3 ms·

Primary training aircraft at least have big potential in electric propulsion.

• Gibbon1 10y ago
  Hybrid Electric aircraft are kinda interesting when you start running the numbers. The weight of the batteries of course reduces the amount of fuel the aircraft can carry. However increased efficiency reduces the amount of fuel you need to carry. There are a bunch of other advantages which would improve safety. In particular better throttle response. A problem with turbine engines is when an aircraft is hit by wind shear during landing you need more power right now, and turbines have lag. And also when you shutdown an engine in a multi-engine aircraft you have a serious thrust imbalance. Hybrid electric would allow power to be routed evenly to each fan as needed.
  • Gravityloss 10y ago
    Traditionally you deal with the lag with variable pitch propellers. But with electric motors you can have a lot of immediate / momentary torque and power and instead vary the propeller speed. I think what is aimed at with electrics is you get a lot simpler aircraft with far lower operating costs and higher reliability and availability. No engine maintenance, no variable pitch propeller, no fuel systems (you do have batteries but they should be self contained man changeable systems). No huge checklists with warmup etc procedures on the ground. It's worth it to just have 30-60 minutes of flight time, because you still get to train takeoffs and landings. Maybe the instructor and student can first swap the new battery with 5x20 kg units or so, take off, do a few touch and go:s, land, then let the next guys do the same.