Tag: Electric propulsion

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Zunum picks Safran for its electric aircraft team

Zunum hybrid-electric design
Zunum Aero’s hybrid-electric design features batteries in the wings, and a gas turbine coupled with an electrical generator in the back. Quiet electric propulsors power the plane. (Zunum Aero Illustration)

Zunum Aero has selected France’s Safran Helicopter Engines to provide a new-generation engine turbine for its hybrid-to-electric airplane, due for first flight in the early 2020s.

Safran’s Ardiden 3Z engine will drive the electrical generator for Zunum’s 12-seat ZA10 aircraft, supplementing the energy stored in the plane’s batteries with peak power of 500 kilowatts during key stages of flight and over long ranges, Zunum said today in a news release. The aircraft will be able to cruise and land on turbo-generator power alone, offering full redundancy. 

The ZA10 is being designed for a range of 700 miles, with an eye toward enabling affordable operations at tens of thousands of underused regional-size airports around the world.

Zunum, which is headquartered in Bothell, Wash., says the aircraft should drive operating costs down to 8 cents per available seat mile, or $250 per hour. That’s said to be 60 to 80 percent lower than comparable conventional aircraft of comparable size.

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Zunum strikes deal with JetSuite for electric planes

JetSuite Zunum Aero plane
Artwork shows Zunum Aero’s hybrid-electric airplane in JetSuite’s livery. (Zunum Aero Illustration)

Zunum Aero says its first hybrid-to-electric airplanes will wear the colors of JetSuite, a private aviation company that’s a partner of JetBlue Airways.

Kirkland, Wash.-based Zunum Aero, which has financial backing from JetBlue Technology Ventures as well as Boeing HorizonX and the State of Washington Clean Energy Fund, aims to start flight tests in 2019 and deliver its first regional-class plane in 2022.

Eventually, California-based JetSuite plans to add 100 of Zunum’s planes to its fleet, the two companies said today in a news release.

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Vahana air taxi makes first test flight in Oregon

Vahana flight
Vahana’s Alpha One air-taxi prototype flies over a test range in eastern Oregon. (Vahana Photo)

This week marked a milestone for Airbus Ventures’ Vahana team, which is developing a self-flying, electric-powered air taxi — also known as a flying car.

Vahana’s 20-foot-wide Alpha One prototype executed its first test flight at the Pendleton Unmanned Aerial Systems Range in eastern Oregon, rising to a height of 16 feet (5 meters) during 53 seconds in the air on Jan. 31.

Another test flight came a day later, Vahana project leader Zach Lovering reported in a Medium posting.

Representatives from the Federal Aviation Administration and Airbus’ A3 advanced-projects division were in attendance, along with the full Vahana team, Lovering said.

“In just under two years, Vahana took a concept sketch on a napkin and built a full-scale, self-piloted aircraft that has successfully completed its first flight,” he said in a news release.

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Zunum Aero builds its first electric airplane motor

Zunum 2022 airplane
An artist’s conception shows Zunum Aero’s hybrid-to-electric airplane in flight. (Zunum Photo)

Kirkland, Wash.-based Zunum Aero has reportedly started building its first prototype electric airplane motor, and plans to put an upgraded version on a test aircraft in 2019. Word of Zunum’s progress came from CEO Ashish Kumar in a Reuters interview.

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Joby Aviation wins $100M boost for flying cars

Joby air taxi
Concept art shows a possible design for Joby Aviation’s air taxi. (Joby Aviation Illustration)

California-based Joby Aviation says it has secured $100 million in Series B financing to take its all-electric passenger aircraft into pre-production and regulatory certification.

Intel Capital led the investment round, which also includes Singapore-based EDBI, JetBlue Technology Ventures, Toyota AI Ventures, Allen & Company AME Cloud Ventures, Ron Conway, Capricorn Investment Group, 8VC, Sky Dayton and Paul Sciarra. Joby also revealed a previously unsecured Series A round, led by Capricorn in 2016, which brings total funding to $130 million.

Founded by inventor JoeBen Bevirt, Joby is working to build a five-seat air taxi that will be 100 times quieter than conventional aircraft during takeoff and landing, and fly 150 miles on a charge. Bloomberg BusinessWeek reports that a prototype for the vehicle, nicknamed “Rachel,” is undergoing flight testing at Bevirt’s private airfield in Northern California.

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TV show reveals turmoil behind solar-powered flight

Solar Impulse pilots and plane
Bertrand Piccard and Andre Borschberg shared the piloting duties on the single-seat Solar Impulse 2 airplane. (Niels Ackermann Photo / Rezo / Solar Impulse)

From the outside, it looked as if the Swiss-led Solar Impulse project smoothly soldiered through adversity as its solar-powered plane made a record-setting trip around the world in 2015 and 2016.

But the perspective was different when seen from the inside: The multimillion-dollar campaign nearly came crashing down when teammates debated whether to go ahead with a crucial Pacific crossing, even though the monitoring system for the autopilot wasn’t working right.

“The engineers were crying,” said Bertrand Piccard, the Swiss psychiatrist and adventurer who served as Solar Impulse’s co-founder, chairman and one of its pilots. “They were begging me to stop.”

The turmoil as well as the technology behind the globe-girdling, fuel-free odyssey are on full display in “The Impossible Flight,” a two-hour NOVA documentary premiering on PBS tonight.

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Boeing HorizonX invests in Cuberg battery venture

Richard Wang
Cuberg co-founder and CEO Richard Wang holds up one of the company’s original battery designs. (Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory Photo / Marilyn Chung)

Boeing’s HorizonX venture investment team says it has led a seed funding round for Cuberg, a California startup focusing on next-generation battery technology for potential aerospace and industrial applications.

Among the most relevant applications would be power storage for electric airplanes and underwater drones — both of which are in Boeing’s wheelhouse.

“Cuberg’s battery technology has some of the highest energy density we’ve seen in the marketplace, and its unique chemistries could prove to be a safe, stable solution for future electric air transportation,” Steve Nordlund, vice president of Boeing HorizonX, said today in a statement.

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