Scudrunners

Oh, I like this plane.



Some test pilots took one out with 3/4 fuel and 4 people to do 10 rotation spins.

http://www.panthera-aircraft.com/

[quote]"Fly 4 people
for 1000NM
cruising at 200 KTS
with 10 gallons per hour. "[/quote]


hmm sounds like a fun toy

They were talking about a hybrid fuel/electric. Would be interesting to see if they can increase the range and efficiency.

The only negative I can find about the Pipestrel products is the prices are out of this world.

The sad thing is that regardless of what they sell
it for, they are losing money on every one.

Really, how come?

Not sure if you're pulling my leg or not ...

When you look at a widget, you are probably
thinking only of direct materials and labor costs
required to make it.

However, the company might also have spent
hundreds of millions of dollars setting up the
production line.

They might also have spent hundreds of millions
of dollars on engineering development, documentation
and certification.

All those sunk costs need to be amortized over
the production of the widgets.  If you make a
million widgets, you can spread the billion setup
dollars over all the many widgets going out the
door.

However, if you only make 50 or 100 of those
widgets, even if you charge a million bucks for
each one, you lose money.

Again, I'm not sure if you're pulling my leg
or not.

Last time I checked, Bombardier was over
US$5Billion into development costs of the
C-series.  Admittedly they are a special case,
the taxpayer will pick up the tab for that,
but a normal company would have to spread
out that US$5B over the production life of
the airplane.

Another special case:  the British and French
governments picked up the tab for the development
and production costs of the Concord for the
airlines, who bought the airplanes at a buck
each (I am not making this up) from their
governments, and still couldn't make a go
of it.  In that case, it was the British and
French taxpayers subsidizing the cokeheads
flying across the Atlantic.

Not pulling your leg. Just blissfully ignorant.

I don't know who's money is into the Panthera, I don't think they have sold one yet. I believe they are still certifying them. I may be behind on that information though.

Not sure how a hybrid would be more effecient in a plane unless you do a lot of descents and climbs and can use electric to augment the climb and recharge on the descent and use only right sized engine for cruise.. but the difference in weight for the engine would be minimal compared to batteries etc.

I suspect an Electric Extra 300 with 20 min run would be fun but then how do you get it anywhere:(

Also not a big fan of composites these days. The spam cans will be being rebuild for years after the carbon ships are scrapped.

[quote author=Colonel Sanders link=topic=3195.msg9076#msg9076 date=1464744934]
Another special case:  the British and French
governments picked up the tab for the development
and production costs of the Concord for the
airlines, who bought the airplanes at a buck
each (I am not making this up) from their
governments, and still couldn't make a go
of it.  In that case, it was the British and
French taxpayers subsidizing the cokeheads
flying across the Atlantic.
[/quote]

Just a small correction to an otherwise great explanation - Air France lost money operating Concorde but it was a profitable operation for British Airways.

[quote author=cgzro link=topic=3195.msg9132#msg9132 date=1464956801]
Not sure how a hybrid would be more effecient in a plane unless you do a lot of descents and climbs and can use electric to augment the climb and recharge on the descent and use only right sized engine for cruise.. but the difference in weight for the engine would be minimal compared to batteries etc.[/quote]
A while back on one of the forums someone mentioned the sawtooth method for saving fuel in a pinch. A minute climb at 85kts followed by 1500rpm gradual descent, and repeat (re "descents and climbs"), a basic hybridstyle-propulsion idea. Syn-system technology elimiminates old fashioned alternator and starter weights on smaller/lighter engines which can be designed only for optimum cruise efficiency.

"Plug-in option" on gas/diesel cars is hybrid without saying it and 3 times the battery capacity on board than older non-plugin hybrids. 7KW of battery, i.e. as in the 2016 Audi A3 E-tron, suggests more battery capacity and better quality is much less important for now as is the suitable engine match. The gas AV-engine can be silent in taxi and flight idle and a "right sized" internal combustion (IC) joined with appropriate electric-assist sizing achieves the excess thrust for every take-off/climb duration. Gas/diesel plugins are showing signs of superb efficiency by eliminating unecessary IC yet supplementing it with the electric where desired/needed. Every cold-start is w/o IC when not needed so zero warmup-fuel energy consumed/wasted. This equates to many unecessary warmup cycles avoided;  5-10km/10min driving prewarms the block by armature heat so IC is at top efficiency upon engagement.