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Electric Sonex
See: http://www.aero-news.net/index.cfm#d
Well, it wouldn't work for me but the idea might be developed into a pre-solo trainer. . A one hour duration could translate into 45 minute instruction sessions costing $50. Dunno...might work for a flight school. No cross country, of course. That would require a piston engine. New lithium phosphate cells can be recharged in 5 minutes - if you have access to a VERY high amperage charger Bill Daniels |
#2
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Electric Sonex
Bill Daniels wrote:
See: http://www.aero-news.net/index.cfm#d Well, it wouldn't work for me but the idea might be developed into a pre-solo trainer. . A one hour duration could translate into 45 minute instruction sessions costing $50. Dunno...might work for a flight school. No cross country, of course. That would require a piston engine. New lithium phosphate cells can be recharged in 5 minutes - if you have access to a VERY high amperage charger Bill Daniels No if that thing has enough energy stored to fly for 1 hour then assuming you are talking about daytime VFR flight then the flight can on last 30 minutes. Sec. 91.151 Fuel requirements for flight in VFR conditions. (a) No person may begin a flight in an airplane under VFR conditions unless (considering wind and forecast weather conditions) there is enough fuel to fly to the first point of intended landing and, assuming normal cruising speed-- (1) During the day, to fly after that for at least 30 minutes; or (2) At night, to fly after that for at least 45 minutes. Now maybe they took the 30 minute reserve into account when they said 1 hour but I didn't see that any where in the story. I kind of doubt that the electric engine that is going to be able to power an aircraft in a commercially usable way is going to come from a company that's last engine product was a modified VW engine. Unless he has hired a metric butt load of really sharp folks and has a megabutt load of cash to throw at the problem. |
#3
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Electric Sonex
In article ,
"Gig 601XL Builder" wrDOTgiaconaATsuddenlink.net wrote: No if that thing has enough energy stored to fly for 1 hour then assuming you are talking about daytime VFR flight then the flight can on last 30 minutes. Thirty minutes in the practice area, then thirty, no, make that twenty nine, minutes in the pattern. ;- I love it. We need to stop using ferin' oil, this is the first of many steps in the right direction. It raises some interesting things to think about: Take off weight equals landing weight. (no fuel burn off) No C.G. shift. (no fuel burn off) It would be an improved training environment (no engine noise) The prop makes a good bit of noise. What if your tiedown spot was all solar cells? Will FBO's stock charged batteries for cross-country flights? |
#4
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Electric Sonex
"Gig 601XL Builder" wrDOTgiaconaATsuddenlink.net wrote in message ... Fuel requirements for flight in VFR conditions. (a) No person may begin a flight in an airplane under VFR conditions unless (considering wind and forecast weather conditions) there is enough fuel to fly to the first point of intended landing and, assuming normal cruising speed-- (1) During the day, to fly after that for at least 30 minutes; or (2) At night, to fly after that for at least 45 minutes. When I was instructing in gliders, it was routine to join the pattern with (the energy equivalent) of perhaps three minutes of fuel! It always worked. The difference is knowing precisely how much energy you have available. The FARs say 30 minutes for airplanes partially because of the inaccuracy of the average light plane fuel gauge and also because folks actually use their airplanes to travel from one airport to another. Neither of those factors need apply to an electric training airplane. First, it would operate from one field. Second, technology exists to fairly precisely inform the pilot how much energy remains in the batteries. (add a GPS-informed computer to the mix and you could always be sure that you had enough energy to return to the field) Vaughn |
#5
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Electric Sonex
In article ,
"Vaughn Simon" wrote: Second, technology exists to fairly precisely inform the pilot how much energy remains in the batteries. (add a GPS-informed computer to the mix and you could always be sure that you had enough energy to return to the field) [smacks myself on the forehead] What a great idea! |
#6
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Electric Sonex
On Jul 24, 8:35 pm, Dan Nafe wrote:
I love it. We need to stop using ferin' oil, this is the first of many steps in the right direction. Except that way too much electricity is being generated using oil or natural gas, and the losses of efficiency in first burning the stuff, then generating electricity, transmitting it long distances and losing more, then the heat losses in running chargers and more heat off the batteries, I think we'd end up burning nearly twice as much as if we just stuck a VW on it. Coal is more available but is so dirty. Nuclear is really avaiable but isn't cheap and scares too many folks. Dan |
#7
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Electric Sonex
wrote in message oups.com... On Jul 24, 8:35 pm, Dan Nafe wrote: I love it. We need to stop using ferin' oil, this is the first of many steps in the right direction. Except that way too much electricity is being generated using oil or natural gas, and the losses of efficiency in first burning the stuff, then generating electricity, transmitting it long distances and losing more, then the heat losses in running chargers and more heat off the batteries, I think we'd end up burning nearly twice as much as if we just stuck a VW on it. Coal is more available but is so dirty. Nuclear is really avaiable but isn't cheap and scares too many folks. Dan The beauty of electricity is its flexibility not its efficiency - although it can be efficient too. The source can be solar cells, wind, hydro, nuclear or conventional coal fired generators. Whatever the source, the pollution can be tightly controlled. No matter the source, delivery is the same. Nuclear power is steadilly attracting supporters from the environmentallist ranks. It's the least poluting, least disruptive power source available. Solar, wind and biofuels will me massively harmful to the environment if scaled up to meet a large fraction of the demand. To meet total electric demand, a solar plant would have to be the size of Texas as would the farm land needed to produce an equivalent demand for biofuels. When the greenies do their math homework, nuclear starts looking good to them. Obviously, the problem with electric airplanes is range. It's doubtful if electricity storage will ever reach the energy density of gasoline. One thing that amazes me is that electrons weight almost nothing. A charged battery, for all practical purposes, weighes the same charged or not - the energy the battery contains weighs nothing. It seems like the boffins could figure out a way to pressurize a container with electrons. There are already electric self-launch gliders you can buy. The battery pack provides more than an hour of power with the capability to climb 10,000 feet. For a glider, that's easilly a two hour flight without lift. Bill Daniels |
