ORIGINAL: airraptor
K sonn do forget to add in the cost of two or more High end chargers for these batteries. they will have to be charged at home or if charging at the field you will need a small generator as you will only get one maybe two charges out of a large car battery. in the long run the E set up will be cheaper. and some of the larger electric DF's have a great sound thats close to modern High Bypass turbines.
Your right about needing a good charger but with today's high end chargers you would only need one good charger like the PowerLab 8. It can charge the 14 cells in 35 minutes so you really only need one set of batteries. The cost of the charger, power supply, and generator will be around the cost of the 25 hour maintenance, pipe, and fuel tanks, but it is also a one time cost that can be spread out over multiple planes. Unfortunately, the pipe, fuel tanks, and maintenance costs are not one time costs unless you move the turbine, pipe, and tanks from plane to plane.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not trying to say EDF is better than turbine. But when someone says the cost of EDF is too much when compared to a turbine, it's usually because they haven't sat down and did a cost analysis between the two propulsion systems. If Jeremy doesn't want to fly EDFs, I'm fine with that. Each to his own. Just don't use cost as an excuse becuase that excuse can be refutted quantitatively.