Siemens Electric Airplane Makes U.S. Debut

https://www.avweb.com/avwebflash/new...-230531-1.html

Siemens Electric Airplane Makes U.S. Debut

By Mary Grady | March 29, 2018

Siemens brought its prototype electric aircraft to the U.S. this week
for the first time, showcasing the airplane at the company’s
Innovation Day in Chicago. “Electric propulsion is one of the
transformative technologies that will help the industry meet the goals
of reduced fuel, emissions and noise,” said Teri Hamlin, vice
president of electric propulsion for Siemens. “By accomplishing
testing on our systems on select flying testbeds in the lower power
classes, we are gaining valuable experience and knowledge that
accelerates and validates our other developments in hybrid-electric
propulsion systems in the high power classes.” Further testing of the
technology will take place in Waco, Texas, at the Texas State
Technical College Airfield.

The Texas facility will become home to the eFusion aircraft, a flying
test bed featuring the Siemens 55-kw electric propulsion unit, the
company said. The Texas facility also will be key in data collection
on new electric propulsion systems, enabling safety standards and
certification efforts for the aerospace market. Siemens also is
working with Airbus on the “City Airbus” demonstrator, a VTOL designed
for urban mobility. That aircraft will fly for the first time later
this year, Siemens said. The company also said recently it will
collaborate with Airbus and Rolls-Royce to further develop innovations
in the field of hybrid electric propulsion.



view on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T_9-V73nT1k

Comments (8)

" meet the goals of reduced fuel, emissions and noise,"

Who set those goals?
I want faster, less expensive, and easier to update/change.
I don't want expensive, sketchy support, low range, and
business-as-usual part 91/43.
I don't think the goals they have match with the customer....

Posted by: Mark Fraser | March 29, 2018 9:59 AM


I can't wait to spend $500K for a coal burning airplane that will run
for 20 minutes.

Posted by: Leo LeBoeuf | March 29, 2018 12:39 PM


I continue to be befuddled by the notion that -- somehow -- an
electric airplane (or car) doesn't use energy. Hmmm ... maybe it grows
on trees and I didn't get that memo?

Unless and until the little green aliens give up the secret of how
their UFO's fly, an electric airplane is nothing more than a gimmick
with today's battery energy density levels. Then again, maybe its a
hybrid and they've put a little popup windmill on this thing to
recharge the battery? :-)

And the notion that they'll be able to build a commercially viable and
certificated airplane exceeds the bounds of reality. At the speed with
which the FAA operates ... it's more likely that the Sun will become a
red dwarf first.

All they're doing is transferring the place where the pollution occurs
from the vehicle to the power generation plant. I guess they haven't
figured that out?

Posted by: Larry Stencel | March 29, 2018 1:20 PM



There are tremendous benefits to electric airplane beyond cleanliness:
- Eliminations of dozens of expensive components for holding,
conveying, and mixing fuel, then getting riding of the combusted
materials: fuel caps, tanks and lines, fuel drains, fuel selectors,
mixture controls, carbs, spark plugs, magnetos, pistons, rings, valves
and springs, pushrods, cylinders, turbos, mufflers, exhaust pipes and
brackets, air cleaners, many cooling components, etc
- All the other stuff you can forget about:: oil consumption, exhaust
stains, fuel stains, alternators, getting on a ladder to refuel a
high-wing.
- No reciprocating engine parts.
- Reduced vibration = less stress on airframes, props, etc. = lighter
components.
- No combustion noise.
- The equivalent of refilling the tank doesn't add weight..
- Reduced likelihood of fire.
- Torque!
- No loss of power with altitude.

I think flight schools will be the first big market, which will
require quick-change battery modules.

I think getting the range and carrying capacity of my 210 will take
longer, but I'd love to have a two-seater electric as a second plane
ASAP.

Posted by: Art Friedman | March 29, 2018 4:11 PM


You might want to talk with Boeing, Art, regarding the reduced
liklihood of a fire.....

Posted by: YARS (Tom Yarsley) | March 29, 2018 5:59 PM

YARS, are you referring to Trans World Airlines Flight 800 (TWA 800) ,
a Boeing 747-100 that exploded and crashed into the Atlantic Ocean
near East Moriches, New York, on July 17, 1996 due to fuel tank
explosion?

What cynics fail to comprehend is that it is the 98% efficiency of
electric propulsion that enables it to compete with ~30% efficient
petroleum-based engines.

And then there is the fact that the current world population of 7.2
billion is projected to reach 9.6 billion by 2050, according to a
United Nations report; that's a 29% increase in the number of people
consuming resources within 32 years Continuing to treat Earth's
environment as a boundless open-system is shortsighted if not
criminal....


Is there any indication of what the power to weight ratio would be? If
the airshow performance only runs 5 mins, you wouldn't need crap loads
of batteries, no?

Posted by: Craig Spirko | March 29, 2018 10:25 PM


If you have never driven an electric vehicle (EV), you probably just
can't understand what a huge difference there is in operating one vs
and internal combustion engine (ICE) vehicle. It's not evolutionary,
it's revolutionary. I own a Chevy Bolt and despite it's limitation,
which are mostly related to infrastructure, I never want to own
another ICE car.

Sure, you are not going to be flying an electric plane cross country
anytime soon, though it may be sooner than you think. But for an
ab-initio trainer, I don't see how you could do better than electric.

As far as expense goes, there is basically no maintenance on an
electric vehicle but tires, and I suppose brakes for a plane. Those
electrons that power it are about 1/3 to 1/2 the price of equivalent
energy for auto gas. You can do the numbers for avgas.

The current Airplane Geeks podcast talks a lot about this topic.

Finally, nobody has ever said that electric vehicles don't use energy.
That assertion as well as people stating that is a common claim of
proponents is patently ridiculous. EVs do two thing. First they are
generally more end-to-end efficient. This is a really hard number to
come up with but the best estimates are that on average, in a car,
they use 1/2 to 1/3 the energy of a ICE vehicle. That's average. You
can come up with edge conditions in both directions. Second they
enable very flexible sourcing of energy, from fossil fuels to solar,
wind, atomic, fuel cells etc. And driving an EV is just pure fun!

Ron

Posted by: Ron Steele | March 30, 2018 8:35 AM


Electric cars are NOT revolutionary, they are evolutionary. 120+ years
of electric cars has relegated them to platypus status because
evolution has shown that they can't compete. They still can't compete
and can only survive in safe spaces away from the real world of
transport.

LOL, infrastructure building to support niche "green" vehicles takes a
LOT of coil/oil/gas and then it takes VAST areas of land to actually
get enough solar power to run anything more than a 1000# death trap of
a car. There again, evolution will weed out the weak....

Posted by: Mark Fraser | March 30, 2018 9:13 AM





Anyone who transcends beyond casual skepticism understands that to be
truly blackhearted is to know that cynicism is the smoke that curls up
from burned dreams.
--Paul Bertorelli