Electric Rag and Tube

[turboplanner]

36 minutes ago, octave said:

69000 Euros

Octave, the pricing came from this link: https://www.pipistrel-prices.com/configurator/configure/420/

 

As anyone can see, the base price is 125,000 Euros, a 3kW (10 hours) charger is 4,400 Euros, Dealer Delivery is 3,800 Euros, making the total price $133,200 Euros which at 5:29 pm  exchange rate is $207,506.95

[facthunter]

If anybody could/should introduce electric it  is RAAus. I'll sign a request/petition anytime. Nev

[octave]

6 minutes ago, turboplanner said:

Octave, the pricing came from this link: https://www.pipistrel-prices.com/configurator/configure/420/

 

As anyone can see, the base price is 125,000 Euros, a 3kW (10 hours) charger is 4,400 Euros, Dealer Delivery is 3,800 Euros, making the total price $133,200 Euros which at 5:29 pm  exchange rate is $207,506.95

 

I am not arguing that they are cheap I am saying that the technology exists and works. In your post you suggested that :

 

"That power is being distributed through four motors in a car, so the first issue is to find a motor which for a Rag and Tube would need to produce about 80 hp(60kW) from the one engine.

Instead of a four branch electrical circuit you would have one, but its cables would need to be heavier."

 

Most EVs do not have 4 motors, perhaps. am misunderstanding what you mean here? 

 

   My point is that suitable motors do exist  for example the  EA-811 https://www.pipistrel-aircraft.com/aircraft/electric-flight/e-811/  Sure at this point is it probably pricey and I have no idea how it compares price wise to a 912.  These motors and aircraft are flying now. 

 

  The price and range will continue to improve.  Perhaps local manufacturing will help with progress  https://www.australianflying.com.au/latest/electric-pipistrels-to-be-built-in-adelaide

 

I am all for innovation.

 

 

 

 

[dlegg]

Amazing really how an electric motor with only 1 moving part is so expensive. Should be so simple to implement. Batteries, controller, motor, propeller. That's it...

[facthunter]

It's not JUST an electric motor that you would get on line and millions of which get made. for about $130  ea. Where you have short model runs the price goes through the roof and if it's in a certified plane double it again. They are generally High Torque motors.  direct drive. Nev

[octave]

Not just expensive electrical motors.   A Rotax 912 costs a small fortune when compared to car engines.

[kasper]

I can only repeat that the design limits of 95.10 are better than the USA and there is absolutely no restriction on what you can do with electrics in the single seat class.  
 

One electric engine - fine. 
10 electric motors from models - fine

small battery pack and an onboard petrol generator as an extender - fine. 
 

you can mix n match to your hearts content and as long as you have 1m^2 per 30kg mtow and stay under 300kg you are fine. 
 

we need no changes to the CAOs for single seat backyard enthusiasts

we need no change to the CAO for single motor single prop 1 or two seat LSA factory or kit planes - muti-motor kit or factory would need CAO change. 
 

so over to the tinkerers - build it and go prove it works.  It’s already been done in Tassie years ago with an electric single seat trike.  
 

if I had the $ and time I would gladly move both of my 95.10s to electric and I may still do that.  

[jackc]

58 minutes ago, facthunter said:

If anybody could/should introduce electric it  is RAAus. I'll sign a request/petition anytime. Nev

Nev,  I was looking to make a submission outlining a methodology for rules, approvals, training regime and category under which the suggested regime could be operated.  

Maybe I am trying to pee upwind in a Cyclone......but ask for nothing and you definitely get nothing 🙂

[jackc]

3 minutes ago, kasper said:

I can only repeat that the design limits of 95.10 are better than the USA and there is absolutely no restriction on what you can do with electrics in the single seat class.  
 

One electric engine - fine. 
10 electric motors from models - fine

small battery pack and an onboard petrol generator as an extender - fine. 
 

you can mix n match to your hearts content and as long as you have 1m^2 per 30kg mtow and stay under 300kg you are fine. 
 

we need no changes to the CAOs for single seat backyard enthusiasts

we need no change to the CAO for single motor single prop 1 or two seat LSA factory or kit planes - muti-motor kit or factory would need CAO change. 
 

so over to the tinkerers - build it and go prove it works.  It’s already been done in Tassie years ago with an electric single seat trike.  
 

if I had the $ and time I would gladly move both of my 95.10s to electric and I may still do that.  

Sadly, I am a long way down the Aviation knowledge base to come up with good info for a submission.  In all my years of business, I used to meet personally with all the people I traded with......I found the personal connectivity took me a lot further in my dealings.  I went wherever I need to go in the World at the time to do it, and it paid dividends.

