Bill Lear did it first: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LearAvia_Lear_Fan Success is dependent on the gearbox.
> Success is dependent on the gearbox.
This uses a single V12 Diesel engine. The Lear Fan used dual turboshaft engines.
The potentially revolutionary Celera 500L aircraft
121–130 of 252 posts
Re: The potentially revolutionary Celera 500L aircraft
#122Not gonna lie, this week I've read two HN postings about dope planes for rich people (boom, now this)......and news articles detailing a crisis of austerity for the NYC subway. It's really sad to me that we can VC these wild bets on inefficient transport for the few, meanwhile perhaps the most efficient people-mover ever devised for the many is on an entirely politically-caused death bed.
Privatize it and it will improve dramatically in a very short time.
Re: The potentially revolutionary Celera 500L aircraft
#123Earlier quoted context omitted.
Why do you think that?
Because COVID has completely rejiggered the economy. Airlines legally are not allowed to pack hundreds of people into a cramped cabin. They're selling fewer tickets at lower prices, and they were already losing money on poor passengers to begin with. Plus, the oil crash is still coming. Fracking has delayed it for a short time, and the covid lockdowns also have slowed consumption, but it is still inevitable. Before f…
Which is why companies like this are going to be doing what Musk is doing with Electric vehicles.
Now, if they could make these for 2000-3000km flights and they ran on 250kWh to 350kWh electric they'd be what the future entails. Especially if they weren't piloted and were fully automated.
Re: The potentially revolutionary Celera 500L aircraft
#124Earlier quoted context omitted.
Because COVID has completely rejiggered the economy. Airlines legally are not allowed to pack hundreds of people into a cramped cabin. They're selling fewer tickets at lower prices, and they were already losing money on poor passengers to begin with. Plus, the oil crash is still coming. Fracking has delayed it for a short time, and the covid lockdowns also have slowed consumption, but it is still inevitable. Before f…
Which is why companies like this are going to be doing what Musk is doing with Electric vehicles. Now, if they could make these for 2000-3000km flights and they ran on 250kWh to 350kWh electric they'd be what the future entails. Especially if they weren't piloted and were fully automated.
Did you hear what I said about COVID? Also your imaginary battery that doesn't exist, is imaginary, and doesn't exist. Unless you want to fly around on a nuke.
And can we stop giving elon musk credit for everything? Tesla employs 48,000 people and contracts god only knows how many. It's pretty clear that elon musk is stealing credit for everyone's work, and Im sure the rest of the company physically cringes whenever people say stuff like "Elon is doing great stuff with batteries"
Re: The potentially revolutionary Celera 500L aircraft
#125Earlier quoted context omitted.
Only if they don't replace them with even larger digital "windows." There's also been work towards electronic windows in aircraft.
Yeah but it'd be cooler if the sides were completely digital "windows". What should these be called? Dindows? Digidows? Digdows? I live in the arctic and I was thinking of building a home without windows but with same idea. It allows you to remove convective heat loss from windows almost entirely. Not to mention it's much cheaper than shipping up glass windows.
Televisions?
Re: The potentially revolutionary Celera 500L aircraft
#126Nice and all, but I just got my private pilots wings a month and a half ago. I've looked at planes. I could buy an fleet of old pipers and burn 9gallons an hour throwing a plane away a year for what just one of these will probably cost. The tech is cool, but I would love to have something robust and cheep for the private pilots out there.
It won't make sense to buy for any individual. But if you run it close to 24/7 renting it out, fuel efficiency matters much more. You could have it on some kind of a scheduled service but sell out flights as a whole for businesses or families.
That way you still get a private jet experience but at a much lower price due to lower flexibility. Still appealing for most.
Re: The potentially revolutionary Celera 500L aircraft
#127Earlier quoted context omitted.
I've seen similar concepts that cover the walls with hi-res lcd to simulate sky & landscape
It's frightening to think what the ultra low cost airlines would do with such video walls. I doubt it would involve showing the passing landscape but instead would be advertisements the entire flight.
Reminds me of Fifteen Million Merits from Black Mirror...
Re: The potentially revolutionary Celera 500L aircraft
#128Earlier quoted context omitted.
The engine in the Celera is designed for aircraft use. It is a turbocharged turbodiesel. In order to get the Chevrolet V-8 to work at altitude, you'd need to put a turbocharger on it which would destroy the fuel economy, especially in this application. Also, automotive engines are not designed to withstand the heavy duty cycle that this aircraft requires.
Actually, the Chevrolet LS series small block V8 has been used in airplanes and helicopters. The only automotive engine series I am aware of that used in aviation. http://www.v8seabee.com/ . https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vertical_Hummingbird
There have been a number of experimentals running Mazda rotary engines, air-cooled VWs, Subaru boxers, and Corvair engines. I think there's a company that fairly recently started making some good-looking Suzuki engine conversions, as well. Probably a ton I'm missing, as well.
Re: The potentially revolutionary Celera 500L aircraft
#129Earlier quoted context omitted.
Definitely some extraodinary claims that will require extraordinary evidence to prove. Especially getting 20+ mpg for 4500 miles, while flying at 450mph, which is near the top end of what piston/propeller aircraft are capable of. For reference, the P51 (one of the fastest fighters of WWII) had a comparable top speed. The Piaggio Avanti [0] has a somewhat similar design and top speed (460 high speed cruise), but has t…
>Especially getting 20+ mpg for 4500 miles, while flying at 450mph That's not what they're claiming though. They're claiming that: 1. 20+ mpg 2. maximum speed of 450 mph 3. range of 4500 miles are possible individually, not that 1+2+3 are possible all at the same time.
Sure, there are all kinds of trade offs between speed, range, useful load, altitude, burn rate, etc. But it’s really the combination of 450, 4500, and 20+ that would make this plane revolutionary. Otherwise it wouldn’t be all that interesting. And if we are to take seriously their claim of competing with commercial aviation, then it would really have to perform pretty close to all three of those numbers at the same time to even have a chance.
Edit: just to add a few numbers from the back of my napkin. To go 4500 miles, it would probably need to do 20mpg anyway. That’s 225 gallons of fuel. JetA is 6.7lb/gl, so ~1500lb. Not sure a small plane could carry a whole lot more than that without giving up all the useful load. And if it can only cruise at ~300mph in order to go 4500 miles, then we’re looking at a 15-hour flight in a pretty confined space with likely fairly basic amenities. It’s not exactly bringing back the glamour of aviation.
Re: The potentially revolutionary Celera 500L aircraft
#130For some perspective, the Scaled Composites Catbird (powered by a 210-hp V6) achieved just over 20 mpg at 200 mph with close to 1000 lbs of payload (it could carry a pilot and four passengers) in the late '80s and early '90s. Amateur-built experimentals have achieved upwards of 50 mpg in realistic flying conditions, but they generally tended to be tandem-seat designs with minimal frontal area and low-powered engines.…
I think this airplane is pressurized, flies very high and has a big turbocharger. And it has a diesel engine, so the MPG means a different thing - diesel is denser. It's optimized differently to the experimentals, and it's more useful commercially. Flying high avoids a lot of weather issues. You don't have to cancel flights because of weather. The drag from the streamlined shape is very low. It's just a textbook mini…
You don't have to cancel flights because of weather.
I don't think many flights today are cancelled because of weather on the route there, it's the weather over each airport, which would still impact this aircraft.