Ever Greater Range for Elektra Solar

Dean Sigler Announcements, Batteries, Electric Aircraft Materials, Electric Powerplants, Solar Power, Sustainable Aviation Leave a Comment

A Second Win Having just come in a close second in a race against an electric car, Elektra Solar’s Trainer attained a Personal Best in range for a flight between Munich, Germany and Bern, Switzerland, a distance of 313 kilometers (194.5 miles).  Calin Gologan noted the route from its home field in München Oberpfaffenhofen to Bern Airport) was highly symbolic, starting from the site where, “We founded the company (Elektra Solar) 10 years ago as a startup from the DLR Institute of Robotics and Mechatronics in Oberpfaffenhofen.  We were now able to fly our aircraft purely electrically from the DLR location directly to the Electrifly-in location in Bern.”  Pilot Uwe Nortmann flew in both outings, both extending the range achieved by this type of electric aircraft. As Calin points out on his Facebook page, “Last year we won this contest with a leg of about 190 km (118.1 miles). A huge progress in one year.”  Looking forward to closing the …

Flying the Atlantic Electrically – The Freedom Flight Prize

Dean Sigler Announcements, Batteries, Electric Powerplants, Hydrogen Fuel, Sustainable Aviation Leave a Comment

It almost stops your editor in his tracks when he reflects that 93 years ago, Charles Lindbergh crossed the Atlantic in his Spirit of St. Louis.  Even more astounding, competitors may win the Freedom Flight Prize by the 100th anniversary of that flight by making a cross-Atlantic and return flight in a 100-passenger, all-electric airliner. Carbon Footprint Ltd. Lindbergh’s plane, custom built but derived from a Ryan M-1 mail plane, cost $10,580 ($158,357 in 2019 dollars) and earned the $25,000 Orteig Prize.  Now, an organization in England, “Carbon Footprint Ltd. has launched a competition to encourage sustainable passenger flight. It has created the Freedom Flight Prize, a competition focused on crossing the Atlantic Ocean 100-percent powered by renewable energy — with seating for 100. The first to do so will win the prize, which is expected to be worth millions of British pounds by the time there’s a winner,” according to Cleantechnica.com. “The competition is open to manufacturers, research/academic groups and inventors to …

Eraole in Flight – Further and Higher

Dean Sigler Biofuels, Diesel Powerplants, Electric Powerplants, Hydrogen Fuel, Solar Power, Sustainable Aviation Leave a Comment

Eraole is a unique machine in a sea of unique craft.  Powered by a combination of sunlight, Total biofuel, and hydrogen, Raphael Dinelli’s tandem-winged biplane has been under development for many years.  With it, Raphael hopes to cross the Atlantic in 2019, Duplicating Charles Lindbergh’s 1927 flight at about half the Spirit of the Spirit of St. Louis’s speed. Eraole’s first flight took place in 2016.  The video will allow you to compare its look then with its changed appearance today. Changes of Plane, Changes of Plans Dinelli’s original plan for the flight included the use of an algae-derived fuel to run Eraole’s engine/generator.  As reported by La Tribune, though, “For four years, the Ocean Vital Foundation conducted research with the Fermentalg research laboratory in Libourne to produce a fuel based on micro-algae. “’Despite the additives that could be added, the oil froze at altitude and became impossible to use,’ says Raphael Dinelli, who had to bring himself to fill …

Chip Yates Charges Up for New Records

Dean Sigler Electric Powerplants, Sustainable Aviation Leave a Comment

Whether the marketing department at Chip Yates’ Flight of the Century enterprise chose an eponymous 235-horsepower Piper “Charger” to carry the inflight recharging batteries for upcoming tests, the name reflects Yates’ own driven personality.  He’s set a world’s record for the Pikes Peak International Hill Climb, soaring uphill on a UQM-powered motorcycle, used the same bike to set Bonneville Salt Flats records, then pulled the bike’s motor, popped it into a Long-Eze, and proceeded to set speed and time-to-climb records.  He’s announced plans to cross the Atlantic Ocean, duplicating Lindbergh’s flight with an electric airplane and the added and unprecedented technology of mid-air recharging. This will require extensive testing of the battery pack, tethering, docking and shuttling technology and the attendant software development.  The Long-ESA (Electric Speed  Altitude) Yates has flown to his records serves double duty as the Silent Arrow, an unmanned hybrid aerial vehicle (UAV) development for the Navy, which has made its China Lake test facilities available …

72 Hours of Flight, Exercise, Rest, and Hypnosis

Dean Sigler Electric Powerplants, Sustainable Aviation Leave a Comment

The first Solar Impulse airplane, HB-SIA, has demonstrated repeatedly that it can stay up all day and all night.  The idea of perpetual flight has enticed designers for years, but the idea of a perpetual pilot has not – until the space age.  Charles Lindbergh had a restless night before his May 20, 1927 takeoff for Europe and spent much of the 33-1/2 hour flight battling his nearly overwhelming need for sleep.  A solar-powered flight will be considerably slower, and thus longer in duration, than Lindbergh’s epic voyage, however. With planned flights for HB-SIB, the second Solar Impulse craft, anticipated to span continents and oceans, the need for maintaining pilot health and alertness becomes imperative. As the team explains, “Over the several years Solar Impulse has proved that is its possible to fly with unlimited endurance. But as we know, Solar Impulse is more than a technical challenge. It is also about pushing human limits to new levels. “The Transatlantic …

