019, 17:55

Yeah, dream all you want. BTDT. When you have 400 times less energy per kg, all things considered, no amount of politics will make it a viable alternative for airborne trasport. Period.

How does the efficiency of gasturbine vs. electric motor affect the amount of energy required?

Tesla claims an efficiency over 90%, while a gas turbine may perhaps reach the 30's?
Toyota made a big deal of it when making a gasoline engine reach 38% efficiency...

beardy

13th Apr 2019, 18:17

There seems to be an enormous amount of ignorance about thermodynamics and chemistry displayed on this thread. Ecto 1 may not be the most diplomatic of contributors but he has a good grasp of the science and engineering, as does Elon Musk but he is also a great salesman from whom I would not buy a used car.

If you are so concerned about global warming and CO2 levels, don't travel.

nolimitholdem

13th Apr 2019, 18:25

I'm not sure why ecto1 bothers. There is more wishful ideology than science being expressed. That becomes obvious when you see attempts to equate battery-powered cars and power tools to airplanes.

Fossil fuels have a net calorific value roughly 100 times of a manganese type lithium-ion battery. Thus an internal combustion engine at 38%, even at a low efficiency of 25%, vastly outperforms the best battery in terms of energy-to-weight ratio. The capacity of a battery would need to increase twenty-fold before it could compete head-to-head with fossil fuel. (A kerosene-powered turbine is even more efficient than an ICE, power-to-weight).

Tesla's claimed efficiency is for the power produced, not the power stored, which seems to confuse people. Fossil fuelled engines ARE less efficient than electric motors, but when the fuel source is still many multiples higher in NCV than the batteries necessary to store electricity they're going to be the only economically viable choice for weight-critical applications unless the battery tech improves exponentially.

The Bartender

14th Apr 2019, 07:27

The capacity of a battery would need to increase twenty-fold before it could compete head-to-head with fossil fuel. (A kerosene-powered turbine is even more efficient than an ICE, power-to-weight).

A battery-powered vehicle will probably never be able to truly compete with ICE, but at some point ICE will be either out of fuel or simply banned.
In the mean time everybody should be happy somebody bothers to research alternatives and try new applications for our current level of technology.

horizon flyer

14th Apr 2019, 14:20

As can be seen from all the comments the problems is the storage of electrons and the energy to weight factor.
Avgas has about 11 kw per kilo but IC engines at 25% efficient so can only extract about 3 kw/kilo. Electric motors are up at 90+% so only need a battery of 2.5 to 3.5 kw/kilo to match Avgas. Lithium has a theoretical energy density of about 10kilowatts/kilo. At the moment the best lithium batteries are around 500 watts/kilo so 5 five times the weight for the same amount of Avgas. Billions of dollars are being spent on battery research so higher densities are coming. The holy grail is lithium air batteries, these should meet or exceed the 2.5kw/kilo target to make liquid fuels obsolete. A US university has an experimental Lithium air that is looking good, time will tell. In the last ten years the cost of EV batteries have dropped by a factor of ten to about 175 dollars per Kilowatt and heading towards $100 per Kw which makes the manufacture of EVs the same as an IC vehicles, plus the density has doubled and will keep increasing. So for aircraft at the moment batteries are not a total replacement solution but a 2 hour endurance is just feasible, which would be good for training. A hybrid is the best solution at the moment it has so many good points a high speed high power density IC engine gas or diesel with no gear box or harmonic problems. Props can be located almost any place on the airframe. So electric drive is compelling and I think will be more reliable and cost less to operate in the future.

IFMU

14th Apr 2019, 14:25

United Technologies is working on a hybrid electric aircraft.
https://www.utc.com/en/news/2019/03/28/project-804
Their demonstrator is a Bombardier Dash 8, not a part 23 Cessna.

nonsense

14th Apr 2019, 16:04

Avgas has about 11 kw per kilo...

Do you mean kilowatt hours? Or perhaps kilojoules? Because kilowatts per kg makes no sense at all.

pattern_is_full

14th Apr 2019, 20:24

"I tol' Wilbur, and I tol' Orville - it just won't fly!" Famous last words.....

beardy

14th Apr 2019, 21:03

"I tol' Wilbur, and I tol' Orville - it just won't fly!" Famous last words.....
Fake news proves nothing but says a lot. If you want to prove a point, stick to the science.

ams6110

14th Apr 2019, 22:59

There was an article this week on the BBC website regarding a German company that believe they have developed a battery that no longer relies on the heavy metals that are hard to source and that will give approx. 600 miles on a single charge. Estimate was for a production model within 5 years.

Technology is always getting better and I think an electric car in the mid 20s will outrun a Diesel engine with ease so an electric plane within 10-15 years should be feasible.

Haven’t EasyJet set themselves a target to fly an electric plane by 2028?

I used to follow EV technology a bit. It's almost cliche that announcements of "game-changing" developments in battery technology are made by research groups, and then that's the last you ever hear about it. Believe it when it's for sale or being used in production vehicles.

tdracer

14th Apr 2019, 23:54

Use as a trainer makes some sense for a battery aircraft - relatively short flights that generally return to the departure airport to get recharged for the next lesson.

Long range intercontinental transport is a completely different story. Given foreseeable technology, biofuels are the way forward. I saw an interesting paper roughly ten years ago about jet fuel from algae - they were already able to produce biofuel from algae that was nearly indistinguishable from Jet A. It has a number of advantages over vegetable oil based fuels - it required a small fraction of the land area, the algae literally ate sewage, and required much less processing than vegetable oil based fuels. While not quite carbon neutral, it was pretty close (much closer than any other proposed bio fuel). At the time Boeing was a participant in the study.
At the time, the biggest drawback to large scale production was it required large amounts of fresh water, but they were working to develop an algae variety that would work with sea water. That and of course cost - it need petroleum to sell for over $100/barrel to be economical.

Imagegear

15th Apr 2019, 02:35

As above - going into production it seems, : Bio Jet fuel (https://asia.nikkei.com/Business/Companies/Jet-biofuel-mass-production-to-begin-in-Japan) but using some waste oil? (Vegetable?)

IG

tdracer

15th Apr 2019, 03:18

As above - going into production it seems, : Bio Jet fuel (https://asia.nikkei.com/Business/Companies/Jet-biofuel-mass-production-to-begin-in-Japan) but using some waste oil? (Vegetable?)

IG

The linked article says jetfuel and biodiesel - I'd bet the waste (vegetable) oil will go to biodiesel, not jet fuel (biodiesel doesn't need to be nearly as pure as jet fuel so the processing costs would be lower).
But really, 125 kiloliters per year? Unless someone misplaced a decimal point, that's basically one 777 fuel load per year. Talk about your drop in the bucket...

horizon flyer

15th Apr 2019, 12:56

Kilo Watt hours of course, normally on batteries amp hours are used because of discharge voltage curves but on EVs the traction battery is always measured in kilo Watt hours as the battery management controller takes care of any voltage changes.to keep power delivery constant.

Lithium, Australia is the biggest supplier is a low density metal, it is the cobalt that is in short supply and nickel is very dirty to refine, but other chemistries are being investigated. Sodium ion, Zinc air and Aluminium air which is quiet good but not rechargeable would be an anode change and liquid removal to recharge. So I think hybrids and short range electrics will creep in then in 10 to 20 years electric full range aircraft will start appearing. So as with mobile phones it will take time to be main stream.

joema

15th Apr 2019, 23:03

"OSM Aviation Group CEO Espen Høiby....goal to shift all short-haul routes to electric flight by 2040..."

There is no question that some useful short distance hops are possible in electrically-powered general aviation aircraft. Work is ongoing in human-carrying drones. Advances in high-power brushless DC motors, lithium polymer batteries, precision GPS and solid state inertial platforms make this possible.

However there is a huge difference between that and the air transport category. Most aviation energy is not consumed by general aviation or business aviation -- it is by commercial air transport. I don't know the exact numbers but I'd estimate over 90%, maybe over 95% is by commercial air transport, ie airline and cargo operations. Therefore any meaningful electric aviation solution must include that or at least articulate a plausible path using attainable technology to achieve electrically-powered commercial air transport.

The quote mentioned "short haul routes". To my knowledge this is routes under 3 hr, although some authorities use 3,200 km (1,727 nm).

What would be the energy or battery requirement for airline transport operations over (say) 1,500 km? Ideally this should provide roughly similar payload and travel time performance, else all of society is plunged back to the pre-jet era. Electric-driven jets are not really possible but electric-driven propellers are. Propeller-driven airliners with near jet performance have existed: the Tu-114 (based on the Tu-95). Fortunately its engines are rated in shaft horsepower which avoids the tricky conversion of pounds thrust to horsepower. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tupolev_Tu-114

The Tu-114 had 4 x 14,800 hp engines. If we assume cruise power at 77% or 45,584 hp, that is 33.9 megawatts. A short-haul flight of two hours would therefore require roughly 67.8 megawatt-hours. How much battery power would be required to fulfill that?

