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[Richard230]

Here is a company that is developing a taxi plane that carries 5 people, flies at 200 mph and can travel 100 miles before needing to be recharged. Frankly those claims seem a bit much to me. They must have a source to those unobtainable batteries that you are always hearing about but never seem to leave the development research labs.

[Richard230]

Here is page 2 of the article.

[TheRan]

What's so unbelievable about it? It says up to for each, not that it can do both at once. The eDA40 already supposedly has a range over 100 miles, no top speed given but gas versions with the same power can do 170mph.

[MVetter]

Yeah these guys are just up the road from me. Got them fancy props that make almost no sound.

[Specter]

The thing I seem to find the most misleading about these kinds of claims is not so much it's speed, but.  it carries 5 people.
Oh really? 
Have you seen the size of the average American lately, especially down south here?  Hint:  Were not 115 lb Japanese twinks, we are big ole boys, aka fatasses !!  and you are gonna carry 5 of us?   good luck fitting us in the damned thing let alone getting it off the ground now! 

Seriously though, the tech is out there already, They have new blades and stuff that can really develop some lift to them.  Given the way it's going to be operated you really won't have any  huge amp surges so don't need to  oversize the battery for that, it's not a motorcycle where all of the sudden the rider wants to go 200 mph in 3seconds. 

They have had RC batteries that can do really stupid C rates for a while now, and since you are not really going to be stomping on them demand wise, they can operate pretty safely.  If you are using an electric motor to drive them, you can pretty much develop the RPM's you need natively and don't need a gearbox, that saves quite a bit of weight too.

As for battery cooling, with that huge prop / fan and airspeed, I don't think that will be a huge problem either.

Just saying.

aaron

[princec]

Given so much of a plane's energy is wasted just keeping it in the air I wonder why small dirigibles or hybrid dirigibles aren't being more directly researched and prototyped.

Cas

[Specter]

very maintenance intensive, slow and the gas can get expensive.

Aaron