E-volo (Doesn’t) Hit the Ceiling

Dean Sigler Electric Powerplants, Sustainable Aviation 2 Comments

According to its makers, “e-volo’s Volocopter is a revolution in aviation made in Germany.  Safer, simpler, and cleaner than normal helicopters, it has a unique way of moving – a groundbreaking innovation. The Volocopter is an environmentally friendly and emission-free private helicopter. Instead of one combustion engine, eighteen electrically driven rotors propel it.” Alexander Zosel, managing director of e-volo, says that the VC200’s maiden flight and first test flights in the dm-arena in Karlsruhe, Germany on November 17 are precursors of coming production models. “There are already numerous requests for the Volocopter from around the world,” he added. The two-seat vehicle made several flights lasting several minutes each, climbing within the gymnasium but not presenting any danger to hanging lights in the 22 meter (71.7 feet) high enclosure. Notably, it did not carry pilot or passenger, but received commands from a radio-control transmitter managed by Daniel Gurdan and Jan Stumpf, two of Ascending Technologies‘ CEOs. Designed from the start as …

An Atlantic Crossing With Mid-Air Recharging

Dean Sigler Electric Powerplants, Sustainable Aviation Leave a Comment

Chip Yates, already famous for his high-speed motorcycle racing with eight world records, four national records, and a world record for the Pikes Peak International Hill Climb among others, wants to make aviation history with a flight across the Atlantic, emulating Charles Lindbergh’s 1927 crossing – but this time with an electric airplane.  Even more exciting, the voyage is planned to include inflight recharging of the airplane. For starters, Yates’ team, composed of aerospace engineers and energy specialists, has purchased a Rutan Long-EZ, removed its gas-burning powerplant, and is converting the airplane to electric power, which they might adapt from Yates’ racing motorcycle, claimed to be the world’s most powerful road-racing electric superbike.  That unit puts out 258 horsepower and 400 foot-pounds of torque. In its new configuration, the EZ will become the Long-ESA for the Electric Speed and Altitude records it will attempt later in 2012. Just notching the records for electric flight is just the beginning for Chip’s …

Green Flight Challenge Winners

Dean Sigler Diesel Powerplants, Electric Powerplants, GFC, Sustainable Aviation 1 Comment

Monday, October 3 was the second day of Nobel Prize announcements, but also marked the Green Flight Challenge Expo, sponsored by Google and staged under the control tower on Moffett Field, home of NASA Ames Research Center, Mountain View, California. The four airplanes that flew in the Challenge at Charles M. Schulz Sonoma Country Airport in Santa Rosa, California were joined by Greg Stevenson’s full-size mockup of his GFC design and a Pipistrel Virus that had won an earlier NASA/CAFE Personal Air Vehicle (PAV) Challenge.  Stevenson’s airplane was a reminder that there were numerous entrants that, for a variety of reasons, could not attend.  There is a huge number of aircraft in the wings, so to speak, that will fill these pages in the next months and years. 20 exhibitors showed off their visions of a greener future, and three rows of tents protected exhibitors and their displays from the rain that started mid-afternoon. At about 11:00 a.m., attendees were bussed to  Building …

Google to Sponsor Green Flight Challenge

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Green Flight Challenge sponsored by Google to bring historic firsts to aviation Aviation’s largest ever prize to be awarded at Moffett Field October 3 during exposition hosted by NASA SANTA ROSA, CA (July 29, 2011) – The CAFE Foundation announced today that Google will sponsor the NASA Centennial Challenge flight competition known as the Green Flight Challenge (GFC). CAFE (Comparative Aircraft Flight Efficiency) will conduct the event from September 25 through October 2, 2011 at Charles M. Schulz Sonoma County Airport.  The NASA-funded prize purse of $1.65M makes this the largest ever prize for aviation.  Competing aircraft must demonstrate at least 100 mph and 200 passenger MPG on a 200 mile flight.  The aircraft in the Green Flight Challenge sponsored by Google represent a diverse mix of singular prototypes created expressly for the competition by some of the world’s top designers. Most will be propelled by batteries and electric motors, some by bio-fuel or hybrid. All competing aircraft will be …

A Trio of Winners at Friedrichshafen

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Erik Lindbergh, as part of his Lindbergh Foundation, has instituted a suite of prizes to recognize and , “Accelerate development of practical electric flight, and stimulate meaningful advances in the emerging electric aircraft industry.”    Having presented four prizes at last year’s Experimental Aircraft Association AirVenture, Lindbergh followed up at Aero-Friedrichshafen 2011 as part of the Berblinger Competition – which drew 24 entrants and eight aircraft that actually completed the Friedrichshafen-Ulm-Friedrichshafen out-and-return course.  With sponsors including Sergei Sikorsky, son of Igor Sikorsky, a competitor for the original Orteig Prize that prompted Charles Lindbergh’s 1927 New York to Paris flight; His Serene Highness Prince Albert II of Monaco, who backs LEAP; and Messe-Friedrichshafen, hosts to the Aero 2011 and to the First Families of Flight gathering, LEAP garners a great deal of recognition for its prize winners. LEAP gave three awards at Aero 2011.  In the best electric airplane category, the judges chose three finalists: • The Hugues Duval Electric Cri-Cri with …