turboplanner

With an efficiency of 85-90% electric motor heat dissipation is far less of a problem than an IC engine which is rarely above 30% efficiency. The recovered energy on the way down would be lucky to be significant but would allow more maneuvering/flight Path adjustments prior to landing and assurance of being able to taxi . The BIG improve is SAFETY through engine reliability .Full climb power to 8,000' and to idle descent cycling is about the worst thing for an aero engine, particularly Piston engine ones. Nev

There’s a big difference in the heat coming out of a quarter horsepower refrigerator motor which lives out it’s life without failures then is used to drive things like grinders and gem tumblers, and the high performance lightweight motors in RC aircraft, slot cars, and motor vehicles where they have to overcome driveline efficiency, surface coefficient, tyres coefficient, startability, gradability for torque and frontal area for horsepower. I drove a couple of Japanese 2 tonne electric trucks in the mid 1990s, and although they had the acceleration of a 5 litre V8, all of them had to be parked to cool off after the test drive. This problem appears to have been partially addressed by reducing the power output in today’s electric cars.

 

 

With Australia so large and difficult to travel it would seem obvious to some that GA would be encouraged, subsidized and embraced so people can easily move around your great island.

If you go back to the time of the first flights in Australia, the Australian taxpayers have paid a huge amount of money for the development, infrastructure, and maintenance of civil aviation. The arguments and cat fights revolve around the peaks of that mountain of cash.

 

Perhaps we were all oversold on the flying cars dreams of Cessna and Piper, and it's time to get over that.

 

Perhaps the work of the pioneer aviators in the US and Australia has petered out, and it's time for a new generation of entrepreneurs to come up with some new ways to boost non-commercial aviation.

 

On the other hand, with airport car parks four kilometers long, commercial aviation in Australia has never been better thanks to extremely low air fares between major cities.

 

It's the smaller cities and towns that have fallen away and are losing their airports.

 

 

Rolls Royce just bought the aero motive part of Siemens. They seem to see a future in it. Also of note, NASA just put two electric motors on a P2006T then decided that was so much fun they are going to replace those two motors with twelve (12) on a slightly higher aspect ratio wing, then fly it around with real people inside to see how it feels for NASA. I can see a 700 SHP electric Cessna caravan with two motors in series coming quite soon. It's already been built. Regardless of how the power is generated or stored, an electric caravan would make a pretty neat sky diving platform. Imagine, flat out on gas and batteries for 20 minutes then the prop windmills on the way down while the battery recharges a bit for another load of meat bombs.

 

I'm liking the idea of a CATO drifter though...

Base to base applications like Skydiving and Training would be good applications for electric.

 

If someone can come up with a solar panel suitable for the top wing surface, that would speed up viability.

 

About a decade ago, a stick-on film with printed receptors was developed. It only had 30% of the efficiency of a rigid silicon panel, but was very cheap to produce, but it seems to have failed in the marketplace.

 

The huge torque of electric motors is also ideal for a very fast climb in a Skydiving aircraft, and the byproduct, high heat, can be dissipated on the dive down and on the ground between flights.

 

 

Interesting. If you consider something agreed to be a real and urgent danger by the vast majority of experts in the field to be BS, who on Earth could you possibly trust to give you information about anything?

 

Senior CONSERVATIVE politicians resist it because a) they're in the pockets of big oil, coal and power companies, and b) because huge segments of their constituency think anything said by experts that doesn't match their worldview must be a "socialist" conspiracy.

 

I don't think it's stupidity, I think it's willful ignorance, cynical manipulation of an easily misled voter base, self interest, and inflexible thinking. In Trump and Pence's case add stupidity and extreme religious beliefs.

It's this sort of factless hyperbole that led to the belief in the US that it was time for an even-handed assessment of what has been going on in the scientific community.

 

Watch for reports of evidence taken by the Presidential Committee on Climate Aecurity (PCCS).

 

 

I disagree with this statement. The energy density and price of batteries has improved markedly since 1986

 

https://data.bloomberglp.com/bnef/sites/14/2017/07/BNEF-Lithium-ion-battery-costs-and-market.pdf

The batteries don't have enough life to achieve all round range, so country people are stuffed.

 

The ranges quoted are for quiet urban driving, not hard acceleration, highway work, towing etc. If you need to lead-foot it range can be sharply reduced, which Bex told us about on one of his trips.