33.9 MW is engine output, not including gearbox and propeller efficiency. To provide this electrically we must consider battery efficiency (say 90%) and electric motor efficiency (say 90%) for overall efficiency of 81%. We won't consider efficiency losses from motor controllers or other sources. This means the batteries must hold about 83.66 megawatt hours (not including reserves) for a two hr "short haul" flight of about 1,500 km.

The battery pack on an 85 KWhr Tesla Model S weighs about 540 kg (1,200 lb). We would need about 984 of these which would weigh about 1.18 million pounds. The Tu-114 had a payload of about 55,000 lb, but 130,000 lb of fuel for a total payload of 185,000 lb.

So very roughly, we only need an improvement in battery energy/weight ratio of about 10x to make this feasible. To recharge 10 of these after landing would require an on-site dedicated two gigawatt power plant, and the assumption each aircraft can sustain an approx 100-200 megawatt charge rate. Maybe Boeing's experience with the 787 li-ion batteries would give them an advantage.

CurtainTwitcher

15th Apr 2019, 23:30

Just a completely random thought about the physics of electric, aircraft, isn't the consumption of the weight of fuel and the jettisoning of the depletion products overboard actually the thing that makes any extended flight possible for realistic commercial transport? Batteries don't lose significant weight as they are depleted. In a nutshell, in the current extended range comes from the continuous reduction in weight and thus consumption energy per nm is continuously reducing as the flight proceeds. I don't see how batteries can do this without physically jettisoning them.

etudiant

16th Apr 2019, 11:44

There is no question that some useful short distance hops are possible in electrically-powered general aviation aircraft. Work is ongoing in human-carrying drones. Advances in high-power brushless DC motors, lithium polymer batteries, precision GPS and solid state inertial platforms make this possible.

However there is a huge difference between that and the air transport category. Most aviation energy is not consumed by general aviation or business aviation -- it is by commercial air transport. I don't know the exact numbers but I'd estimate over 90%, maybe over 95% is by commercial air transport, ie airline and cargo operations. Therefore any meaningful electric aviation solution must include that or at least articulate a plausible path using attainable technology to achieve electrically-powered commercial air transport.

The quote mentioned "short haul routes". To my knowledge this is routes under 3 hr, although some authorities use 3,200 km (1,727 nm).

What would be the energy or battery requirement for airline transport operations over (say) 1,500 km? Ideally this should provide roughly similar payload and travel time performance, else all of society is plunged back to the pre-jet era. Electric-driven jets are not really possible but electric-driven propellers are. Propeller-driven airliners with near jet performance have existed: the Tu-114 (based on the Tu-95). Fortunately its engines are rated in shaft horsepower which avoids the tricky conversion of pounds thrust to horsepower. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tupolev_Tu-114

The Tu-114 had 4 x 14,800 hp engines. If we assume cruise power at 77% or 45,584 hp, that is 33.9 megawatts. A short-haul flight of two hours would therefore require roughly 67.8 megawatt-hours. How much battery power would be required to fulfill that?

33.9 MW is engine output, not including gearbox and propeller efficiency. To provide this electrically we must consider battery efficiency (say 90%) and electric motor efficiency (say 90%) for overall efficiency of 81%. We won't consider efficiency losses from motor controllers or other sources. This means the batteries must hold about 83.66 megawatt hours (not including reserves) for a two hr "short haul" flight of about 1,500 km.

The battery pack on an 85 KWhr Tesla Model S weighs about 540 kg (1,200 lb). We would need about 984 of these which would weigh about 1.18 million pounds. The Tu-114 had a payload of about 55,000 lb, but 130,000 lb of fuel for a total payload of 185,000 lb.

So very roughly, we only need an improvement in battery energy/weight ratio of about 10x to make this feasible. To recharge 10 of these after landing would require an on-site dedicated two gigawatt power plant, and the assumption each aircraft can sustain an approx 100-200 megawatt charge rate. Maybe Boeing's experience with the 787 li-ion batteries would give them an advantage.

I'd thought cruise thrust was usually only about 25% of takeoff power, suggesting the requirements are correspondingly more modest.

joema

16th Apr 2019, 15:45

I'd thought cruise thrust was usually only about 25% of takeoff power, suggesting the requirements are correspondingly more modest.

I think for turboprops it's typical to cruise at 70-80% torque. Since many turboprop engines are thermodynamically flat-rated, the actual energy consumption to maintain cruise torque can still be quite significant -- certainly more than 25%.

A large electric-powered propeller-driven air transport vehicle with Tu-114-level payload and performance would have to expend about the same energy. It appears that would equate to over 30 megawatts sustained cruise output for a two-hour short-haul flight, or over 60 megawatt hours, not counting reserves or takeoff.

It's true that batteries don't get lighter as they discharge, so expended units could hypothetically be progressively jettisoned in flight. That would help but would require a large new infrastructure. At current energy densities that would equate to over 1 million lb of batteries per plane, so it's not really possible with current technology. It would require at least a 10x improvement in battery energy/mass ratio just to achieve short-haul capability for something the size of a prop or fan-powered 737. To recharge the planes, each airport would require one or more on-site dedicated multi-gigawatt power plants.

You could pick up a little more efficiency using unducted fans, but that's just nibbling at the edges of a much larger problem.

steamchicken

16th Apr 2019, 15:54

CurtainTwitcher Just a completely random thought about the physics of electric, aircraft, isn't the consumption of the weight of fuel and the jettisoning of the depletion products overboard actually the thing that makes any extended flight possible for realistic commercial transport? Batteries don't lose significant weight as they are depleted. In a nutshell, in the current extended range comes from the continuous reduction in weight and thus consumption energy per nm is continuously reducing as the flight proceeds. I don't see how batteries can do this without physically jettisoning them.

There is a battery technology that might let you do this. The flow battery: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flow_battery They are normally used for things like balancing wind power on the electricity grid because they can be scaled up to arbitrarily large sizes - all you need is a bigger tank of electrolyte.

The other nice thing about them is that you can separate the process of recharging from the battery itself - rather than running it in reverse to recharge, you can fill it up with fresh electrolyte drawn from some off-stage industrial process.

Now, if the electrolyte was the sort of stuff you could happily release into the air once spent, and also the sort of stuff you could manufacture regeneratively...well, you could use the rest of the world as the other half of the battery. This is probably not going to happen outside science fiction, though, as one of the best chemistries for a flow battery involves bromine. Although there are enormous reserves of it in the sea, it's extremely ozone-destroying (especially if you were thinking of releasing it in the stratosphere!) and quite toxic.

In any case, using the Tu-114 example above you'd need ~60 tonnes of lithium bromate and hydrogen for that 2 hour trip. If you screw your eyes up right, you could make a case the Br would end up back in the sea and consequently be renewable, but the Li would need to be mined and we're going to want every tonne for batteries of all kinds where it would also be recyclable.

There are organic flow batteries but going by the same rough calculation for the best quoted electrolyte, the Tu-114 example would need about 200 tonnes of the stuff and it's usually synthesised from...oil.

horizon flyer

16th Apr 2019, 17:27

A good point that an electric will not decrease in weight in flight, so will consume more energy for the same flight, also the under carriage will have to be stronger to take the higher landing weight.

So may be the best way to work out kilo Watts needed is measure the first hour of cruise fuel consumption, convert to kilograms used ;
then taking the engine efficiency/100 x kg used x kW per kilograms of fuel = kilowatt hours used per hour.

So example 30%/100 x 100kg x 12kW = approx. 400kWhrs best battery at the moment 0.5 Kg/kWhr so 800Kg for one hour of flight..

But a battery at 3kWhr per Kilogram would be close at 133kilograms just multiply flight duration for total weight. I may have over estimated the engine efficiency, if lower then it would be a closer to liquid fuel.

The hope is the Lithium air battery will come closer to this power density, but of course would still need the oxygen from the air to function.

horizon flyer

17th Apr 2019, 19:42

….Except the e-flyer exists and has flown- the amphibian is just one more "paper aeroplane",

There is a video on their website of it flying News (http://equatoraircraft.com/news.html) So little more than a paper aeroplane.

DaveReidUK

17th Apr 2019, 22:21

There is a video on their website of it flying News (http://equatoraircraft.com/news.html) So little more than a paper aeroplane.

See post #32.