But having said that......I am prepared to have a go, but I have to make sure I have a good case to present.  Not into making an idiot of myself, IF I can help it 🙂

 

[facthunter]

I don't think YOU should be required to write the rules etc We have the dog so don't have to do the barking ourselves.. Why shouldn't they progress this is the question.. It's GOING to happen anyhow but why be the last to realise it? Nev

[kasper]

But we don’t need any new rules 🙄

[spacesailor]

kasper,

One less rule would be ' heavily  for me & my Hummel Bird.

Is there no ' knight in shining amour ', that could reverse that " wing loading rule " .

spacesailor

[jackc]

29 minutes ago, kasper said:

But we don’t need any new rules 🙄

No we don’t, but in making a submission......you do the core submission and then you have variables you may need to use in negotiating a workable outcome.

Now, you never send a submission in.......it gets circulated, laughed at and gives the receiver a chance to apply negative decisions with little consultation.

So, you make an appointment with the key person simply saying you want to discuss some aspects of Aviation etc.  You could have a report to submit.

to that key person.  It’s not hard to make a plan and IF you get a knock back then it’s up to using the skills of negotiation get a foot in the right door.

Start with RAAus and see where it leads, may have to knock on CASA’s door?

May need involve a politician?   

I wonder if we have any RAAus or CASA lurkers here, snickering to themselves 🙂

 

[kasper]

33 minutes ago, spacesailor said:

kasper,

One less rule would be ' heavily  for me & my Hummel Bird.

Is there no ' knight in shining amour ', that could reverse that " wing loading rule " .

spacesailor

But spacey ... as you have been told countless times before ... the day they closed 95.10 to the Hummel they opened 95.55 to the Hummel.  
 

there is no reason other than what I can see as blinkers as to why you continually post about the Hummel and 95.10 when the Hummel is and has always been able to be registered with RAAus.  

[Marty_d]

6 hours ago, kasper said:

And I am thinking of the 95.10 thick wing Sapphire as the test vehicle for electric ... it can accommodate the batteries within the wing and can operate on around 20kw of power (currently has 20.5kw of KFM107ER in it)

 

And that is easily doable with the plug and play from Geiger 

New system - a 4kg engine, 31kg of batteries and 8kg allowance for everything additional you are at around 43kg installed system

Old system - the IC engine, heavy mount and fuel system and that is 32kg ... the fuel not carried takes the removed system weight to 46kg

 

Like for like comparison ... I get a weight saving of around 3kg and accept an endurance of 1 hr allowing for 1 climb to 2,500ft  (I did the calcs based on the power settings required on the KFM I am looking to take out)

 

Now all I need it approval from he-who-must-be-obeyed for the spend and I am seriously looking at converting to electric ... esp. as their folding prop would allow better gliding in the big wing sapphire and I have 6wk of solar on the roof that are better charging my batteries than feeding back to the grid.

What's the approximate cost of that system from Geiger?  Given 31kg I'm guessing 2 battery packs?

[Marty_d]

10 hours ago, facthunter said:

Maybe, but  other road users PAY with fuel tax so the principle and equity are served. How many people can afford an electric vehicle at current prices and get FREE use of the roads?  Nev

 

When there's significant takeup of EV, I'd agree with you.  But until then there's such a price disparity to begin with that governments should be doing everything they can to encourage it, not the opposite.  At the moment EV's make such a small percentage of all vehicles that taxing them will result in negligible gain while acting to suppress demand.

[kgwilson]

A US style FAA part 103 would never get off the ground in Australia (pardon the pun) due to our regulation mad administrators. I think that there is a place for very light weight solar powered electric aircraft with batteries and I'd like to see very minimal regulations, preferably none. Remember that the Swiss built Solar Impulse 2 flew around the world in 2015 and the technology and materials have improved dramatically since then. I reckon you should be able to build your own and fly it round the farm to check feed, crops, animals, troughs etc without CASA poking its unwanted nose in anywhere.

[facthunter]

Then it might be harder to bring in. There's other  ways to subsidise EV's or even build them here..  Why should less well off s who drive gas clunkers get hit  and perhaps milionaires pay no road tax. . I can't see me ever being able to afford an EV . It's not just my situation I considered this at length and decided it was wrong in principle. Nev

[kgwilson]

Taxing EVs is a backwards thinking kneejerk panic reaction to a current tiny proportion of the governments revenue stream. They should be doing the opposite like most European countries and subsidising the cost of EVs, providing free or heavily subsidised quick charge stations. Look what happened with rooftop solar. The only problem with that was the failure to recognise the massive uptake would cause overloads in the distribution network. This can be easily overcome with distributed local storage but as always our political dickheads are always way behind the 8 ball.