 

The life cycle is coming in at around 10 years, when you have to replace all batteries - a very expensive job

 

The end of life batteries require an expensive disposal process.

 

The batteries take too long to charge. Manufacturers have been quoting range replacement, i.e. charge the battery to suit 200 km range. If the batteries go to zero, charging them can take up to 40 hours.

 

All of these issues can be resolved if there's a significant break through in battery design.

 

 

And on the other hand ... a former Ford CEO, who was a great proponent of EV's when at the helm of Ford, is now saying that the rush to EV's and electric motive power is not going to happen at the speed that everyone is predicting ...

 

[/url]https://www.autonews.com/executives/former-ford-ceo-says-industry-faces-reckoning-over-ev-goals

 

The second and third comments under the article are very much on the mark. China is definitely leading the charge to EV development, but there's the worrying factors that China owns and controls the rare earth metals mining and production - and the production of batteries with the current factory numbers, has no hope of meeting the massive demand, if everyone decides they need an EV.

 

There may be a technological breakthrough in batteries, somewhere, of course - some researcher could possibly produce a battery that is much more energy-intensive, or which only requires simple constituents to manufacture.

 

But the bottom line is, it's not only battery technology that needs to come up to speed, electric motor development still has a way to go, to increase the electric motors efficiency.

 

And at the end of the day, electric motors still need magnets, and hi-tech magnets still need rare earth elements.

 

My gut feeling is, that we will still be relying on hybrids for a couple of decades yet, until EV's start to actually become competitive.

Yes, the key to a future for EVs is a breakthrough in battery design, otherwise they'll go the way of the GM EVs that were called back in and crushed due to minimal customer demand.

 

If the Presidential Committee finds that Global Warming "Scientists" have been spinning us a tale they're dead as soon as the horrible truths of that sink in, and oil drilling will take off again. If they find the global warming claims justified, you'll see a wartime type development funded by government.

 

It's hard to say "They'll never find a suitable battery" because people have a habit of solving problems, but I was forst promise one in 1986, and we are still no furtjer advanced.

 

Hybrids should not be compared with EVs, because the designer has the ability to decide how big to make the ICE and how big to make the electrical system. What we've seen in the Prius system is a relatively low power ICE to give the Prius just "acceptable" performance that renewables enthusiasts are prepared to put up with.

 

The RAV4 Hybrid we talked about a couple of days ago has a very healthy combined power output for towing and passing, and there's nothing to stop someone using, say, an existing power/torque engine for a Hilux/Navara and adding smaller scale electric motors, to get fuel savings.

 

 

I agree entirely Sir,. . using the word 'JET' must be a misnomer, since jets require Hydrocarbon based fuel to work as a 'JET' engine.

 

With the application of Devil's Advocate here,. . what happens if the software has a hiccup, ie, is there a failsafe Ballistic parachute to save the 'Taxi' passengers in that event ?. . . for as we all know,.. . Software never goes wrong. . .. does it. . .

The same question applies for drones with multiple props; mine dives straight for the ground if a prop goes out, some have enough capacity in the other motors to compensate, but there's no denying that these newer concepts become instant rocks. The ballistic chute is working well for some light aircraft.

 

 

Currently having an argument about the new Hybrid RAV4's towing ability on another forum. The spec sheet claims 480kg towing ability for the 2WD Hybrid, and 750kg unbraked trailer and 1500kg braked trailer for the AWD.

 

But another forum user stated the Hybrid is not capable of towing anything, and the Toyota salesman stated outright to him, that it was a waste of time trying to tow anything with the Hybrid, as it wasn't capable enough.

 

As a result, the forum user purchased a conventional drive RAV4, because he has a need to do some towing. He also stated that Toyota will not supply a towbar for the Hybrid, a claim that I find, a little far-fetched.

 

I suspect the salesman was trying to steer him away from the RAV4 Hybrid, because demand for the Hybrid has far exceeded Toyota projections.

 

The factory calculated sales of the Hybrid were going to be 40% of the model range, but it's actually at around 65% on order from the range, and Toyota are stunned by the Hybrid demand, and are having to rejig production levels on the models.

Just looked at the sec sheet for the curent RAV4

 

All versions have a towing capacity of 750 kg without trailer brakes or 1500 kg with trailer brakes.