Longtimer

22nd Apr 2019, 14:33

Another Engine in the works.

22 April, 2019
SOURCE: FlightGlobal.com
BY: Jon Hemmerdinger
Boston

Electric motor company MagniX will supply powerplants for Eviation Aircraft’s in-development electric aircraft Alice, marking another win for the upstart motor maker and a second power option for Alice buyers.

Eviation will offer the nine-passenger Alice with triple MagniX Magni250s – electric motors generating 375shp (280kW). They will turn Alice’s props at 1,900rpm, says MagniX chief executive Roei Ganzarski.

“They are very light and very powerful,” he says of the Magni250 propulsion system.

Eviation expects the Alice, a commuter and business aircraft, will be certified in 2021 and enter service in 2022.

MagniX, based in Redmond, Washington also expects 2021 certification for the Magni250.

Israel-based Eviation had already named Siemens as one motor supplier for the Alice. Siemens’ system includes 260kW electric motors powered by a 900kWh lithium-ion battery pack. That same battery pack will power the Magni250s.

Two motor choices eases "potential supply chain issues”, giving customers “broader choice of price points and maintenance schedules,” Eviation chief executive Omer Bar-Yohay has said.

The Alice will have three pusher propellers – one behind its “V” tail and one each at the wingtips – and be capable of flying 565nm (1,050km) and at 260kt (482km/h), says Eviation.

That range would enable the Alice to serve many existing air routes and make new connections via smaller, under-served airports, the companies say.

“That’s a significant aircraft,” Ganzarski says of the Alice, noting 45% of air routes fall within its range.

Actually, 55% of airline flights worldwide in April were within 565nm, according to Cirium data and analytics.

https://www.flightglobal.com/assets/getasset.aspx?itemid=76543

=rightEviation Aircraft

Each Magni250 contains two modules (managed by separate inverters) that, combined, provide 375shp. If an motor problem occurs, software can shut down one module and keep the other running, meaning the system will still provide 50% power, a feature Ganzarski calls "graceful degradation".

“You can really create a high level of redundancy,” he says.

MagniX has conducted more than 1,500h of motor ground tests in both Redmond and at its Australia site, and Eviation has been testing a Magni250 with the Alice’s propellers in Israel, says Ganzarski.

Eviation says MagniX is one of few manufacturers capable of building an electric engine for the Alice.

“MagniX has not just tested their propulsion system, but they’ve ran it with Alice’s specific profile,” Eviation says. “We can reassure customers that their motor can perform as expected under normal conditions and extreme ones.”

Eviation, which is providing the battery system, has been assembling the first Alice prototype in Vannes, France. Alice will have a fly-by-wire system and Honeywell cockpit avionics.

“We hope to fly the aircraft ahead of the Paris air show in June, where it will make its debut,” Bar-Yohay has said. MagniX’s motor will also be on display at the show.

Eviation plans to achieve first flight of the fly-by-wire equipped Alice this fall. It will perform flight testing in Prescott, Arizona, and expects three aircraft will join the flight-test campaign, including two prototypes and one production-conforming aircraft.

THE CASE FOR ELECTRIC

Owned 100% by Singapore investment company Clermont Group, MagniX is also developing its 751shp Magni500 motor for installation on de Havilland DHC-2 Beaver seaplanes operated by Canadian regional carrier Harbour Air.

Those motors well suit Harbour because many of its flights have duration of only 30min – within the system’s capability.

Despite naysayers, Ganzarski insists technology already allows for development of electric passenger aircraft, though not anything like a widebody jetliner.

There’s no escaping that the best lithium-ion batteries have about 260Wh/kg of energy density – almost 50 times less than jet fuel’s 11.9kWh/kg density.

Electric aircraft therefore cannot nearly match the range of fuel-powered aircraft.

However, small electric passenger aircraft can efficiently operate countless shorter-distance routes, Ganzarski says.

The key is developing aircraft from scratch around batteries and motors, making them essentially “flying batteries”, says Ganzarski.

Electric motors are lighter and smaller than fuel engines, and they can be fitted on an aircraft’s wingtips, such as on the Alice.

“If I tell you that tomorrow we can take nine passengers 650 miles, and maybe in five years [take] 50 people 650 miles, that’s a reality,” Ganzarski says. “I see no reason you cannot… with the current motor technology we have.”

Electric motors cost significantly less to operate than fuel-burning engines – 60-80% less than internal combustion engines, says Ganzarski.

The electricity required to power a small electric aircraft on a 100-mile flight might cost $8, compared to $350-$400 for the fuel a convention aircraft would need, he says.

Also, electric motors also have far fewer parts than fuel-burning engines, meaning they require significantly less maintenance and overhauls.

Pilot DAR

22nd Apr 2019, 15:19

Wow, that's a shiny hangar floor!

As a person who flies and certifies aircraft, I would be concerned about a wing or tail low landing causing propeller damage. In any case, I expect that a computer in the plane would have to reduce thrust on a wingtip motor, in the case of a loss of thrust on the other side for any reason. They could be cross shafted like a tilt rotor, but that gets complex and heavy. The V tail would be challenged providing enough yaw control to overcome thrust asymmetry for the wing motors.

And, I imagine a really inconvenient hump in the cockpit floor where the nosewheel has to be when it is retracted.

I was keenly interested in the innovation of the Learfan, back in the day. But after understanding the many interrelated design innovations and challenges, it became apparent that it is less than ideal to innovate a very different airframe design, a different powerplant, and different propeller arrangements all on one airplane at one time. I'm very much in favour of electric aircraft development, and participated in a design study, but that was for re [motoring] a 172. Everything about the airframe and propeller (to have been MTV electric) was proven, and very accepted, it was only the changed powerplant which was open for investigation and development.

I continue to watch with interest, though with the eye of an aircraft certifier.....

Big Pistons Forever

22nd Apr 2019, 15:31

I think Harbour Air's electric Beaver is the real deal. The numbers can be made to work for the 20 minute scenic flights they do all summer and the Vancouver - Nanaimo sched ( 32nm), assuming a 1 hr turn time for a fast recharger at the dock at Vancouver and Nanaimo. One advantage is that conventional airplane parts are stupid expensive ( eg 50,000 USD for an overhauled Beaver engine good for 1600 hrs) so expensive bleeding edge technology can still be cost effective.

The bigger challenge is that so far battery technology has increased incrementally. To make electric power viable for more than specialty niche applications like what Harbour air wants to do, you need batteries 10 times more power per kg than what is presently available and there is nothing like that on the horizon.

SeenItAll

22nd Apr 2019, 15:47

And in addition to the weight of the batteries, there is also the recharge time. Unless they can accept a lot of juice really quickly, the economics of short-haul operations will be substantially compromised.

ams6110

22nd Apr 2019, 15:53

Wow, that's a shiny hangar floor!

That's a computer-generated artist's concept image.

As a person who flies and certifies aircraft, I would be concerned about a wing or tail low landing causing propeller damage. In any case, I expect that a computer in the plane would have to reduce thrust on a wingtip motor, in the case of a loss of thrust on the other side for any reason. They could be cross shafted like a tilt rotor, but that gets complex and heavy. The V tail would be challenged providing enough yaw control to overcome thrust asymmetry for the wing motors.

With any EV or E-anything.... believe it when you can buy one. The hype-to-reality ratio in this area is about 50:1.

Mac the Knife

22nd Apr 2019, 20:38

Aeroplanes now! Well I did have one with a supercap that could carry its own weight happily around for nearly 3 minutes.....

The energy density of hydrocarbon fuels is 20-50 times higher than the most advanced Li-ion concept based electrochemical batteries.
Wake me up when it's 2-5x higher, and the battery's brisance a fair bit less than good 'ol black-powder.

Ye'd do better to use the piddling amount of very expensive renewable energy that we produce to synthesize a better grade of avtur.

And if you sit down and think about the chemistry, engineering and economics carefully enough, is the truth of the matter.

Mac

:ouch:

Photonic

22nd Apr 2019, 20:53

Looking at the computer rendering of the Eviation above, the thing that strikes me is that it looks exceptionally lightweight, judging by the doors and stairs, and the landing gear. I know composites can be very strong, this just looks to me like it's pushing the limits.

Of course light weight is an advantage for E-power, but I wonder about compromise with safety in hard landings or actual crashes. Maybe the real thing would be less delicate than the rendering looks at first glance, if it ever makes it into production.

Ascend Charlie

22nd Apr 2019, 21:51

jack11111

23rd Apr 2019, 00:36

Is this a pressurized aircraft, or will it fly in the weather below 10,000 ft.?

Also fast charge rates mean battery life is shortened.

