On Monday, March 16, 2015 at 8:16:51 AM UTC-7, Dan Marotta wrote:
Why don't they do it non-stop, like the Voyager?* http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rutan_Voyager*
Sure the Voyager used gasoline but it had to carry all of it along
with food, water, and other essentials.* And they did it in days
rather than seasons.* With lithium batteries and solar cells, what's
to stop them?* And frankly, what's the use of either?




On 3/16/2015 2:29 AM, Kilo-Bravo wrote:



Surely the most remarkable adventure in this century is the RTW-Flight of swiss made Solar Impulse 2, operating without a single drop of Kerosine or Gas.
The 2.300 kg Solar Impulse 2 is propelled by 4 x 17.5 hp electric-motors powered by the endless energy of the sun, collected during daytime by 17.248 Solar-Cells and stored in Lithium Accu-Packs for the night.
The RTW-Flight is divided into 12 independent flight-segments with planned endurance-time between one and five days lasting flights.

Two of the 12 segments have already been performed without any problems, 10 more flights must be done. The complete RTW-journey lasts until July - August, depending on wether-conditions during spring and summer 2015 at the northern hemisphere.

UL-Segelflug.de has just started a new blog-series about the outstanding solar-project. The "Kickstart-Blog", describing the adventure in details can be read via the following link: http://www.ul-segelflug.de/blog/rtw-...impulse-2.html

Estimate departure for next flight-operation is March 18th, ETD 00:30 UTC / ETA 14:00 UTC.

All flights can be monitored via Flight-Tracker and/or Live-TV and all flights will be accompanied by blogs at UL-Segelflug.de/blog/rtw-solar-impulse-2.html.

Best regards from Germany
Klaus





--

Dan Marotta

Not taking anything away from the Voyager, but "sure it used gasoline", and "what's the use of either" solar cells and lithium batteries ??? I guess if you don't get it, you don't get it.