Posted on 06/27/2024 6:14:12 AM PDT by Red Badger
About 300 pounds more than than my old Piper Colt (but it had neither a jet APU or an electric motor!)
https://aerospace.honeywell.com/us/en/about-us/blogs/electric-aircraft-propulsion-how-it-works
Onboard electric power is generated by the main engines and super-efficient auxiliary power units, which Honeywell pioneered over 50 years ago. All this sets the stage for electric propulsion, which is the next step in the evolution toward electric aircraft.
Honeywell has studied several different propulsion architectures – ranging from the legacy engines on most aircraft today to all-electric, battery-based solutions. There are various hybrid architectures across that continuum – including Turboelectric, Partial Turboelectric, Series Hybrid, Parallel Hybrid and Series-Parallel Hybrid. All of these deploy electric motors in various ways as part of the overall propulsion system.
In contrast to propulsion systems built solely around an internal combustion engine, all-electric and hybrid-electric architectures utilize an electric motor. The motor can be the sole source of thrust or it can be used in combination with a conventional engine, by either providing another source of thrust or even a boost of power to the propulsion system during key stages of flight.
For example, we are developing a one-megawatt turbogenerator that can run on biofuel to reduce carbon emissions even further. Additionally, Honeywell’s recent acquisition of Ballard Unmanned Systems places us squarely in the middle of another important means of providing power: hydrogen fuel cells, which are already being used to generate power for smaller Class I and Class II UAS platforms.
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