![]() Right now the motor is in lab testing at sea level, and once it passes those tests (some time next year is the plan) it will be run in an altitude simulation chamber and then up at 40,000 feet for real. Second is the stability and noise reduction that comes from having multiple engines that can be adjusted individually or in concert to reduce vibration and counteract turbulence. If you have six or eight engines, one failing isn’t nearly so catastrophic, and as a consequence the plane doesn’t need to carry twice as much engine as you need. Planes with two huge engines are designed to be capable of flying even if one fails. Several of Wright’s motors would be attached to each wing of the proposed aircraft, providing at least two benefits. Relying on hydrogen complicates things but it makes for a much faster transition to electric flight and a huge reduction in emissions and fuel use. This first craft would be a hybrid electric, combining the lightweight, efficient propulsion stack with the range of a liquid fuel engine. Wright is making sure its engines can be used by retrofitted aircraft, but it’s also working on a plane of its own with established airframe makers. A higher voltage than is normally employed for aerospace purposes and an insulation system to match enable an engine that hits the power and efficiency levels required to put a large plane in flight. The lightness comes from a ground-up redesign using a permanent magnet approach with “an aggressive thermal strategy,” he explained. “It’s the most powerful motor designed for the electric aerospace industry by a factor of 2, and it’s substantially lighter than anything out there,” said Engler. Wright’s engine is a 2-megawatt motor that produces the equivalent of 2,700 horsepower, at an efficiency of around 10 kilowatts per kilogram. All the same, integrating a new propulsion system into a plane isn’t trivial. He likened it to electric vehicles in that much of the car doesn’t change when you go electric, mainly the parts that have operated the same way in principle for a century. What changes is what propels the aircraft forward,” said Engler. “We’re not reinventing the concept of the wing, or the fuselage, or anything like that. Fortunately, despite the company’s name, they don’t need to build it entirely from scratch. While H3x is focused on small aircraft that will probably be taking flight sooner, Wright founder Jeff Engler explained that if you want to take on aerospace’s carbon footprint, you really have to start looking at commercial passenger jets - and Wright is planning to make one. H3X rethinks the electric motor to power the next phase of mobility So it falls to companies like Wright and H3x to build electric engines that can produce more thrust from the same amount of stored energy. After all, if a jet burned a thousand gallons of fuel per second, the plane couldn’t hold the amount needed to take off. Since reducing the mass of batteries is a long, slow process, it’s better to innovate in other ways: materials, airframe and of course the engine, which in traditional jets is a huge, immensely heavy and complex internal combustion one.Įlectric engines are generally lighter, simpler and more reliable than fuel-powered ones, but in order to achieve flight you need to reach a certain level of efficiency. In order to escape this conundrum, the main thing to improve is efficiency: how much thrust can be produced per watt of power. ![]() ![]() Electric planes have been held back by this fundamental conundrum, that the weight of the batteries needed to fly any distance with passengers aboard means the plane is too heavy to fly in the first place. Wright is among the startups looking to change the math and make electrified flight possible at scales beyond small aircraft - and its 2-megawatt engine could power the first generation of large-scale electric passenger planes.Įlectric cars have proven to be a huge success, but they have an advantage over planes in that they don’t need to produce enough lift to keep their own mass in the air. Just like the automotive industry, aerospace has its sights set on going electric - but flying with battery-powered engines is a tougher proposition than rolling. ![]()
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