MurphyWasRight

23rd Apr 2019, 00:50

joema

23rd Apr 2019, 12:12

In the March 2019 issue of Flying magazine, aerodynamicist Peter Garrison discusses the feasibility of electric airliners. He says he's long been skeptical this would be possible, barring an unexpected revolution in battery technology. However in an even-handed fashion he reviews the challenges and progress to date. He discusses two current electric regional aircraft projects, Eviation and Zunum.

It's a stretch to call Eviation an "airliner", it's about the size/weight of a Pilatus PC12. They will supposedly be displaying a prototype (don't know if it's flyable) in June of this year. Zunum uses ducted fans, but is so far only a paper airplane.

The backers of these are not attempting to replace traditional airliners, not even smaller regional jets. They understand battery limitations make that impossible. Rather they are hoping to open a new market for short range low cost air taxi service to smaller airports using 8-10 passenger planes. In essence a similar market and service profile to what VLJs originally planned, notably as promoted by the Eclipse 500. Except the electric planes so far under development will have a range of maybe 600 miles, and Garrison doubts that will be achievable on actual aircraft.

Ian W

23rd Apr 2019, 12:36

The other problem not raised here is that the Part 135 requirements of remaining endurance will often exceed the total endurance of the aircraft. Currently proponents of electric aircraft seem to be ignoring standard 14CFR regulations as if they are 'special'. This approach is extended to the safe separation standards between aircraft which will greatly reduce the number of 'Jetsons' that can be airborne in urban areas too.

Longtimer

23rd Apr 2019, 13:45

New aircraft rises 'like a balloon'By Kenneth Macdonald BBC Scotland special correspondent

23 April 2019https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-48013519

https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/images/ic/720x405/p0774btg.jpgMedia playback is unsupported on your deviceFuture versions of Phoenix could be fitted with cameras and deployed in surveillance workExit playerMedia captionFuture versions of Phoenix could be fitted with cameras and deployed in surveillance workResearchers from the University of the Highlands and Islands (UHI) have helped create a revolutionary new type of aircraft.

Phoenix is an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) designed to stay in the air indefinitely using a new type of propulsion.

Despite being 15m (50ft) long with a mass of 120kg (19 stone) she rises gracefully into the air.

She looks a little like an airship, except airships don't have wings.

"It's a proper aeroplane," says the UHI's Professor Andrew Rae.As the project's chief engineer, he has overseen the integration of Phoenix's systems.

"It flies under its own propulsion although it has no engines," he says.

"The central fuselage is filled with helium, which makes it buoyant so it can ascend like a balloon.

"And inside that there's another bag with compressors on it that brings air from outside, compresses the air, which makes the aeroplane heavier and then it descends like a glider."Launch satellitesThis ability to "breathe" - to switch quickly between being heavier or lighter than air - doesn't just make the plane go up and down.

It is the key to driving it forward. Phoenix is the first large-scale aircraft to be powered by variable-buoyancy propulsion.

It moves through the air like a porpoise through water.

That means it can travel long distances and stay aloft for long periods.

The point? To create a cheaper alternative to launching satellites. https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/624/cpsprodpb/14DF6/production/_106549458_superblimp3.jpgImage caption Prof Andrew Rae says the Phoenix is a "proper aeroplane" The wings and tail carry solar panels so there is no need to carry fuel aloft.

The quasi-airship shape is based on an aerofoil, meaning it also provides lift like its wings do when the plane moves forward.

Prof Rae, using two wind tunnels at UHI's Perth College campus, led the design of its aerodynamics.

The technique of variable-buoyancy propulsion is already used underwater.

The Scottish Association for Marine Science (also part of UHI) has a small fleet of remotely operated vehicles - they call them gliders - that gather data in the North Atlantic.

They dive deep to collect data, then rise to the surface to transmit it via satellite.

But air is much less dense than water and this has made the principle a trickier proposition for flight.

Phoenix is the first aircraft of its size to use it. https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/624/cpsprodpb/14F72/production/_106547858_superblimp1.jpgImage caption The central fuselage of the Phoenix is filled with helium It is 15m (49ft) long with a wingspan of almost 11m (36ft)

Production versions would need to be scaled up to reach the altitudes of 20km required to fulfil its intended role.

An autonomous vehicle which is self-sufficient in energy could stay in the air for days, weeks, even months.

The technical term is "ultra-long endurance autonomous aircraft".

The team think it could revolutionise the telecommunications industry.'Almost expendable'The oft-quoted rule of thumb in the space business is that putting a satellite into orbit costs its weight in gold.

A Phoenix "pseudosatellite" could do the same job from high in the atmosphere at a fraction of the cost.

Prof Rae says some aircraft can already do this but are complex and expensive.

Phoenix, by contrast, is so cheap as to be "almost expendable".

In addition to UHI, the Phoenix project involves Bristol, Newcastle, Sheffield and Southampton universities.

It also involved four commercial companies and three of the UK's Technology Catapults, and has been part funded by the UK government's innovation agency Innovate UK.Winter windsThe prototype Phoenix has been successfully tested inside the Drystack in Portsmouth, a huge indoor area which normally stores pleasure boats.

It was used to shelter the aircraft from the winter winds although production versions would operate in all weathers.

The project has involved its partners integrating the solar cells, flight control system, micropumps, carbon fibre wings and tail, reversible hydrogen fuel cell and rechargeable battery.

The last of these is what enables a solar-powered vehicle to keep working all night.

Now that the prototype has flown successfully, the consortium wants to collaborate with major manufacturers to take Phoenix to the next level.

KRH270/12

23rd Apr 2019, 21:09

tdracer

23rd Apr 2019, 22:52

As said above, it looks like just a dream, without really thinking about it - where does that nosewheel go on retraction; a crosswind will have the props hitting the ground as you kick straight and lower a wing; the tail prop is a worry on rotation for takeoff; asymmetric flight will be a serious problem; and why have 2 sets of airstairs when they could save weight with just one?

There also doesn't look like much room under any floor to place the batteries? They can't be in the tailcone - too far back - and no room in the nose, with the nosewheel strut and wheel, pilot's feet and his big watch.

Way back when I was in college, I took a course on aircraft design - a really interesting class (and the instructor quite literally had written the book). In the course, you had to design an aircraft from scratch - obviously not all the gory details, but basic aircraft design, with estimated weight, performance, and costs - and your grade was entirely based on a presentation of the aircraft in front of the class along with a documenting report. You could either do an individual project, or you could team with another student. Anyway, a couple of people in the class decided to base their design on some glossy handouts of a 'revolutionary' new aircraft design that some company was busy raising funds 'so they could bring it to market'. Within a month they'd determined the concept was completely unworkable and would never even be able to fly (forget the promised fantastic performance), and they were forced to throw it out and start over from scratch (I'll always remember - when they did their presentation, they started out with a picture from the gloss handout - 'this was the concept' - then they put of a drawing of a streamlined brick - 'this was the reality' - then they went on to present a workable aircraft design). As expected, the aircraft proposed in the glossy handout was simply a scam to get money from gullible investors and soon disappeared without a trace.

'Alice' appears to be the same thing - something to bilk money out of gullible investors with no chance of actually working.

cattletruck

24th Apr 2019, 09:49

The hype-to-reality ratio in this area is about 50:1

Coincidently the same ratio between petrol and electric battery energy density.

Unless they can prove it flies as advertised then it only proves that anyone can build a website.

funfly

24th Apr 2019, 10:10

A great deal of the stored energy in an aircraft is getting from ground level to cruise height.
But, unlike liquid fuel, once used a battery weight remains.
An ‘initial start’ battery pack that would achieve this initial phase then detach and return to base would prevent having to carry the high weight for the endurance of the flight.

Andrewgr2

21st Jun 2019, 06:49

Alice seems to have moved on from being a computer rendered image on a shiny hangar floor to a real prototype st the Paris Airshow. Look here! (https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-48630656) Presumably arrived by road but apparently due to undergo flight tests this year.

bill fly

21st Jun 2019, 10:53

One big problem with electric aeroplanes is the mains plug... Every time you cross a national boundary you have to change the adapter.
Also all those wires get a bit tangled after a while.

bafanguy

21st Jun 2019, 11:53

Alice seems to have moved on from being a computer rendered image on a shiny hangar floor to a real prototype st the Paris Airshow.

Why the conventional landing gear configuration rather than tricycle ? Seems like an odd choice these days. Perhaps a bit of weight reduction...tail wheel weighs less than a proper nose gear ?

https://www.airlineratings.com/news/electrifying-alice-sparks-interest-paris/

Pilot DAR

21st Jun 2019, 11:57

Why the conventional landing gear configuration rather than tricycle ?

I opine that there was not enough room to retract the nosewheel.

