Pipistrel’s Plans Evolve in Exciting Ways

Dean Sigler Announcements, Electric Powerplants, Fuel Cells, Hybrid Aircraft, Hydrogen Fuel, Sustainable Aviation Leave a Comment

In its 30th year, Pipistrel is making many changes, from a crisp new logo to new emphases and technologies.  Its 801, intended for Uber’s Urban Air Mobility program, will segue into a cargo version and return later after the firm gains experience with deliveries.  Meanwhile, Pipistrel will concentrate on developing a 19-seat, 300-mile range regional airliner while growing its global outreach for personal aircraft.  Pipistrel is evolving and flourishing in exciting new ways. From Hang Gliders to Global Reach Ivo Boscarol, founder, owner and president of Pipistrel companies, CEO of Pipistrel d.o.o. Shares a look at his firm’s three-decade history and plans for the near future. Pipistrel reports in its newsletter, “The information that Pipistrel is running a program developing a large cargo-delivery hybrid-electric UAV in-house is accurate. For this program, we will be communicating about progress on a separate occasion, when we are ready to unveil the exact specifications, purpose and capability.”  It will at the same time hold …

VoltAero Has Ambitious Plans

Dean Sigler Announcements, Batteries, Electric Powerplants, Hybrid Aircraft, Sustainable Aviation Leave a Comment

VoltAero is a small French company that might succeed in electric flight where bigger firms have failed.  Its hybrid-electric system marks an innovative path to quiet flight. Airbus ventured into electric aviation with a four-motor conversion of the Colomban cri-Cri in 2010 and a clean-sheet craft, the E-Fan, a sleek, essentially ducted fan two-seater in 2015.  Initially big plans for production of two and four seat variants bloomed – then withered.  Airbus dropped plans for the personal electric airplane market and instead concentrated on at least three versions of Urban Air Mobility devices and a hybrid-electric demonstrator based on a BAE 146 airliner.  This last project, the E-Fan X, was canceled recently.  Jean Botti was Chief Technology Officer for Airbus, and Didier Esteyne a test pilot for the Cri-Cri and E-Fan.  Botti is now CEO of VoltAero: Esteyne its Technical Officer.  VoltAero has ambitious plans for its hybrid electric future, and management experience to pull them off. Flying VoltAero’s unique …

eHang Flies for Real at Kitty Hawk

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eHang has been busy over the past year, with demonstration flights worldwide, and last week in Kitty Hawk, North Carolina – the birthplace of aviation. Not a Long Commute In March, 2019, EHang founder, Mr. Hu Huazhi commuted via EHang AAV (Autonomous Aerial Vehicle) in Guangzhou, China.  As you can clearly see, it’s not a long commute, but a demonstration  of the faith the founder and others have in the machine.  As reported here two years ago, the company flew its entire executive group and and Guangshou city officials in their two-seat machines.  eHang reports on their extensive testing and demonstration flights: “To date, EHang has safely conducted over two thousand trial flights in the United States, China, Austria, the Netherlands, Qatar, and the UAE to ensure that its AAVs operate safely and reliably in different areas globally.” eHang, already prosperous from model drone sales, has invested heavily in a corporate infrastructure and international marketing.  They note a Blue Paper …

Bye Aerospace Expands Its Horizons

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Bye Aerospace has been making inroads into both battery development and flight training with partners on an international scale.  Alliance with Oxis Energy As reported in July, Bye Aerospace and OXIS Energy announced a collaborative program to achieve a 50-to 100-percent increase in flight time from a single charge compared to existing batteries.  On its web site, OXIS reveals that it is, “…developing a <30 kWh battery system integrated with an Aviation Battery Management System for a two-seater electric passenger aircraft.”  The partnership, “…seeks to achieve a 50% to 100% increase in flight time from a single charge on future Bye Aerospace eAircraft,” with cells exceeding 500 Watt-hours per kilogram at 20 Amp-hour capacity.  This will lead to weight reduction and increased flight duration.   Quantum Air, OSM and Bye Form a Synergistic Enterprise Quantum Air is a short-range carrier with a mission.  “Our mission is simple and prevalent throughout our brands.  To change the way people travel through cutting-edge …

Greeting the New Year with Hope

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Two Videos to Ponder We’re not there yet, in the land of flying cars and even motorcycles.  But we do have some pretty good images of where we are and where we might be headed.   CNBC produced some pretty thoughtful and well-researched pieces on a major problem plaguing all of us who live within bumper distance of one another – and some plausible solutions.  Both videos touch on urban air mobility. How Much Do Traffic Jams Cost the U. S. Economy? Gridlock, traffic jams and delay – they all frustrate us daily if we live in a big city.  They take away from family time, pollute the air, and drive us to distraction.  This video ends with an optimistic take on the benefits sky taxis might bring to groundlings everywhere.  We could use cleaner skies, more time at home, and more Zen-like minds.  You might learn how to handle the challenges of heavy traffic, too. Why Don’t We Have Electric …

