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Volocopter 2x – Safer Alternative to a Personal Helicopter

volocopter.com

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Re: Volocopter 2x – Safer Alternative to a Personal Helicopter

#51

Post by FabHK »

tempestn wrote: post #42
FabHK wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Indeed, the volocopter breaks with traditional heli modus operandi, but that's a good thing. It is much simpler to operate, with one control stick: * rotate to rotate the craft (replacing rudder) * move forward/backwards/sideways to move (translate) the craft (replacing cyclic) * operate simple switch on top to ascent/descent (replacing collective and throttle) (Disclaimer: 1. As far as I know, 2. I have crowdfund-in…

Out of curiosity, is there a button that's held while rotating the stick to rotate? The stick looks directional, so it wouldn't make sense to just rotate it and keep it rotated... Anyway, sounds like a cool setup.

My understanding is that when you rotate the stick, the angle controls the rotational (yaw) speed of the Volcopter (in other words, you hold the stick straight, it'll keep looking in a fixed direction, say north. Now if you twist the stick a few degrees, it'll slowly rotate in that direction (and keep rotating as long as you hold it twisted). If you twist it more, it'll rotate faster. If you let go (untwist), it'll stop rotating and maintain that heading.)

You can see this in this video of the first manned flight a year ago, at around 2:26.

You can also nicely see the thumb controlled ascent/descent switch at the beginning. Controls look super intuitive.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OazFiIhwAEs

Re: Volocopter 2x – Safer Alternative to a Personal Helicopter

#53

Post by FabHK »

friendzis wrote: post #41
qeternity wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It seems like a big motivation behind this is to appeal to non aviation folk and make it a mainstream offering.

I can understand such motivation, but aviation is extremely heavily regulated area. I am not sure whether non-standard controls would even be allowed, though. While driver's license is granted for demonstration of rather basic ability to handle a vehicle, even non-commercial pilot's license (which I do not have, so) is granted for demonstrating substantial ability to control an aircraft and number of hours clocked. E…

> I am not sure whether non-standard controls would even be allowed, though.

Good point, regulation is a huge issue.

It is my understanding, though, that FAA and EASA are moving away from regulation that is very prescriptive in exactly how to achieve something (which would indeed make it hard to introduce an entirely new control concept) towards regulation that prescribes more what needs to be achieved (controllability, safety, etc.), under the heading of "performance-based certification".

Also, it appears regulators in Germany are somewhat positively disposed towards this, and even considering to establish a new category of aircraft with distinct certification requirements and airmen licensing requirements.

I mean, in fixed wings, you have to demonstrate a certain number of take-offs and landing, which makes perfect sense, but it's not really transferable to this aircraft:

ok, you sit in a Volocopter and then press the switch up with your thumb for take-off for a few seconds, then hold it fully down until touchdown (automatically slowed down when ground proximity is detected), then repeat a few times (up, down), and get your license... :-)

Re: Volocopter 2x – Safer Alternative to a Personal Helicopter

#54

Post by FabHK »

taksintikk wrote: post #52

I would have assumed 12 motors is 11x more chances of failure than a helicopter.

It has 18 rotors (basically 3 on each of the corners of a hexagon, 6 in an inner circle, and 12 in an outer circle), each driven by its own engine.

Pairs of rotors on opposite sides are driven by 9 independent powertrains and batteries, so failure of one battery/powertrain induces not much asymmetry and poses no problem.

At least 4 rotors can fail and the aircraft still remains fully controllable.

Beyond that, there is a ballistic rescue chute (as in the Cirrus SR20/SR22 fixed wing aircraft), which you can't really have, by construction, in a traditional helicopter.

Re: Volocopter 2x – Safer Alternative to a Personal Helicopter

#55

Post by upofadown »

I think the big issue with this sort of scheme would be noise. Small, heavily loaded props will be super loud. There are a lot of them in this case. The noise wouldn't linearly increase with the number of propellers but it would increase with the addition of each one.