DaveReidUK

21st Jun 2019, 12:27

Alice seems to have moved on from being a computer rendered image on a shiny hangar floor to a real prototype at the Paris Airshow.

Can somebody convince me that it's a prototype and not just a mockup, please ?

bafanguy

21st Jun 2019, 12:59

I opine that there was not enough room to retract the nosewheel.

Where will Cape Air find all those young pilots with tail wheel experience to fly Alice ? :uhoh:

Less Hair

21st Jun 2019, 13:06

They teach them from scratch to fly their electric aircraft in their own school. Said to be one reason to take Cape Air for the first batch of production aircraft.

bafanguy

21st Jun 2019, 14:30

They teach them from scratch to fly their electric aircraft in their own school. Said to be one reason to take Cape Air for the first batch of production aircraft.

I was just being tongue in cheek. ;)

cavuman1

21st Jun 2019, 14:40

Here is a status report on NASA's electrically-powered prototype aircraft: NASA's X-57 (https://www.nasa.gov/centers/armstrong/features/Major-Milestones-for-NASAs-Electric-X-Plane.html)

- Ed

golfbananajam

21st Jun 2019, 14:55

This is all very well, but what will the turn round time be to recharge a 600 mile range battery to allow it to fly back?

Winemaker

21st Jun 2019, 15:02

I might just be confused, but it seems as though this 'electric' plane is powered by a gas turbine which drives the main pusher propeller and runs a generator that powers two wing tip electric motors; that's how they can achieve a 650 mile range - it's not running of batteries. How is this an 'electric' plane? What about the loss of efficiency every time there is a power conversion step? Am I missing something here?

DaveReidUK

21st Jun 2019, 15:20

pattern_is_full

21st Jun 2019, 15:46

The linked article's final paragraph mentions a different aircraft (or different optional hybrid power system) - EcoPulse. In passing, it should be noted that many large ships (E.G. RMS Queen Mary 2) now use "distributed power" - diesel or turbine-powered generators produce electric power to drive the actual electric motors attached to the props.

See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Integrated_electric_propulsion

As to the change to a tailwheel - probably to protect the pusher-prop (as noted, it was a bit exposed to a prop-strike in the tricycle configuration).

But for those wondering about where the nose wheel would have fitted in the original: Pilots have been stepping over a hump between the cockpit seats since the DC-3 and B-17 - it's called a control pedestal. Check that original shiny-floor mockup and you'll see the nose-wheel would have retracted right between the pilots. And in an electric plane, the throttles are probably simple rheostats - the pedestal will be mostly empty space with minimal levers and such inside. Tuck the wheel right in there.

Winemaker

21st Jun 2019, 17:48

Thanks pattern, I did misread the article.

bafanguy

21st Jun 2019, 19:51

Can somebody convince me that it's a prototype and not just a mockup, please ?

For what it's worth, the narrator refers to the airplane as an "airworthy aircraft" in this video. But, he is with media...so...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yyQaWEBGNxg&app=desktop

Winemaker

21st Jun 2019, 22:34

Color me skeptical. Here are some VERY rough numbers; please feel free to correct any errors of bad assumptions.

I am comparing the weight of energy for a Cessna Grand Caravan and the electric plane, simply because they are about the same size and carry approximately the same number of passengers.

1) The energy density of kerosene is 39.5 kw-hr/gallon
2) The Caravan consumes in the range of 75 gallons (550#)/hour in cruise. For a 540 mile trip this is approximately 1650# or 8850 kw-hr of energy.
3) The energy density of a Lithium battery is maximally about 250 wh/kg, so let's give the electric a generous 400 wh/kg.
4) Let's give the electric machine another boost and call the efficiency of the turbo-prop 30% and the electric 100%.
5) With these assumption the electric will need 2655 kw-hr of stored energy and will arrive with a flat battery and no reserve.
6) At 0.4 kw-hr/kg the battery will weigh 6600 kg.

Doesn't look doable to me

Lantern10

22nd Jun 2019, 01:21

These folk think they are achieving something.

https://www.ampaire.com/

Wizofoz

22nd Jun 2019, 01:55

These folk think they are achieving something.

https://www.ampaire.com/

The company said this is a "parallel hybrid," meaning the internal combustion engine and electric motor work to optimize power output as the plane flies.

https://www.dw.com/en/ampaire-test-flies-worlds-biggest-electric-plane/a-49098126

Looks like they put an electric unit in the rear, while keeping the recip in the front- and STILL needed a pod to house the batteries.

Hardly ground-breaking.

It's all vapour-ware until battery technology makes another quantum leap. It will happen, but not as soon as the plethora of "paper aeroplane" companies suggest.

Kerosene Kraut

22nd Jun 2019, 08:02

Batteries as we know them are certainly not weight efficient enough for aviation use and won't be for tens of years to come. Hydrogen has volume and storage issues. It looks like the only high capacity electrical power source for aircraft might be nuclear fuel from a pure technical standpoint. I'd stick to Kerosene.

FlightlessParrot

22nd Jun 2019, 08:43

The company said this is a "parallel hybrid," meaning the internal combustion engine and electric motor work to optimize power output as the plane flies.

https://www.dw.com/en/ampaire-test-flies-worlds-biggest-electric-plane/a-49098126

Looks like they put an electric unit in the rear, while keeping the recip in the front- and STILL needed a pod to house the batteries.

I suppose one way you could try to make a parallel hybrid work would be to have an ICE running at a constant power output, set to be just a little above cruise power. Surplus power would be electrified and stored in the battery or capacitor, to be used for times of high power need, like take off and climb. It's the principle called a "mild hybrid" in cars.

In land transport, with weight not being a critical factor and constant variation of speed to charge the battery, I can see this might be a win, with a smaller ICE running more of the time in its most efficient regime. I would be very sceptical about an aviation application, but I know nothing, and it would presumably take some fairly serious analysis to see if the added complexity was worth the gains. Does anyone have information?

IFMU

22nd Jun 2019, 14:05

UTC is betting on an electric future and is building a flying demonstrator. They are not playing with small airframes but are converting a Dash 8.
https://youtu.be/Dl7qJFx_M48
The hybrid electric is a good start to an electric future. There will be much experience gained and a potentially viable hybrid aircraft to boot.

Besides building a flying demonstrator, they are also building a lab to support future development. Construction has already started.
https://youtu.be/vp9YqHLnMXU

atpcliff

24th Jul 2019, 06:34

The "Alice" has been ordered in double-digit numbers by Cape Air, a US airline that flies small planes on short routes.
https://www.capeair.com/#/availability

Apparently, they are now flying to Australia...."Billings to Sydney" (dry humour)...

MPN11

24th Jul 2019, 20:04

As an all-electric car owner, I'm happy after a full charge from the mains electricity gives me 70 miles range ... at c. 30 mph.

The basic physics of batteries have a long way to go, IMO.

There's a lot of fantasy in these expositions.

FlightlessParrot

25th Jul 2019, 09:29

Perhaps the all-electric aircraft will be the airship of the mid 21st century.

Sailvi767

25th Jul 2019, 11:22

These folk think they are achieving something.

https://www.ampaire.com/

read the fine print. It’s another hybrid design.

KiloB

25th Jul 2019, 18:53

Perhaps the all-electric aircraft will be the airship of the mid 21st century.
I suspect most of these companies are the Pyramid Schemes of the mid 21st century.

tdracer

25th Jul 2019, 20:50

Another one bites the dust:

https://www.seattletimes.com/business/boeing-aerospace/local-electric-airplane-startup-zunum-runs-out-of-cash/

Zunum, the Bothell-based startup developing a small hybrid-electric airplane, has run out of cash, and much of the operation has collapsed.The company promised to develop a family of small jets to serve lucrative short-hop routes with on-demand air-taxi services. A graphic produced by the company showed three different electric aircraft flying over Seattle: a 10-seat plane; a 50-seat plane; and a 100-seat airliner.The credibility of the company’s Silicon Valley-style pitch for a technology shift that would transform aviation was boosted by investments from Boeing and JetBlue. But unless new investors step forward, that fanciful dream is dead.

KelvinD

25th Jul 2019, 21:17

According to a former RAF pilot, now working for Rolls Royce assured us TV this evening that RR would be demonstrating an electric plane at Farnborough.

Lantern10

25th Jul 2019, 23:19

read the fine print. It’s another hybrid design.
So were the first electric cars, but now look at how far we have come.

Icarus2001

26th Jul 2019, 04:57

Wizofoz

26th Jul 2019, 05:03

DaveReidUK

26th Jul 2019, 06:35

According to a former RAF pilot, now working for Rolls Royce assured us TV this evening that RR would be demonstrating an electric plane at Farnborough.

