Fuck fox news.
Do not use the fucking terrorists for a source under any circumstances.
this post was submitted on 29 Jun 2025
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Kill it with fire!
-GOP
This brought to my mind Battery of Hate, a 1933 sci fi story by John W. Campbell, about an inventor who comes up with a super-powerful battery and uses it to power an electric airplane. A battle ensues with an industrial tycoon determined to quash the invention. I remember it being a pretty well written story for the period. Wish I could find it online - amazing that it's not on gutenberg, given that it was published 92 years ago.
amazing that it's not on gutenberg, given that it was published 92 years ago.
Wouldn't want people getting ideas, eh?
If we had simultaneously actually researched battery technology on an industrial level since the start of car manufacturing, I'm sure we would already have much better batteries.
It's not a joke or conspiracy that there's the fossil fuel industry engages in suppressing and downplaying technology that might affect their business.
Nonsense. Oil companies would never do Such things.
Only when mobile phones started being an actual notion did batteries finally start becoming reasonable. Now it's been like 40 years and the development is pretty significant. But if there had been 80 years more...? Who knows.
Some of the first cars were electric, at least I remember reading about those breaking records (like going over 60km/h maybe, it was a long time ago).
Non-shitty source: https://www.aopa.org/news-and-media/all-news/2025/june/05/first-passengers-board-new-electric-aircraft
(No offense op)
Yes offense, op. Fuck fox news, without exception?
Ah, AOPA. I wonder if they spent more or less on printing and postage on the junkmail they still sometimes sent me than they ever got from me in membership fees.
They don't hold a candle to the EAA though. Holey cheese grater.
Thanks for the heads up, didn't know about EAA vs AOPA quality.
What's with EAA?
I joined, I quit, they mailed me shit for YEARS. There's no possible way they did anything useful with the membership dues I paid given the entire rain forest worth of junk mail they printed and mailed me.
Fox News is not the source I expected from this sort of article...
"Woke commie company out to make us all gay with electric plane!"
Better?
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4 people, 70 miles in 35 minutes. Vertical takeoffs in the works. $8 in fuel costs. Are we finally getting close the what the Jetson’s envisioned 60 years ago?
No, that mostly just means the ultra wealthy get this and no one else. Maybe it'll be useful for some other stuff, like critical organ deliveries or something too, but I'm skeptical it does us any good. I'd also guess that being electric is only because it's quiter, so they can fly into places with noise ordnances or something too, but maybe that's too cynical.
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110km = 68 miles (or about one hour of car travel on many US interstate highways)
Something something Americans will do anything but travel by train for short distances.
Edit: apparently y'all are unfamiliar with the meme, and as such taking my comment at 100% sincerity instead of the intended 38%. Also I'm an American myself, so the only intended disrespect was of the self-depreciating variety.
I haven't read this article yet, but I did recently read about electric planes. There are a shockingly large percentage of flights in the US (and probably the world) that are that short. Not a percentage of passengers, but percentage of flights. Lots of islands that don't have a routine ferry service, or small rural communities in places like Alaska that may be separated from the road system by a mountain range.
Those small communities couldn't support constant rail (or ferry) service, so small planes are actually the most economical way to serve them. Even places like Hawaii could use electric planes to good effect.
The first I read about them was for flights to Nantucket Island, which absolutely gets ferry service, but it's also where a lot of rich people have homes, and they are going to fly. https://nantucketcurrent.com/news/cape-air-to-buy-electric-planes
You ever tried to travel by train here? Long or short distance. The rail infrastructure isn't there
By design, not by requirement. It used to be there.
Me when converting Mile to KM :)
Me when converting KM to Mile >:(
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Havent read the article yet, but I recall reading that with modern battery architecture electric planes were physically impossible. Is this plane not using lithium ion, or was I mistaken? It wasnt an issue of the tech not being ready yet, moreso that lithium ion simply could not achieve an energy density to weight ratio that was needed.
Edit: the article does not say.
Second edit: how far off are we from either not having power storage or only minimal power storage and then we just beam energy to the plane?
It’s absolutely not impossible. Airplanes are more efficient than drones, and efficiency grows with scale. Drones fly. Of course an airplane can do the same.
The problem is one of speed and range. The best form of propulsion we have for electric airplanes is the propeller, which has a lower top speed potential than a turbofan. The energy density of batteries is also lower.
Realistically, an electric airplane will have reduced range and speed compared to a modern jet.
Any idea why they went with an open prop vs a ducted fan?
edit: the motors are 600mm diameter, so not easy to install in the duct is my guess. It's impossible to package an inboard configuration on such small airframes.
I can’t comment for their engineering team, but usually open props are more efficient because any reasonably sized duct constrains prop diameter. Increasing prop diameter is the best way to improve efficiency. Ducting a very large diameter prop comes with a large structural and weight penalty.
Generally speaking, the only time ducts buy their way on is when they are also needed for bystander protection.
Another issue is batteries don't change (significantly) in mass during flight. Most airliners have greater takeoff weight than landing weight, because after flying a jet for a few hours you're going to burn many tons of fuel. Batteries don't do that, so you'd have to have an airplane capable of landing at it's MTOW.
Also planes tend to increase their cruising altitude as weight decreases, it's more efficient due to the lower air resistance. Electric motors would be more efficient across a wider range of conditions than turbo fans though.
That's all moot though, because you must don't have the energy density for long haul flights in batteries. They're trying to make air taxis happen again. They were talking up air taxis before 9/11, and they never really happened. And back then they were talking about using existing aircraft driven by conventional gasoline or jet fuel. Now we're talking about new airframes with battery electric power.
Could you imagine the fucking noise? Air taxis should never happen.
"Air Taxi" operations looked more like, say you're going golfing in Pinehurst, NC. If you take an airline, you're probably going to get a flight to RDU, rent a car at the airport, drive an hour down US-1. Or if you're enough of a high roller, the Pinehurst Hotel will have sent a limousine an hour up US-1. Either way you're talking driving boomer golf shorts royalty through Sanford and Tramway, and those towns just aren't very Wall Street Journal.
Instead, load them in a Cessna Centurion and make a ~20 minute flight to the Moore County Airport, which depending on traffic around the circle. Something like 12 golf courses to include Pinehurst #2 are within a 10 minute drive. The 36 hole Country Club of Whispering Pines is just behind the airport, the 10th hole and 11th tee of the Pines course is across the street from runway 23's threshold.
North Carolina has over a hundred public municipal airports, the vast majority see no regular airline traffic at all, and not everyone traveling to North Carolina is going to Raleigh, Greensboro, Charlotte, Asheville, Fayetteville or Wilmington. Those are the only places Boeings or Airbuses ever go.
Havent read the article yet, but I recall reading that with modern battery architecture electric planes were physically impossible.
Something something bumblebees.
My dad was an apiarist, bee keeper, and educator.
One of may favourite bee anatomy facts is that the spots on their hind legs that collects pollen....is called Pollen Pants. Love it. Fucking amazing.
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