[turboplanner]

2 hours ago, kgwilson said:

Taxing EVs is a backwards thinking kneejerk panic reaction to a current tiny proportion of the governments revenue stream. They should be doing the opposite like most European countries and subsidising the cost of EVs, providing free or heavily subsidised quick charge stations. Look what happened with rooftop solar. The only problem with that was the failure to recognise the massive uptake would cause overloads in the distribution network. This can be easily overcome with distributed local storage but as always our political dickheads are always way behind the 8 ball.

There's plenty of disussion on the Victorian tax, but it's not significant and is a payment for distance travelled nominally to support road infrastructure and maintenance. It's not going to play a part in the bigger picture where The upfront cost of EVs is 2.32 to 2.6 times the prices that people can afford. Governments could give financial support to assist in the building of a charging network.

 

Overloads in the distribution network?

It's disgraceful that the networks are paying peanuts for power supplied by homeowners, but that's what can happen when you have private companies selling power. It's not in their financial interest to have their customers generating all their non-peak power, so providing zero income let alone wanting to sell it at retail price.

We are lucky enough to have the AEMO dashboard available to the pubic, so we can actually see what renewables are producing. This year, when the temperature dropped, renewables broke 50% market share for the first time, but generally in non- Peak Power times they can only pump out around 15% market share, and on a hot day with air conditoning going all over the country, they've only been able to produce 1% of Peak Power. Renewables just produce flat out all the time; they don't have the ability to do better than that 1%, and if you were to increase their output 99 times to get to 100% Peak Power, the Infrastructure cost would send us all broke, so we have another problem to solve where people trying to flog a concept haven't done their homework.

 

 

 

[octave]

45 minutes ago, turboplanner said:

There's plenty of disussion on the Victorian tax, but it's not significant and is a payment for distance travelled nominally to support road infrastructure and maintenance. I

Not an insubstantial amount

 

"If the proposal is approved, owners of electric cars registered in the state of Victoria would pay 2.5 cents per kilometre – or about $375 per year based on the national annual average distance travelled of 15,000km"

 

55 minutes ago, turboplanner said:

The upfront cost of EVs is 2.32 to 2.6 times the prices that people can afford.

 

I am not sure exactly what this means because it does not define "what people can afford"   None the less this is somewhat relevant.  A more interesting figure would be to compare the like for like new price.  I don't believe EVs are generally  2 to 2.5 x more than a petrol equivalent.    

 

58 minutes ago, turboplanner said:

It's disgraceful that the networks are paying peanuts for power supplied by homeowners, but that's what can happen when you have private companies selling power.

As someone who imports a large amount from my solar to the grid I would of course like the highest price,    A fair price needs to include the price of getting my solar to the grid  (poles and wires etc.)    I also have to accept that sometimes the grid does not want or need all of my power therefore some of my input is curtailed. I produce more power than I need and a battery is looking more and more economically viable especially as the prices fall My system produces an excess of around 1.5 MWh a year over what I use.    There are also new programs whereby you can allow the network extremely limited access to draw small amounts of power to help with peak times. (you get paid for this.)  Community batteries are another interesting area.

 

1 hour ago, turboplanner said:

on a hot day with air conditoning going all over the country,

 

My solar powers this comfortably.   

 

1 hour ago, turboplanner said:

if you were to increase their output 99 times to get to 100% Peak Power, the Infrastructure cost would send us all broke

 

I would agree with you here if we did it overnight but as experience throughout the world shows we can move towards better ways of generating  and distributing energy.    My KWh price from my power company recently dropped by 3 cents a kilowatt at a time when renewables are increasing.

 

I do look at the AEMO Mix summary chart regularly. Right now in Victoria wind and solar account for 37% and hydro 3%, Brown coal  is 60%  And Tasmania is 100% renewables at the moment.  Of course they do have geographical advantages.

 

Back to planes

 

Be interesting to see how this company goes in the future

 

Australia's first electric plane company set to fly in SA

 

[facthunter]

Roads are paid for in Part by users That's been the case for yonks.  Would you suggest EV's don't pay tolls? Others can subsidise them? Same principle. Keep your charges targeted or it all gets done on a whim and a fancy. If you want them subsidised do so. There's plenty of other ways..  Nev

[octave]

1 minute ago, facthunter said:

Roads are paid for in Part by users

To be clear I have no problem with every user paying for road infrastructure.  I think $375 a year would be a significant contribution.

[facthunter]

 I can see the system sometimes has a problem with too much input from solar. I delayed ever having airconditioning until I had solar. IF I had oriented the panels a bit more west of north I would have fitted the usage better with the supply of sunlight.. I had contact with a person who owned a power station. He was getting 2.6 cents/Kw/HR so 111 cents seems not too bad compared with that. Nev

[octave]

I have downsized so my roof space is limited.   My system works very well because my panels are spit between east, north and west giving a good output from sunrise to sunset.