 

That's the maximum MASS it can tow, so think tradie's trailer with low profile load.

 

The Gross Vehicle Mass is 2230 kg, less the Kerb Mass of 1705, gives a vertical load of 525 kg including the driver, full fuel, and any tow bar down force.

 

Gross Combination mass is not specified so you can't tell whether the vrtical load has to be reduced to get maximum trailer mass.

 

 

So, how do you get an "electric jet"?? I was under the impression lift or propulsion either came from electric motors driving props or ducted fans, or from jet engines that burn fuel compressed between turbines and compressors.

 

But an "electric jet" has to be a total misdescription, unless it actually has a jet engine power principle, in the design?

I don't know, but there is such a thing as a jet of air and a jetstream, so I took it to mean that electric motors were driving fans which produced jets of air in the direction and strengths needed.

 

 

Here we go into fantasy land; anything but the truth.

 

 

Very impressive, not only in the design but in their outlook.

 

Shows mankind is far from finished with harnessing conventional physics.

 

James Dyson has also been doing outstanding work with air manipulation in the field of home appliances.

 

Makes a pleasant change from the announcement of NEW electric cars (actually invented in 1828) with radiator grilles and IC engine bays, electric trucks again with radiator grilles, and cab heights required to clear 14 litre IC engines with double turbochargers, and autonomous trucks with cabs with windscreens.

 

 

I'm not sure we have the latest, or correct story here. What I've read is that the Council have stopped operations for one hour every Sunday, which is different to trying to close down the airport. That's also a contentious claim because the Church its being closed for no longer exists.

 

However, even if the Council can't find the records (which might well be stored at the Public Record Office in West Melbourne, there's nothing to stop the owners producing their copies.

 

If both copies can't be found, a witness to the original details can still appear at VCAT.

 

If a Place of Worship is permitted near the airfield, and someone decides to build one, the Airport still has existing rights to the noise it has producing regardless of whether any paperwork can be found or not, I would think.

 

Vev often makes comments on this site, and I wouldn't be getting too excited unless he specifically asked for help.

 

The problem with this Petition is if the facts are not in line with the problem it's discounted.

Confirmed tonight it does have the potential to shut down all operators so please disregard the above.

 

 

I'm not sure we have the latest, or correct story here. What I've read is that the Council have stopped operations for one hour every Sunday, which is different to trying to close down the airport. That's also a contentious claim because the Church its being closed for no longer exists.

 

However, even if the Council can't find the records (which might well be stored at the Public Record Office in West Melbourne, there's nothing to stop the owners producing their copies.

 

If both copies can't be found, a witness to the original details can still appear at VCAT.

 

If a Place of Worship is permitted near the airfield, and someone decides to build one, the Airport still has existing rights to the noise it has producing regardless of whether any paperwork can be found or not, I would think.

 

Vev often makes comments on this site, and I wouldn't be getting too excited unless he specifically asked for help.

 

The problem with this Petition is if the facts are not in line with the problem it's discounted.

 

 

There is an iPhone app called LiveATC. I use it to listen to Archerfield. It has helped a lot. Looking at a map of the aerodrome and the approach points and picturing them in my mind as the pilots speak helps a lot, but is demanding. Knowing what they are going to say helps me understand what they said. Also listening to music at the same time as the app helps me get used to directing my attention to the radio when it starts. I suspect that if I talk to the tower slowly, they will speak slowly back to me. Disclaimer: have about 10 hrs recently. Archerfield has people say "dual" or "solo" if they are training, when they request to taxi. I suspect that that cues them to speak slowly or extra slowly.

They and the instructors know each other intimately, so an inflection in the Instructor's voice may give a hint of a student who's a bit of a handful. I've also been in the tower when the controller was watching a solo student through binoculars all the way round his circuit. This one was being frustrating, so he likely was going to phone his instructor afterwards and go over the circuits with him so the instructor could fix up his weaknesses. We thought we got away with a lot, but we didn't.

 

 

Capital Golf Course is at the end of 35, so it could have been an EFATO from 35 or a touch and go gone wrong

 

 

Turbo - Will an American-based insurance company insure a private person within America, whose regular domicile is in Australia? I would have though that American domicile would have been required.

Don’t know but email is cheap.

