Technology

68991 readers

4220 users here now

This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.

Our Rules

Follow the lemmy.world rules.
Only tech related news or articles.
Be excellent to each other!
Mod approved content bots can post up to 10 articles per day.
Threads asking for personal tech support may be deleted.
Politics threads may be removed.
No memes allowed as posts, OK to post as comments.
Only approved bots from the list below, this includes using AI responses and summaries. To ask if your bot can be added please contact a mod.
Check for duplicates before posting, duplicates may be removed
Accounts 7 days and younger will have their posts automatically removed.

Approved Bots

founded 2 years ago

MODERATORS

[email protected]

102

Lilium (LILM) receives firm order from UrbanLink to put 20 eVTOL jets into service in Florida (electrek.co)

submitted 11 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

25 comments fedilink hide all child comments

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments

[–] [email protected] 1 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Lol

In January 2020 Aerokurier published a report which stated that Lilium could not meet its stated aircraft performance goals and would only be able to fly for two minutes at a time.[41] The anonymously-authored report was dismissed by the company but later backed up by four German aerospace academics who wrote that Lilium was "using brilliant PR to create an illusory world to attract investors."[42][43] In February 2021, Forbes published an article citing a number of former employees that stated the development of Lilium's aircraft was "dogged by problems and that the flight test campaign made minimal progress."[44]

From the companies Wikipedia page.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 11 months ago

I ran the numbers myself a while back, it's not pretty at all.

Until you hear about people traveling >200mi and getting their commercial pilots licenses entirely on conventional takeoff fixed wing electric aircraft (see pipistrel electro) it's safe to assume this vtol industry is grounded. The conventional fixed wing aircraft are wildly more efficient in terms of battery mass fraction and range but they don't get investors excited like a personal quadcopter for the (ultra wealthy) masses.