Photo: Airbus
Depending on where they are positioned in the industry, aircraft makers and other companies involved in aviation are trying different recipes in their fight to go as green as possible, as soon as possible. For some, that means more efficient engines, for others new engines designs, and for a few an entirely new means of propulsion altogether.
For a joint effort between companies Daher, Safran, and Airbus, the future lies somewhere in between all that, in an aircraft demonstrator called EcoPulse.
The plane is essentially a Daher TBM, a single-engine turboprop business aircraft that's been in this world ever since 1988. Unlike the TMB, which only has a single propeller mounted on the nose, the EcoPulse has an additional six propellers mounted in equal numbers on each of the two wings.
The extra gear is called ePropeller, and unlike the main one at the front, which is normally powered by a Pratt & Whitney engine, get their spin courtesy of a battery made by Airbus and a turbogenerator produced by Safran. This means a single power source can be used to operate several electric motors, allowing for a significant reduction in the amount of emissions.
The reason why that's so has to do with the purpose of the plane. The EcoPulse was developed as a platform to test hybrid-electric distributed propulsion, something the parties involved in the project believe might be the right path to greener aviation.
The mutant airplane was first shown by the companies at the Paris Air Show in 2019, and has been involved since in a large number of tests, including in the air. Until now, however, the plane flew for about ten hours with the six extra propellers off, to see if the modifications made to the plane hold.
We're now learning that on November 29 the EcoPulse departed Tarbes Airport in France and was airborne for around 100 minutes. Some of these minutes were flown, for the first time in the aircraft's life, in hybrid-electric mode.
What that means is the pilots engaged the extra six ePropellers to verify "the proper functioning of the demonstrator's flight control computer, high-voltage battery pack, distributed electric propulsion and hybrid electric turbogenerator."
We're told the test flight was a success, but we are not given any actual details of what that means. The parties involved say they'll use the data from the flight to check the effectiveness of the system, and that will probably lead to more tests in the near future.
The EcoPulse is not actually meant to serve as a precursor of an actual plane, but it might give birth to some of the technologies that will go into them in the near future. That includes the larger aircraft that do real harm to the environment.
The plane is essentially a Daher TBM, a single-engine turboprop business aircraft that's been in this world ever since 1988. Unlike the TMB, which only has a single propeller mounted on the nose, the EcoPulse has an additional six propellers mounted in equal numbers on each of the two wings.
The extra gear is called ePropeller, and unlike the main one at the front, which is normally powered by a Pratt & Whitney engine, get their spin courtesy of a battery made by Airbus and a turbogenerator produced by Safran. This means a single power source can be used to operate several electric motors, allowing for a significant reduction in the amount of emissions.
The reason why that's so has to do with the purpose of the plane. The EcoPulse was developed as a platform to test hybrid-electric distributed propulsion, something the parties involved in the project believe might be the right path to greener aviation.
The mutant airplane was first shown by the companies at the Paris Air Show in 2019, and has been involved since in a large number of tests, including in the air. Until now, however, the plane flew for about ten hours with the six extra propellers off, to see if the modifications made to the plane hold.
We're now learning that on November 29 the EcoPulse departed Tarbes Airport in France and was airborne for around 100 minutes. Some of these minutes were flown, for the first time in the aircraft's life, in hybrid-electric mode.
What that means is the pilots engaged the extra six ePropellers to verify "the proper functioning of the demonstrator's flight control computer, high-voltage battery pack, distributed electric propulsion and hybrid electric turbogenerator."
We're told the test flight was a success, but we are not given any actual details of what that means. The parties involved say they'll use the data from the flight to check the effectiveness of the system, and that will probably lead to more tests in the near future.
The EcoPulse is not actually meant to serve as a precursor of an actual plane, but it might give birth to some of the technologies that will go into them in the near future. That includes the larger aircraft that do real harm to the environment.
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