 

 

That's very true. And the reason there is no "middle of the road" local/state airshows?

 

CASA rules and regs (forced insurances) make it too expensive in relation to the potential income, making it unviable for small clubs/organisations unless there is a major sponsor willing to fork out.

The aviation”family” and”market” are too geographically spread to make Country Airshows financially viable these days so it’s a matter of coming up with something else.

 

 

Absolute ********. OCTA you could always go no SAR/no details if you wished. Full SAR was available but no longer for VFR flights - still available for IFR (at a cost).

Correct; I said “You COULD....” at the beginning, but left out the other two options.

 

 

One would think so, but our experience is otherwise. Our CASA has been set up to prevent accidents and not to support flying.

For CAVU Mark:

 

We once had a Department of Civil Aviation which did everything from promoting aviation to providing Communication, Pilot Assistance, Compliance and Enforcement, Training and Promotion.

 

You could go to a DCA office and receive a personal Meteorology briefing, nominate nominate "full reporting" when you submitted a flight plan with "reporting points", and you would be monitored for the whole of your flight. If you didn't report within two minutes of your flight plan time, you'd receive a radio call with assistance. If you didn't respond to the call within 15 minutes, Search and Rescue would be activated. If you called up to say you were lost or couldn't handle the weather someone in a Flight Centre would be allocated to be your guardian and would talk you home, in conjunction with airline pilots if necessary. The cost per GA mile flown by private pilots burned up a prohibitive amount of tax dollars, with millions of uneventful miles flown.

 

Over time the Department was reduced in size, and from the 1980s when government departments decided to offload public liability on to a user-pays system, the Department completely cut operational ties, placing management of civil aviation under control of semi-independent bodies who in turn set about structuring themselves for user-pays and user-risk control.

 

Communication and Pilot Assistance went to Airservices Australia, which for some reason rarely ever gets a mention on this forum, Compliance and Enforcement, and Training went to CASA (Civil Aviation and Safety Authority), and Promotion went to the Users. The more risky operations like ultralights, warbirds, gliding etc wen to Self Regulation where the participants took over their own public liability risk, allowing some activities for the first time

 

Ironically we went from what some people would call a cotton wool world where we had to explain where we were going and stick to the plan, to being able to fly anywhere in the Country within our licence capabilities without monitoring.

 

The other very important part in our history and also that of the United States was the decision to have common regulations around the world through ICAO and this can be quite irritating to non-European country flyers, cramping our style and being blamed on CASA. We often have discussions where people point out that flying in the US is much less regulated, but when I check the latest FAA regs, I find the operative phrase is "was less regulated" as the US adds the same ICAO changes as we do.

 

Australians have never picked up on the fact that they are now responsible for promoting their own flying industry. There is a successful bi-annual Airshow, but it almost goes from there to local fly in breakfasts. In Australia "V8 Supercars" is a body which has successfully promoted forms of auto racing, like NASCAR in the US, so there's an opportunity here for someone to produce a marketing instrument like these which finances private flying.

 

The above is not necessarily accurate, but as much as my brain can remember right now.

 

That's why CASA has been set up to prevent accidents and not to support flying.

 

 

autonomous cars have to work in environment with idiots all around. To predict, not only react to, events like "this sheep ahead will turn right from the leftmost lane with heavy braking", robots can not do this without armour and big guns. In the air everything is much easier, at least untul there will be the same number of users on manual control. Robots can communicate to each other, not a problem, so very dense air traffic can go without any problem, but the single manual-controlled craft and corpses will be carried by carts.

 

Road autonomouse cars just went the wrong way. Instead of making automatisation for simple but time-consuming conditions (drive on highway etc) they try to automatise everything, that is unreal. Only Tesla tries to do something like this with their advanced auto control, but they rely on road marking which is unreliable at all, it can be invisible or be erased any moment due to repairs etc. Robots must rely on robot-readable data, like undersurface cable, roadside static reflectors or something like this. Not everywhere, but for example if Msystem in Sydney will be equipped with such a markings - lot of users will pay for cars which can drive out of city manually, set on M1, autonomousely drive to Campbelltown and again 10 km of manual drive to home. Especially if it will be dedicated line, for robots only.