Re: Volocopter 2x – Safer Alternative to a Personal Helicopter

#56

Post by FabHK »

upofadown wrote: post #55

I think the big issue with this sort of scheme would be noise. Small, heavily loaded props will be super loud. There are a lot of them in this case. The noise wouldn't linearly increase with the number of propellers but it would increase with the addition of each one.

From the Volocopter FAQ [1] (in somewhat charming Denglish):

> DOES A VOLOCOPTER MAKE LESS NOISE THAN A HELICOPTER?

> Yes, the Volocopter is much more pleasant in terms of its acoustics due to its design and above all much quieter than conventional helicopters.

Listening to the video [2], this doesn't seem altogether implausible - the sound seems ok, like a fan more than a chopper.

[1] http://www.volocopter.com/index.php/en/kontakt-en/faq-en

[2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OazFiIhwAEs

Re: Volocopter 2x – Safer Alternative to a Personal Helicopter

#57

Post by upofadown »

FabHK wrote: post #56
upofadown wrote: post #55

I think the big issue with this sort of scheme would be noise. Small, heavily loaded props will be super loud. There are a lot of them in this case. The noise wouldn't linearly increase with the number of propellers but it would increase with the addition of each one.

From the Volocopter FAQ [1] (in somewhat charming Denglish): > DOES A VOLOCOPTER MAKE LESS NOISE THAN A HELICOPTER? > Yes, the Volocopter is much more pleasant in terms of its acoustics due to its design and above all much quieter than conventional helicopters. Listening to the video [2], this doesn't seem altogether implausible - the sound seems ok, like a fan more than a chopper. [1] http://www.volocopter.com/index…

In comparing the Volocopter noise to helicopters it would be something with no main rotor noise and 18 heavily loaded open tail rotors:

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helicopter_noise_reduction#Tai...

My guess would be that the noise wouldn't carry as far due to the higher frequency but would be very loud closer in, again due to the higher frequency.

Re: Volocopter 2x – Safer Alternative to a Personal Helicopter

#58

Post by FabHK »

upofadown wrote: post #57
FabHK wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From the Volocopter FAQ [1] (in somewhat charming Denglish): > DOES A VOLOCOPTER MAKE LESS NOISE THAN A HELICOPTER? > Yes, the Volocopter is much more pleasant in terms of its acoustics due to its design and above all much quieter than conventional helicopters. Listening to the video [2], this doesn't seem altogether implausible - the sound seems ok, like a fan more than a chopper. [1] http://www.volocopter.com/index…

In comparing the Volocopter noise to helicopters it would be something with no main rotor noise and 18 heavily loaded open tail rotors: * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helicopter_noise_reduction#Tai... My guess would be that the noise wouldn't carry as far due to the higher frequency but would be very loud closer in, again due to the higher frequency.

Interesting, could well be. So not a problem for people on the ground, but you'd want to have a good noise-cancelling headset while on board.

Re: Volocopter 2x – Safer Alternative to a Personal Helicopter

#59

Post by fulafel »

devdoomari wrote: post #6
fulafel wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Helicopter glide property is important because most are single engine. You could easily put several independent motor + battery partitions in this one.

but then, wouldn't fuel efficiency go down?

This is electric, the batteries are already just big bunches of small cells. Partitioning those won't appreciably affect battery performance.

Re: Volocopter 2x – Safer Alternative to a Personal Helicopter

#60

Post by gardnr »

1ba9115454 wrote: post #15
dmitrygr wrote: post #10

1. Helicopters (multi or single rotor) are significantly less fuel efficient than planes per distance and per time 2. Electric planes are just barely approaching the flying time that is anything beyond being a joke 3. These guys do not state their flying time My guess? It is so bad that it is not worth mentioning.

For urban moblity, let's take a use case of flying someone from central london to heathrow airport i.e. 20miles or 30km. Assuming this thing could fly at 60km/h then a flight time of 30 minutes would be required. I'm not aware of any electric VTOL vehicle with this capability at the moment. But we live in hope.

Well put. I do appreciate your notion of hope. I was going to express this sentiment as "no fucking way!" but in reality I am glad someone is working on (currently) impossible problems.
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