Joby and Uber Elevate Form Partnership

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In a new partnership agreement, Uber Elevate recently added Joby Aviation to its stable of aircraft companies which are to supply craft for its Urban Air Mobility program.  Joby builds electric motors, 12 of which line the wing of NASA’s X-57 Maxwell, with two larger motors for forward thrust when the small units are shut down. This inventory of electric motors on the NASA project gives Joby a certain entrée to interest from the Urban Air Mobility movement, and it’s received that interest from Uber.  Well financed in its own right, Joby has committed to meeting Uber’s desire to have operating sky taxis in the air by 2023, as reported by Andrew J. Hawkins in The Verge. We have written about Joby several times in the past, including this 2014 report that includes an early rendition of the Maxwell project. Much has happened for Joby since then.  Hawkins picked up the story in 2018. “Joby is the brainchild of inventor …

SAS 2019: IBM Battery Research with Dr. Jangwoo Kim

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Dr. Jangwoo Kim has a resume’ that puts a great many qualifications together that spell “battery designer.”  He has a B.S. degree in chemical engineering from Yonsei University, one of three “Sky Universities” regarded as South Korea’s most prestigious.  At Cornell University, he received M. S. and Ph.D degrees in chemical engineering, and then worked for LG Chem on lithium-ion battery pack design.  After that, he returned to Cornell to work on his Ph.D, investigating “next-generation rechargeable battery technology, including Li-Air and Li-Sulfur, specialized in inorganic nanomaterial synthesis and polymer processing via an electrospraying method.”  He joined IBM Research, Almaden Research Center in 2016 and participated in the Battery 500 project, aiming to build a battery pack with a specific energy of 500 watt-hours per kilogram.   We see the project leader, Dr. Winfred Wilcke, in a short video about that project. Battery 500 intended to reduce or eliminate heavy metals such as cobalt from the cells.  Cobalt is not rare, but …

A Joyous Boxing Day Electrified

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Boxing Day is a holiday unique to the British Empire, a day-after Christmas gift-giving celebration in which the well-off gave gifts to their servants. Yahoo Entertainment explains, “While there is some dispute over what the name actually means, it’s commonly believed that Boxing Day refers to the habit of aristocratic employees gifting their servants or tradesman on Dec. 26 as a thank you for their work throughout the year. The employers would give them each a box to take home to their family with gifts, bonuses and leftover food. “Samuel Pepys, a naval administrator and Member of Parliament, is famous for writing in his diary in 1663: ‘Thence by coach to my shoemaker’s and paid all there, and gave something to the boys’ box against Christmas.’” Certainly some regifting was in action, a chance for the upper class to get rid of fruitcakes sent by maiden aunts, or to reward particularly meritorious servants. In the spirit of Boxing Day, your …

Help Promote Electric Aviation

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Beth Stanton, an aerobatic pilot and superb writer (you can read her articles in Sport Aviation), shares the following action item.  Readers are invited to comment to the FAA by December 31.  Your comments could have a big effect promoting electric flight, especially in flight training.   “Progress on affordable electric training is happening!  “Joseph Oldham, director of the Sustainable Aviation Project (SAP) asked me to pass this information along – “The SAP petition to the FAA for exemption to operate 4 Pipistrel Alpha Electro Aircraft with the issuance of a Special Light Sport Aircraft airworthiness certificate to conduct flight training is now posted for public comment: “https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2019/12/09/2019-26468/petition-for-exemption-summary-of-petition-received-cities-of-mendota-and-reedley-california   “Comments must be received by 12/30/19.   “The progress of the Sustainable Aviation Project has been featured in the past few  years in two innovation features in EAA Sport Aviation magazine. An article with the latest updates is slated for the May 2020 issue of EAA Experimenter magazine.  “Details about the …

First Lindbergh E-flight Rally

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The Lindbergh E-flight Rally coinciding with Friedrichshafen’s annual Aero Expo will explore the growing capabilities of these amazing machines.  The Lindbergh Foundation invites owners of electric aircraft to gather two days before the opening of Aero Expo 2020 to fly over the scenic marvels of Germany, alighting on Expo opening day “around 11 a.m., just on time for the AERO press conference.”   The hoped-for en masse arrival would highlight the number of electric aircraft now flying and their reliability.  Organizers explain, “Like the first ultralight aircraft did then, the first electric aircraft today need to prove that they already function perfectly.” The two-day aerial cortege would fly “along Lake Constance, and past castles, palaces, and churches, to a first stopover at Regio Airport Mengen, which was recently awarded a contract by the state of Baden-Württemberg for the construction of a test platform for electric flight/autonomous flying.”  There, entrants will charge their batteries and head for their second and last …