Yes, you have to have a datum to tell the computer where to position the car every nano-second of the inputted trip, and lane markers appeared to be accurate datums, but for the reasons you say, in real life situations have been a disaster. A Council decides to resurface the road, and bingo! the datums for that section are black; where is the car supposed to go? I have a Level 1 autonomous car which makes me drive away from the line markers. If I drift over the line the steering wheel shimmies, as sign comes on and it's very uncomfortable until I get back into the lane; tuned my driving accuracy up nicely, but one day there were roadworks ahead and the contractors had painted a new set of lanes over the old ones and veering into a bypass. As I turned to follow the bypass, I got the shimmy, ignored it, and then the steering wheel pulled strongly back towards the original lane. I knew I had to turn the steering wheel back for the bypass, but now there was a solid resistance and I had to use muscle to get it into the bypass. An autonomous vehicle would have gone on in that case, then sharply braked to avoid hitting any barriers, but then, what's next? I tease the designers to come up with an algorithm for this intersection:

 

 

What CAVU Mark said.

 

Get some quotes from the US. It's their airspace so they have all the risk data, and because of the number of people paying premiums, they're usually a lot lower than what we would pay.

 

 

I am training at Coffs Harbour and we often have students from a Port Macquarie school fly into our area, The school at Port Macquarie has a contract to train Chinese students for their commercial licence. Coffs Tower seems to understand them but I don’t. Right now I am not doing well on the radio as sometimes the tower is a bit quick for me. Have to get my act together as I have to sit my radio exam soon.

 

Cheers,

 

Jack.

Phone them and see if they'll let you come up and observe for a while - maybe suggest 30 mins/hr and see what they say (off peak). I did two sessions like that, one at Moorabbin Tower and one at Tullamarine. It really helps you orientate yourself on what they are looking for, how they process what's being said and what frustrates them. They will also give you the best lead on reference material. It's no use studying FAA stuff which doesn't apply in Australia and then have to unlearn it.

 

 

It's a highway, frequented by road traffic - that comes and goes randomly and suddenly. Previously-unseen vehicles could pull out onto the highway from a track in the scrub, near the "runway", just as you decided it was safe to put down.

 

Accordingly, the highway traffic use has to be regulated if incoming aircraft need to land, and traffic control initiated to avoid conflict. I thought that would be a fairly obvious condition, to anyone with a degree of "forward thinking"?

 

In most cases, where a light aircraft pilot decides to do an emergency or precautionary landing on a road or highway, it's quite common for the landing aircraft to hit road vehicles, or other road obstructions.

 

In many cases, roadside guide posts and/or road signage have to be removed before the aircraft lands, as they are a potential danger to aircraft wings, particularly if the weather conditions are gusty with cross-winds, and departure from the centreline upon landing is likely.

 

With many of these highway runways, the guide posts and signposts are installed with a quick removal arrangement on their base, so they can be pulled down quickly for aircraft arrival, and re-erected quickly for normal road use.

 

Many years ago (I think it was around 1985), a former business associate with a PA-28, had engine stoppage due to fuel starvation, supposedly due to a faulty fuel tank selector valve (we suspected operator error, but he was an accomplished liar, so he got away with it).

 

He put down on the highway between Kalgoorlie and Coolgardie - which although wide enough at the time, didn't have enough wing clearance between the highways sealed section, and the roadside signage.

 

As he coasted to a halt, he caught a wing on a very substantial piece of roadside signage, and tore the wing off. He had a 13 yr old girl as a passenger, but fortunately, neither he nor his passenger were injured.

You're right about outback traffic Came across a guy camped in the middle of the track one night, sleeping in his tent. Another time we stopped at the Burke & Wills Dig Tree. You can't get much more remote than that. As I stopped my young daughter opened a rear door and threw up on the sand. I moved the car forward to get away from the smell and avoid it being tramped back into the car. Ten minutes later a Land Cruiser came up and parked in my original spot. Before we could run back and warn them one of the kids had jumped out of the car straight into the mess.

 

 

Thanks John, great story and pictures, and great fuel cartage system. I've walked a few miles just to get something to eat. Bought two folding bikes, but they were too heavy, and still too big.

 

Also very impressive coverage of Australia on that map!

 

 

Some of them can be very enterprising and create "friends" who "join in" any argument they are losing, and back them up, or express "outrage" at anyone denouncing them, but they all leave their tell tale signs.