Rolls-Royce is leading a highly specialised challenge to build the world’s fastest all-electric aircraft (https://www.rolls-royce.com/media/our-stories/innovation/2018/introducing-accel.aspx)

Due to fly next year, though whether it's in time for Farnborough remains to be seen.

Deltasierra010

26th Jul 2019, 10:15

Statistics can be made to prove or disprove anything, the reality is that over the last 4 yrs electric cars have hardly increased their share at all. Lack of government incentive is one reason along with initial cost and limited range, EVs will be the norm in maybe 10yrs time, at present we just have early adopters.

As for electric aeroplanes, short duration trainers maybe and recreational planes but the energy density is far to small it needs a 10 fold increase to be really useful and thats a long way off

netstruggler

26th Jul 2019, 10:22

That's a 26 fold increase in 7 years. You think that insignificant??

It depends where you're starting from.

Try buying 26 lottery tickets and see if that significantly increases your chance of winning the jackpot. Mathematically yes it does, but not to the point where you have a significant chance of winning during your lifetime.

Also, during that period the number of all vehicle sales has increased 100 times more than the increase in the number of electric vehicles. So things still aren't going in the right direction.

beardy

26th Jul 2019, 11:17

The environmental effects are based on absolute numbers of units not proportion of total.

horizon flyer

27th Jul 2019, 00:22

Of course China is the biggest market for electrics, about 30,000 a month in sales and rising. The Chines government wants electrics. The biggest manufacture of EVs world wide is a Chines company called BYD ( Beyond Your Dreams ) in fact you may own one of their, products the battery in your mobile phone. As of today electrics with 250 plus range are available at around £32,000 from several manufactures, the Kia being about the best at this price/range point. In aircraft it is not really viable until a battery of 2.5Kw/hours/Kg is available. So I believe all these electric aircraft so far are, just getting ready for this battery when ? may be another 10 years.

futurama

27th Jul 2019, 01:35

https://cimg6.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune.org-vbulletin/643x375/screen_shot_2019_02_18_at_8_08_16_am_b1158916740eecc5026b90c ae7695645a67e5603.png
Yes, look how far we have come. Last year in Australia 0.3% of cars sold were electric. In the USA 2.1 % and in Japan 1%.
The above chart is a blatant lie.

1. Look at the fine print. The chart "excludes Tesla, which does not reveal sales data". That's a lie. Tesla is a publicly traded company and reports sales data every quarter (example (https://ir.tesla.com/static-files/0b913415-467d-4c0d-be4c-9225c2cb0ae0)). In 2018 Tesla produced 254,530 vehicles and sold 245,162. For the chart to exclude Tesla -- the #1 EV car manufacturer in the world -- is beyond misleading.

2. The chart compares apples vs. oranges, because it includes vehicle categories (such as large trucks) with no EV equivalent yet. But if we compare by market segment, EVs have been doing very well, and in some cases (such as Tesla) EVs sales are surpassing the competition (https://cleantechnica.com/2019/04/06/tesla-15-of-luxury-car-sales-in-usa-q1-2019/):

https://cimg4.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune.org-vbulletin/800x463/screen_shot_2019_07_26_at_9_27_48_pm_1bb765e561b78c57a39685b 401cab8835678d6c7.png

As we can see in the category Tesla competes in (Small & Midsize luxury vehicles) Tesla outsold all competitors in the US during Q1 2019, and looks to repeat the same for the full H1 as they reported record production and sales in Q2 (https://www.forbes.com/sites/kenkam/2019/07/26/tesla-is-still-on-the-right-track/#2ffe95a53097).

tdracer

27th Jul 2019, 03:24

As we can see in the category Tesla competes in (Small & Midsize luxury vehicles) Tesla outsold all competitors in the US during Q1 2019, and looks to repeat the same for the full H1 as they reported record production and sales in Q2 (https://www.forbes.com/sites/kenkam/2019/07/26/tesla-is-still-on-the-right-track/#2ffe95a53097).
The other side of that is Tesla lost over a billion dollars in the process (~$700 million 1st quarter, ~$400 million 2nd quarter). More worrisome is that, while they delivered more cars in the 2nd than the first, income was down by a billion dollars. In short, Tesla is having to cut prices to maintain demand, when they are all ready selling for less than their costs of production. Not even Musk can keep that up indefinitely...

futurama

27th Jul 2019, 04:28

The other side of that is Tesla lost over a billion dollars in the process (~$700 million 1st quarter, ~$400 million 2nd quarter). More worrisome is that, while they delivered more cars in the 2nd than the first, income was down by a billion dollars. In short, Tesla is having to cut prices to maintain demand, when they are all ready selling for less than their costs of production. Not even Musk can keep that up indefinitely...
Not quite. With a company in growth mode, we have to look at the reason behind the numbers. Tesla actually has positive gross margins (around 20%); they are making money on each car sold. And their revenue jumped 60% compared to last year, which is remarkable since the bulk of the federal subsidies expired last year.

So why the big loss? It's largely because Tesla is making major capital investments to expand: building a new factory in China, preparing for another in Europe, and in developing a brand new car (Model Y). They also took an accounting charge to restructure their sales channel (going from a dealership model to primarily online sales).

For sure Tesla has a lot of risks. E.g., the high-end Model S is getting old and will need a design refresh. But if we dig deep, then we that Tesla's free cash flow actually swung to positive this quarter. And despite all the capital investments they're making, Tesla will likely become profitable (again) this year. Plus with $5 billion cash in the bank, they have some wiggle room to spare.

Machdiamond

27th Jul 2019, 14:27

The other side of that is Tesla lost over a billion dollars in the process (~$700 million 1st quarter, ~$400 million 2nd quarter). More worrisome is that, while they delivered more cars in the 2nd than the first, income was down by a billion dollars. In short, Tesla is having to cut prices to maintain demand, when they are all ready selling for less than their costs of production. Not even Musk can keep that up indefinitely...

Q1 revenue was 4.5 billion and Q2 was 6.4 billion, I don't know were you are taking that billion dollars down. More crucially, free cash flow was positive 614 million in Q2 versus negative 920 million in Q1.

Tesla is making money with a pretty decent gross margin of around 20%. And it was capable of sustaining that margin in Q2 in spite of mostly selling the lower priced Model 3 now.

The main reason it loses money overall is because it is financing a growth rate of more than 50% (average of last 5 years), more typical a tech company like Amazon or Google and nothing like any other car company. The long term financial outlook of Tesla is excellent, being the undisputed market leader of the fastest growing automotive market segment (73% growth globally in 2018) . As an investor in the company, I prefer to see them grow relentlessly rather than pull accounting stunts like they did with their highly profitable Q3 and Q4 quarters last year.

There is an amazing amount of Tesla bashing in the media because electric cars are jeopardising some well entrenched interests with deep pockets. I find rather unfortunate that a lot of the false narrative about electric cars is spilling over to electric aviation, and especially in the PPRuNe threads on electric powered aircraft.

To be honest, the fact that most (not all !) of the electric aircraft startups we hear about nowadays are total fantasy from a physics standpoint is not very helpful either.

horizon flyer

27th Jul 2019, 17:59

Again all the comments so far on electric vehicle have not taken into account the Chines market the biggest in the world for vehicle and electrics and BYD produce more than Tesla which is second. See https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2019-04-16/the-world-s-biggest-electric-vehicle-company-looks-nothing-like-tesla

Note Warren Buffet has a shares in this company and he is not known for making bad choices.

