aeajr

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While I enjoy researching and writing the articles in this book I also like to share other resources I find that may be helpful in your understanding of electric powered flight.

Here is a good article from Model Airplane News, October 2014

Tips for Getting Started with Electric Airplanes
by Gerry Yarrish
http://www.modelairplanenews.com/blo...s%20and%20more

aeajr

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I just updated the chapter on BECs to bring it up to date.

aeajr

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For the benefit of new readers, I have recently revised some of the chapters to bring them up to date. You may see that the article was posted in 2008 but will note a "revised" or "Updated" date shown under the chapter title.

Some of the articles were written when brushless motors, lithium batteries and 2.4 GHz radios were just becoming common. So I have updated the articles to make them more relevant to today's equipment.

As always, ask away! We are all here to help each other.

Wagon1

Wow. This is great information and exactly what I was looking for. My club just lost out to a curmudgeon living near the field. No more nitro/gas. I will miss the smell and sound or nitro mostly. The smell especially brings back very great memories. I need to switch my entire hanger to electric. I am no engineer, but it sure seems like a degree is necessary to fly electric. My first endeavor will be to build a Senorita kit I have not started yet as electric, I figured that would be easier than converting one already built. Thank you for the great head start.

aeajr

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Electric is not hard once you learn to give up the idea of this glow motor = that electric motor and learn to work from watts/pound. However if you can't give that up there are electric motors sized to approximate their glow counterparts.

aeajr

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Electric power is great for airplanes but it has really changed the world of gliders. Used to be that if you didn't want to use a winch or a hi-start you put a glow motor on your glider and ran it till the fuel ran out. Or you put in a brushed motor and some NiCd batteries and ran the motor till the battery ran out. The electric batteries were so heavy and the motors so inefficent that electric gliders were not very popular.

Today the brushless motors are so powerful and the LiPo batteries so powerful that e-gliders can now be very close in weight and performance to their pure gliders brothers. And very few put glow motors on gliders anymore

aeajr

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Note that in 2017 I resigned my position as moderator on RCU. As a result I will no longer be able to update the book. But I am happy to answer questions that come up to the best of my ability.

aeajr

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If you have an intermittent problem and can't track it down, shake the plane in your hands. Reach in and wiggle wires. Sometimes there is a loose connection or one that is about to fail. This process can sometimes help you find those bad connections.

CSMITH1510

Thanks for your articles, they were very helpful

aeajr

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Over the years the nature of electric-powered flight has changed from being a dog based on inefficient brushed motors and NiCd batteries to the current high-performance state of brushless motors and Lithium batteries. Glow is fading out and the market has split to gasoline for the large planes and electric at the low and middle-sized as the dominant power sources.

I stopped by a club not too long ago that I had tried to join 17 years ago. I had an RTF parkflyer, back before the name parkflyer was in use. They would not let me in. They only flew glow and gas. And so it was with a lot of small electric pilots. So the electrics went outside the clubs and the clubs started to wither.

Today, most of the planes that are less than 10 pounds are electric. Some of the heavier planes are electric too.

A lot of change.

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Not to forget - the bloody things sound more like hair dryers than they do airplanes.

bisco

i loved my os max back in the 60's, but fell in love all over again with electric in the 90's. it was very primitive then, and after a 25 year hiatus, i cannot believe the technology. i attribute it to the quad drone popularity, along with digital and battery advances.

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BAH HUMBUG! Airplanes should sound like airplanes, not like hair dryers

bisco

i understand the sentiment, and at 12 years old felt the same way, although that was the only choice.

now, i love my electric car, and electric planes! speak softly, but carry a big stick