On today's episode, Will China Beat the USA to Commercial eVTOL Services?
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It may seem hard to believe, but in the early days of the helicopter there were
serious doubts about whether vertical flight would ever have a practical use.
Bell Aircraft, one of the pioneers of commercial helicopters along with Vought-Sikorski,
produced a promotional film that suggested the use of helicopters as personal air vehicles,
taking you from your driveway to the shopping plaza in minutes.
Of course, the pilot training and skill required to safely fly a helicopter is
significant, and only the most affluent use helicopters as personal transportation today.
But that may be changing. Dozens of mobility companies, from garage startups to heavyweights
like Boeing and Airbus, are racing to use advanced composite structures along with
lightweight batteries and electric motors driving multiple lift rotors,
to create what are essentially gigantic versions of commercial drones.
The goal is simple: create a form of intracity transport that does from
rooftops and parking lots what taxis do on the streets today. Obviously,
not everyone can qualify as helicopter pilot, and it is widely assumed that eVTOL transport will be
autonomous. But like autonomous driving for road vehicles, it’s more difficult than it looks.
Many experts believe that the initial generation of flying taxis will be piloted,
in the same way that taxis are driven by cab drivers today,
but with flight control systems that are highly redundant, highly automated and
will use a pilot training and licensing system that is tailored to these unique vehicles.
Technically, it’s easy to see why. Conventional helicopter flying using cyclic and collective
control inputs is not only tricky but is also technically challenging for the machine itself.
In forward flight, the advancing rotor must have a lower angle of attack than the retreating rotor,
to account for the forward motion component of the air velocity over the blades.
This requires a complex mechanism, and to complicate it even further,
the rotor head itself must tilt to induce motion in the desired direction of travel. The blades
require another degree of freedom, using bearings or a teetering hinge to allow this movement.
Look at a helicopter rotor head and you can see the complexity in the multiple shafts,
linkages and bearings required.
The eVTOL does away with this complexity by its very nature. Power is distributed amongst
multiple electric motors, each spinning a smaller rotor, with a far simpler fixed pitch propeller.
Counterrotating power plants on each side of the vehicle eliminate the need for an
anti-torque tail rotor, and with a fly by wire system operating with stability control,
it should be possible to keep the vehicle stable by varying individual motor RPM automatically.
This could simplify the pilot’s workload, possibly allow a licensing scheme that would make it cost
effective to operate air taxi services with a professional in the cockpit. And of course,
the more advanced the stability control systems, the more likely that a private owner with minimal
skills beyond those needed to drive a car will be able to operate one of these things.
Eventually, of course, they will be fully autonomous.
Right now in China, two potential vehicles are in that country’s Civil
Aviation Administration certification process, the Ehang EH216-S and the
Aerofugia AE200. The Chinese have several advantages in developing this technology.
Risk tolerance is government-determined in China, and once certified, their airframe makers and taxi
operators will not face the daunting prospect of American tort law and liability insurance.
For the Chinese government, it’s an opportunity to leave the world an important new transportation
technology, and potentially become a global center of excellence for electric air mobility.
Without doubt European and American authorities
are watching with interest, as are the aircraft makers.
Is their smart play to lead in this technology, or wait and see?
We’ll have to wait and see.
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