On aircraft they will still need an engine to power them even if the propeller or Fan is driven by an electric motor till batteries reach 2.5Kws/hours/kg. But using an electric transmission means propellers/fans can be positioned about any place on the airframe. Also the ic engine generator set can be optimised for high power density and placed in the best place for weight and balance. If the genset can run on Diesel/turbine fuel with lower fuel burn then the weight saving in fuel would compensate for any overall increase in power system weight plus the better aerodynamic would result in lower fuel burn another help.
So I think there are benefits to this system even if it still burns liquid fuel.

futurama

29th Jul 2019, 00:08

Electric aircraft updates from Oshkosh (via CleanTechnica (https://cleantechnica.com/2019/07/28/electric-aircraft-news-airventure-in-oshkosh-bye-aero-eflyer-opener-blackfly-xti-ge-catalyst-more/)):
Bye Aerospace (https://byeaerospace.com/) has 624 “customer commitments” for its electric eFlyer training aircraft, with no less than 170 deposits, 318 memoranda of understanding (MOUs), and 136 MOU options
XTI Aircraft TriFan 600 (http://www.xtiaircraft.com/trifan-600/) hybrid-electric VTOL aircraft will use GE Aviation’s in-development Catalyst (https://www.ainonline.com/aviation-news/business-aviation/2019-05-22/ge-just-starting-bizav-engine-development-journey) turboprop engine
Ampaire (https://www.ampaire.com/) announced plans to bring hybrid-electric conversions to more types, including the Cessna 208B Grand Caravan and Viking Twin Otter. The conversions will cut fuel consumption by 70%-90%, reduce maintenance by 20%-50%, and result in quieter flight.
Texas Aircraft Manufacturing (https://texasaircraft.com/) demonstrated its converted and certified Colt S-LSA (https://texasaircraft.com/colt-aircraft/) at Oshkosh. The company is also working with Rolls-Royce Siemens to create a new electric light-sport aircraft based on the =Corp]SP55D (https://press.siemens.com/global/en/feature/electric-flight?content[) electric motor.
Continental announced a partnership with VerdeGo Aero and its electric-VTOL powertrain. VerdeGo has been working on a 2 to 3 seat tilt-wing eVTOL.

phylosocopter

29th Jul 2019, 23:08

even a hybrid drive has enormous potential fuel , cost and safety benifits

transmission losses.. remember the trend now for efficiency in jet engines is geared fans and these gear drives add weight, complexity, and consume power , electric motors are small, light (relative to a jet engine) and can be designed for any speed, torque relationship required .. the amount of gear creating wind-age is also reduced

motor size.. instead of fossil fueled engines designed to deliver TOGA power the hybrid engine needs only to deliver a bit more than cruise power, an insignificant amount of battery ( weight and volume wise) can supply TOGA (ludicrous amounts of, if required!) as well as power to land safely if main engine fails.

safety .. power from multiple fossil fueled engines can be (re)-routed to multiple drive motors so balance can be maintained in the event of an engine outage

cost.. the electric drives need a fraction of the maintenance and have far greater reliability . The generator engines can be modular and easier to swap (than a wing mounted engine/gear/fan assembly)

Less Hair

30th Jul 2019, 09:57

Eletric flight is nothing for heavy airliners. Batteries are to heavy and will remain so. The only power source would be nuclear power. But this has acceptance problems.
The smart thing with Alice is: They do what is possible today. Existing "Tesla" battery, lightweight structure, small, short range. It's not a fantasy like many others are it's build for FAR 23 right away.
It doesn't make sense to go bigger than that with available battery technology.

Less Hair

30th Jul 2019, 12:26

By 2040 Norway wants to move all short haul flights to all electric.

Deltasierra010

31st Jul 2019, 06:51

I don’t really get hybrid drives for aircraft, if you are going to have electric drive for a propeller you need a generator of some kind which is is going to weigh more than any gear box. In addition the current bypass turbine is compact, fairly light and uses the thrust from the turbine as well as the fan, the power source in any other position would provide less thrust and be no more efficient

There are plenty of examples of electric drives in locomotives, heavy plant and tractors using massive Diesel engines where weight is not an issue and mechanical transmission impractical, for large aircraft weight is a big issue and only a turbine gives an acceptable power to weight ratio. For light aircraft a piston engine could drive a generator to charge the battery to power the electric motor drive, replacing the direct drive propeller but as we have seen in cars fuel economy gains are difficult to achieve, the main advantage is less city pollution.

Any hybrid aircraft would need to carry batteries + fuel + piston engine + generator + electric motor, it will be interesting to see what payload is left.

Icarus2001

1st Aug 2019, 02:54

For light aircraft a piston engine could drive a generator to charge the battery to power the electric motor drive So what would the advantage of this arrangement be? You are still burning fuel, still making noise and still carrying the weight. To achieve what?

A little like this...

https://cimg9.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune.org-vbulletin/1600x1066/cadillac_elr_portl2_mountains_976d0682ca9712c467afd912ba469b fb62617e3f.jpg

Machdiamond

1st Aug 2019, 03:34

Hybrid aircraft have no technical connection whatsoever with hybrid cars.

Hybrid cars are mostly efficient in city driving because they can get some of the energy back in when braking (particularly for city busses). Plug-in hybrids are also nice where you get some cheap and short go-to-work city-range purely on electricity.

Aircraft can't use regen because when you descend, regen creates drag and increases descent slope which means your top of descent needs to be some further distance away and the energy you need cover that distance is ALWAYS (look up entropy) going to be more than the regen energy of the descent, with the exception of poorly planned mostly speed brakes deployed descents.

Where hybrids start to make sense on aircraft is when you consider the wildly different power requirements of flight segments like taxi, takeoff, climb, cruise and descent, and you discover that on short haul aircraft your turbine engine sucks terribly most of the time except when near full power (piston engines don't suck so bad at low power and are less desirable in hybrids). Then you can scale down the turbine engine and pair it up with electric power assistance, and if you do it right you end up with a significantly reduced block fuel - even considering generator losses. And that's only the beginning of possibilities.

Less Hair

5th Aug 2019, 13:16

pattern_is_full

5th Aug 2019, 17:59

The main problem for battery powered aircraft I see is their weight. Especially on landing. An empty battery is as heavy as a fully loaded one. That's like every landing will be a heavy landing. Combine that with short endurance and many short flights and you have a high structural fatigue and you will need more robust structure.

Yes, but at what point does landing weight become a special factor? I.E. must be a value less than MTOW, and so-listed in the manual? And assumed by the engineers? And does that include any aircraft likely to be electrified any time soon?

If a given design has a MLW of 5000kg, it can land at 5000kg. That is the spec, and it can be landed that way on every landing. There's nothing in the books that says "MLW - but only use this 10% of the time!"

And it doesn't matter how that weight is divided between structure, engines, batteries/fuel, and payload. Payload being the factor where adjustments are most easily made.

The difference between MTOW and MLW for a Twin Otter is 200lb/90Kg. Leave out one seat = end of problem.

Of course, that doesn't contradict the general idea that weight is always a critical problem in any aircraft, from balloons to A380s. And that electric flight beyond a certain point will depend on "unrealized" technology, like the ability to make aluminum engine blocks in place of cast-iron was for aviation 116 years ago.

ThreeThreeMike

5th Aug 2019, 21:05

Yes, but at what point does landing weight become a special factor? I.E. must be a value less than MTOW, and so-listed in the manual? And assumed by the engineers? And does that include any aircraft likely to be electrified any time soon?

If a given design has a MLW of 5000kg, it can land at 5000kg. That is the spec, and it can be landed that way on every landing. There's nothing in the books that says "MLW - but only use this 10% of the time!"

And it doesn't matter how that weight is divided between structure, engines, batteries/fuel, and payload. Payload being the factor where adjustments are most easily made.

The difference between MTOW and MLW for a Twin Otter is 200lb/90Kg. Leave out one seat = end of problem.

Of course, that doesn't contradict the general idea that weight is always a critical problem in any aircraft, from balloons to A380s. And that electric flight beyond a certain point will depend on "unrealized" technology, like the ability to make aluminum engine blocks in place of cast-iron was for aviation 116 years ago.

Based on current power densities, a 90 Kg battery will provide enough power to support a Twin Otter for three or four minutes.

Using electric power to substitute for two GE90-110 engines will require a battery weighing more than the passengers and fuel that a 773 can carry.

The entire idea of electrifying airplanes is rather pointless. The pretzel twists of different methods being proposed by the acolytes to attain what is essentially insignificant flight time illustrates that quite easily.

Sailvi767

5th Aug 2019, 21:27

Yes, but at what point does landing weight become a special factor? I.E. must be a value less than MTOW, and so-listed in the manual? And assumed by the engineers? And does that include any aircraft likely to be electrified any time soon?

If a given design has a MLW of 5000kg, it can land at 5000kg. That is the spec, and it can be landed that way on every landing. There's nothing in the books that says "MLW - but only use this 10% of the time!"

And it doesn't matter how that weight is divided between structure, engines, batteries/fuel, and payload. Payload being the factor where adjustments are most easily made.

The difference between MTOW and MLW for a Twin Otter is 200lb/90Kg. Leave out one seat = end of problem.

Of course, that doesn't contradict the general idea that weight is always a critical problem in any aircraft, from balloons to A380s. And that electric flight beyond a certain point will depend on "unrealized" technology, like the ability to make aluminum engine blocks in place of cast-iron was for aviation 116 years ago.

You omit the fact that with a fuel verses electric aircraft you can adjust the amount of energy you carry onboard to account for the length of flight and other variables. A electric aircraft loses the ability to depart with a 50% fuel load to allow increased payload. In airline operations that occurs on almost every flight. A twin otter with a OEW of about 8000 lbs would be heavily load restricted if it took off with fuel fuel every flight. Payload would be about 2000 lbs max. Perhaps 9 passengers and baggage. Batteries are going to need to be far lighter than a comparable fuel load before the concept becomes viable. The same energy density would result in many operational restrictions.