#8
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Electric Sonex
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#9
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Electric Sonex
Bill Daniels wrote:
wrote in message oups.com... On Jul 24, 8:35 pm, Dan Nafe wrote: I love it. We need to stop using ferin' oil, this is the first of many steps in the right direction. Except that way too much electricity is being generated using oil or natural gas, and the losses of efficiency in first burning the stuff, then generating electricity, transmitting it long distances and losing more, then the heat losses in running chargers and more heat off the batteries, I think we'd end up burning nearly twice as much as if we just stuck a VW on it. Coal is more available but is so dirty. Nuclear is really avaiable but isn't cheap and scares too many folks. Dan The beauty of electricity is its flexibility not its efficiency - although it can be efficient too. The source can be solar cells, wind, hydro, nuclear or conventional coal fired generators. Whatever the source, the pollution can be tightly controlled. No matter the source, delivery is the same. Nuclear power is steadilly attracting supporters from the environmentallist ranks. It's the least poluting, least disruptive power source available. Solar, wind and biofuels will me massively harmful to the environment if scaled up to meet a large fraction of the demand. To meet total electric demand, a solar plant would have to be the size of Texas as would the farm land needed to produce an equivalent demand for biofuels. When the greenies do their math homework, nuclear starts looking good to them. Obviously, the problem with electric airplanes is range. It's doubtful if electricity storage will ever reach the energy density of gasoline. One thing that amazes me is that electrons weight almost nothing. A charged battery, for all practical purposes, weighes the same charged or not - the energy the battery contains weighs nothing. It seems like the boffins could figure out a way to pressurize a container with electrons. There are already electric self-launch gliders you can buy. The battery pack provides more than an hour of power with the capability to climb 10,000 feet. For a glider, that's easilly a two hour flight without lift. Bill Daniels We are along way from even getting close to a replacement for gasoline in aircraft or for that matter cars where weight isn't near as critical. BUT, if we would stop using petroleum products in everything other than the transportation sector we would reduce their use by 25%. And doing that would be huge. Many of the steps being taken now are nothing but "feel good" moves that really don't reduce the amount of petroleum used just move some of the use out of the public eye. In fact many of the current fuel saving programs probably increase the net use of petroleum. Add to that the fact that we are now replacing fuel with what should be food and you are just begging for real problems in the future. I think it is funny that the environmentalists are getting back on the Nuke bandwagon, since it was mainly they that stopped construction of new nuclear power plants in the first place. Nuclear energy is safe. The US Navy has proved that. I've often wondered how large an area could be powered with the reactor from a nuclear powered carrier? One of the big problems with commercial nuke plants is that they almost always started each plant from scratch on a clean sheet of paper. Think how much less it would cost if we had an assembly line of small reactors. Yes I realize there is the issue of what to do with the waste. The answer to that is reprocess until you can't reprocess any more then shoot what's left into the sun. It would be like one guy ****ing in the ocean. |
#10
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Electric Sonex
We are along way from even getting close to a replacement for gasoline in aircraft or for that matter cars where weight isn't near as critical. BUT, if we would stop using petroleum products in everything other than the transportation sector we would reduce their use by 25%. And doing that would be huge. IMHO, the 25% figure is very low--by more than an order of magnetude. Many of the steps being taken now are nothing but "feel good" moves that really don't reduce the amount of petroleum used just move some of the use out of the public eye. In fact many of the current fuel saving programs probably increase the net use of petroleum. Add to that the fact that we are now replacing fuel with what should be food and you are just begging for real problems in the future. Very true. BTW, I have heard that's what really brought down the Japanese war machine in WWII. I think it is funny that the environmentalists are getting back on the Nuke bandwagon, since it was mainly they that stopped construction of new nuclear power plants in the first place. Nuclear energy is safe. The US Navy has proved that. I've often wondered how large an area could be powered with the reactor from a nuclear powered carrier? One of the big problems with commercial nuke plants is that they almost always started each plant from scratch on a clean sheet of paper. Think how much less it would cost if we had an assembly line of small reactors. Yes I realize there is the issue of what to do with the waste. The answer to that is reprocess until you can't reprocess any more then shoot what's left into the sun. It would be like one guy ****ing in the ocean. It certainly is interestng to find the greenies coming to their senses--if true. In any case, there are plenty of uses for thermal energy that is not hot enough to generate high pressure steam--so nuclear "waste" could easily have a second, and even a third, usefull life before the first reprocessing becomes necessary. Peter |
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