Chinese Manufacturers Set A New Record For Electric Manned Aircraft With Pure Electric Flight Of 250 Kilometers

Pickpook learned from the official account of Fengfei Aviation that the eVTOL (Electric Vertical Takeoff and Landing, electric vertical takeoff and landing) aircraft company Fengfei Aviation Technology announced that its eVTOL aircraft - Shengshilong No successfully completed a flight of 250.3 kilometers under a single charge state, setting a new record for the range of a 2-ton eVTOL aircraft in the world.

The flight test was completed at Fengfei Jining Test Base on February 23, and the real and complete flight process was recorded through video and third-party equipment.

The long-distance flight video shows the complete flight stages of vertical takeoff, forward transition, fixed-wing cruise, reverse transition and vertical landing, with a single flight range exceeding 250 kilometers.

According to public information, the previous record was 248.8 kilometers (154.6 miles) set by Joby Airlines in the United States.

Fengfei Shengshilong No. 4 aircraft has a maximum take-off weight of 2 tons, pure electric power, 5-seater design, and can fly autonomously.

It adopts a compound wing configuration, uses the rotor to take off vertically, and then performs a forward conversion after flying to a certain height, and then cruises quickly and horizontally like a fixed-wing aircraft, with a speed of over 200 km/h.

eVTOL aircraft do not require traditional airports with runways. Compared with helicopters, they are quieter, more environmentally friendly, safer and more reliable, and lower in cost.

In the future, they will be widely used in urban air travel and intercity travel scenarios in metropolitan areas. Data shows that more than 14 million people in my country suffer from extreme commuting time (more than 60 minutes one way), and eVTOL is also considered to be an important solution to solve ground traffic congestion, reducing hours of ground traffic time during peak hours to 15-20 minute.

The long-range mission was carried out at Fengfei eVTOL test base in February, and the mission covered 20 circles on the scheduled flight track. Although "Shengshilong" No. 4 is equipped with advanced avionics equipment, in order to ensure the objectivity and effectiveness of the test results, the aircraft was equipped with a third-party avionics equipment (Stratus 3) during the test and was tested on the ForeFlight system. Recording and verification of actual flight distances. As an independent professional system, ForeFlight has been widely used in the aviation field.

Omer Bar-Yohay, Global President of Forward Aviation Technology, said: "Based on the continuous optimization and rigorous testing of the previously verified models, Forward Flight has accumulated a large amount of actual flight data, which will help Shengshilong's development iteration and airworthiness certification. This ultra-long-distance flight The test has fully and truly demonstrated the excellent performance of Fengfei aircraft, and we are very happy to continue working towards the goal of obtaining EASA airworthiness certification in 2025."

In addition, for the carrier aircraft V2000CG Keruiou, which is on the same platform as Shengshilong, Fengfei has jointly formulated the basis for the type certification with CAAC and the Civil Aviation Administration of China, and successfully passed the civil aviation expert review meeting in early February this year. items are closed.

The type approval basic submission draft and the G-1 issue summary have been formally submitted to the Civil Aviation Administration, which also marks that the airworthiness work of the V2000CG model will enter the stage of "compliance plan formulation" in an all-round way.

Founded in 2017, Fengfei Aviation Technology is committed to providing global customers with safe and reliable air logistics operation systems and air three-dimensional travel solutions.

The R&D and airworthiness center was established in Germany, the business and operation center was established in the United States, and the manufacturing and production center was located in China.

According to the strategic plan of "from small to large, from objects to people", Fengfei's eVTOL autopilot aircraft has completed nearly 10,000 conversion flights, and it is the first to realize eVTOL in scenarios such as island logistics, organ transplantation, emergency material transportation, and commercial logistics. The application of technology landed.

Fengfei Aviation Technology officially stated that the company has strong vertical integration capabilities. The flight control avionics, three electronics and core components all have completely independent intellectual property rights. Composite core technology.

This Is The First Aircraft Without Wings In The History Of Aviation

Since the dawn of mankind, we have looked up at the sky and longed to fly like birds. But even the person with the least aeronautics and savvy knows that in order to fly you need wings to give lift to a plane or anything like that to take off.

And what else would the plane need to get on? Those are long runways. The runway is, in essence, a dilemma. Because they take up a lot of land and are expensive to build and maintain. In particular, military runways are the first target in a war, because if you destroy the enemy's airstrip, you effectively eliminate the enemy's air force.

During the 1950s, aircraft engineers began to think out-of-the-box ideas. If planes had more power and features, they might not need to use runways anymore. Thus, a wave of experiments with vertical take-off and landing (VTOL) forms of aircraft began. And if proven to be successful, the new designs will essentially eliminate the need for runways because they can take off from virtually anywhere.

Renowned French aircraft engine builder SNECMA (Société Nationale d'Études et Construction de Moteurs d'Aviation, now Safran Aircraft Engines), used a design by Austrian engineer Helmut von Zborowski, to begin with. built a prototype aircraft that did not use typical triangular wings. In fact, the C.450 Coléoptère (in French for "beetle") had no wings at all.

Powered by a jet engine with an axial pump design, the Coléoptère has a circular "wing" 3.2 meters in diameter that surrounds the lower half of the aircraft. SNECMA hopes the design will turn it into a jet by compressing the incoming air, mixing it with fuel, and igniting it to take it well beyond the Mach speed standard.

During takeoff and landing, thrust is deflected using propellers located in the engine's exhaust manifold. Four small fins strategically placed around the "wing" will act as rudders to provide directional control on the fly. The fins are retractable, concealed inside the nose, and will deploy when needed to help tilt the plane while vertically into "landing" mode.

The innovatively designed swivel cockpit seat allows the pilot to remain in a locked and vertical position based on the aircraft's axial orientation.

Since this was the time before simulations could be tested on a computer, pilots had to directly participate in testing on the prototype product. And the first practical tests were started in April 1959.

Serious problems arose almost immediately. Without stabilizing wings, the aircraft spins while hovering in the vertical take-off phase. Sitting like astronauts atop the rocket, the pilots had trouble seeing the ground. Finally, because it has no wings, the vehicle theoretically wouldn't allow it to glide to safety if its engines failed. The Coléoptère project faced the risk of failure.

On July 25, 1959, SNECMA continued to test the ability to convert from vertical to horizontal flight mode of the aircraft. But it tilted too much and the pilot could not regain control. He was forced to rush out to save his life, and Coléoptère was destroyed after the fall. The application for funding for the second prototype did not materialize and the project was eventually abandoned.