Interested Passenger

6th Aug 2019, 06:50

the only electrically powered transport that really makes sense is railways. Effectively a direct link from power station to motive power unit. No energy storage required.

A downside that never gets mentioned for battery vehicles, that would surely be another nail in the aircraft coffin is the weight doesn't go down with usage, so landing weight would be same as take off, and you're always lugging around partially useless batteries, as opposed to air in an emptying fuel tank.

For aviation, electric tugs or an equivilant to save fuel burn on taxi would make sense, if you don't have to get things up to temp of course.

Bravo Delta

6th Aug 2019, 23:31

Where are they going to park these electric aircraft whilst the batteries are on charge?
Not very profitable for airlines to have planes on the ground with extended turn around times.

Machdiamond

7th Aug 2019, 00:24

Where are they going to park these electric aircraft whilst the batteries are on charge?
Not very profitable for airlines to have planes on the ground with extended turn around times.

With current battery technology (Porsche 350 kW fast chargers and Tesla SuperChargers), about 30 minutes at the gate. In five years from now, about 20 minutes which is typical short haul turnaround time.

Thanks for asking.

Machdiamond

7th Aug 2019, 00:33

Based on current power densities, a 90 Kg battery will provide enough power to support a Twin Otter for three or four minutes.

You are a bit off and misunderstood the point Pattern_is_full was making. The MagniX - Harbour Air retrofit of the Beaver with electric power is pretty much based on the PT6 STC and 6000 lb increased gross weight, which allows for 40 minutes endurance with 6 passengers with a 600 - 700 kg battery and still within the STC weights. Harbour Air typically does 15 minutes hops with their Beavers so the numbers check out ok in my book.

Machdiamond

7th Aug 2019, 00:40

You omit the fact that with a fuel verses electric aircraft you can adjust the amount of energy you carry onboard to account for the length of flight and other variables. A electric aircraft loses the ability to depart with a 50% fuel load to allow increased payload. In airline operations that occurs on almost every flight.

You omit the fact that electric aircraft is only viable with (and serious electric projects only claim) really short range routes, like inter island below 100 nm. In these conditions, relative to conventional aircraft, you operate well below fuel with maximum payload so you never worry about these trades. You fuel up for short range and you go with max payload all the way, like the ATR's.

Machdiamond

7th Aug 2019, 00:48

Sailvi767

7th Aug 2019, 01:35

With current battery technology (Porsche 350 kW fast chargers and Tesla SuperChargers), about 30 minutes at the gate. In five years from now, about 20 minutes which is typical short haul turnaround time.

Thanks for asking.

Not even a remotely valid comparison. The amount of energy transfer needed is going to be vastly greater than charging a car. Cable sizing alone is going to be interesting!

Machdiamond

7th Aug 2019, 02:05

Not even a remotely valid comparison. The amount of energy transfer needed is going to be vastly greater than charging a car. Cable sizing alone is going to be interesting!

For short haul on 6-9 passenger all-electric aircraft is about a factor of five for small commuters, ten at most (500 kWh to 1 MWh). This is about the same level of electric truck charging infrastructure currently in development. Google HPCCV and such.

You may be thinking about larger aircraft but that is not what I am talking about.

phylosocopter

7th Aug 2019, 03:35

For short haul on 6-9 passenger all-electric aircraft is about a factor of five for small commuters, ten at most (500 kWh to 1 MWh). This is about the same level of electric truck charging infrastructure currently in development. Google HPCCV and such.

You may be thinking about larger aircraft but that is not what I am talking about.

the trend with electric air trainers is for the battery to be modular and swap-able "(2 to 5 minutes)" turnaround one pack charging on the ground another in the air. agree we arn't talking a380 yet but for short hops and training flights this technology is real and current.

https://electrek.co/2018/04/27/all-electric-trainer-plane-airworthiness-certification-faa-us/

Manwell

7th Aug 2019, 04:30

This is what is commonly called a con. Anyone in the know can hand around press releases saying any damn thing, but that doesn't make it true. You'd have to verify every element of the story to know the whole truth the PR won't mention.

The whole basis of switching to electric vehicles is based on the lie that CO2 from fossil fuels cause climate change, and the true irony is that oil isn't a fossil fuel, CO2 is good for the planet, and climate change is natural. There's a lot more to it than this, but I don't want to bore you with the details, because there are a lot.

DaveReidUK

7th Aug 2019, 06:18

There's a lot more to it than this, but I don't want to bore you with the details

Much appreciated.

FlightlessParrot

7th Aug 2019, 08:46

The whole basis of switching to electric vehicles is based on the lie that CO2 from fossil fuels cause climate change, and the true irony is that oil isn't a fossil fuel, CO2 is good for the planet, and climate change is natural. There's a lot more to it than this, but I don't want to bore you with the details, because there are a lot.

CO2 may be good for your planet, but on our planet we have rather too much of it in the atmosphere.

Icarus2001

7th Aug 2019, 11:21

and the true irony is that oil isn't a fossil fuel Let me guess, it was created six thousand years ago?

AppleMacster

7th Aug 2019, 11:40

Charging speeds are already at 10.5MW for battery-powered Ferries. It’s all done with a robotic connector, too, no refueller required.

https://www.forseaferries.com/about-forsea/sustainability/

Sailvi767

7th Aug 2019, 11:59

You omit the fact that electric aircraft is only viable with (and serious electric projects only claim) really short range routes, like inter island below 100 nm. In these conditions, relative to conventional aircraft, you operate well below fuel with maximum payload so you never worry about these trades. You fuel up for short range and you go with max payload all the way, like the ATR's.

It will be impossible to build or convert a aircraft at a reasonable cost with such a limited utility. No one will want it and shipping it anywhere will be a pain. For a electric to be successful it needs to have a market that makes it commercially viable. A 100 mile range won’t achieve that.

Machdiamond

7th Aug 2019, 13:20

It will be impossible to build or convert a aircraft at a reasonable cost with such a limited utility. No one will want it and shipping it anywhere will be a pain. For a electric to be successful it needs to have a market that makes it commercially viable. A 100 mile range won’t achieve that.

What percentage of Cape Air routes are under 100 miles? How do you think they will like near zero maintenance cost on the propulsion system and cheap electric recharge at a small fraction of the fuel cost? Isn't that also going to make more routes commercially viable?

What about the competitiveness of an emissions free aircraft servicing cities that are progressively banning internal combustion engine cars (mostly in Europe for now)? Once such an aircraft becomes available, are those cities going to expand that mandate to airplanes of that size?

All-electric small regional aircraft is a small aircraft / small distances marke, and being all-electric changes the economics of the operations quite a bit.

For longer ranges, there is hybrid propulsion. Up to 600 nm range maybe. Further than that the fuel saving gets cancelled out by the weight of the system, with today's battery energy density. So it will be a long while before we see all-electric Boeings and Airbus.

Ancient Mariner

14th Aug 2019, 13:50

First el-craft crash in Norway today. Both occupants survived. No more details at present.
Edit. Not a crash, successful emergency landing. Avinor boss was pilot.
New edit. If you land on your nose, in water it is apparently considered an emergency landing.
https://www.dagbladet.no/nyheter/elfly-nodlandet---med-statssekretaer-og-avinor-sjefen-om-bord/71491030
Per

Sailvi767

16th Aug 2019, 11:26

What percentage of Cape Air routes are under 100 miles? How do you think they will like near zero maintenance cost on the propulsion system and cheap electric recharge at a small fraction of the fuel cost? Isn't that also going to make more routes commercially viable?

What about the competitiveness of an emissions free aircraft servicing cities that are progressively banning internal combustion engine cars (mostly in Europe for now)? Once such an aircraft becomes available, are those cities going to expand that mandate to airplanes of that size?

All-electric small regional aircraft is a small aircraft / small distances marke, and being all-electric changes the economics of the operations quite a bit.

For longer ranges, there is hybrid propulsion. Up to 600 nm range maybe. Further than that the fuel saving gets cancelled out by the weight of the system, with today's battery energy density. So it will be a long while before we see all-electric Boeings and Airbus.

I suspect the average route for Cape Air is about 100 miles. The aircraft of course needs to have the range to fly that 100 miles plus power to divert to another airport and maintain reserves. Cape Air has purchased a new aircraft for the next 20 years the Tecnam P2012 traveler. The business case for Tecnam to design and build the traveler was based on a expected demand for 11,000 aircraft in its class.