Talk:Electric aircraft

Move to 'Battery electric air vehicle"

See the battery-electric vehicle talk page for more information. (Under nr 58; requested move) Thanks.

KVDP (talk) 08:46, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

Stupid idea. Where is this being discussed exactly? Greg Locock (talk) 08:54, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

Added the link. Don't discard it so quickly and leave it on talk page for a while, its the most logical subdivision that includes all vehicles (I do admit it sounds a bit unusual).

KVDP (talk) 09:08, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

Oppose - that name is very cumbersome and not what users will be looking for. I would rather see that title be a re-direct to this article. - Ahunt (talk) 12:02, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

At the very least, you may try to change the name to "Battery-electric aircraft" or atleast "Electric aircraft", as electric airplane only involves airplanes (thus limiting the article's possible expantion)

KVDP (talk) 08:22, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

NASA Pathfinder

Should also have a place 90s, it may have started in the 80s but the majority of the program took place in the 90s.--Craigboy (talk) 18:23, 8 July 2010 (UTC)

Could be. But if that is the case, then that section will need verifiable, reliable secondary source citations for the claims. That section has been fact-tagged {{citation needed}} for several months now. N2e (talk) 19:53, 8 July 2010 (UTC)

Advantages and disadvantages of electrical propulsion section

The advantages of electric aircraft include increased safety due to decreased chance of mechanical failure, such as from volcanic ash, less risk of explosion or fire in the event of a collision, less noise, along with environmental benefits associated with the potential elimination of consumption of fuels and resultant emissions and pollution.

The main disadvantage of electric aircraft is decreased range. The range can be increased by adding solar cells to the aircraft's body to create a solar airplane. However, the plane's surface area must be large compared to its weight for them to have a significant impact on range.

I have removed the above section from the article to here instead for further discussion. Even though User:Bios Element removed the fact tags on 8 July 2010 with the edit summary "No need to cite the obvious Folks" I think that this section is not only not obvious I think it is WP:OR, incomplete and wrong. I have seen no ref that proves that electric aircraft have a longer MTBF than other types of propulsion. While there maybe "less risk of explosion or fire in the event of a collision" there is the problem of battery explosions and contamination, depending on battery type, which is not discussed. While the section touts the "environmental benefits associated with the potential elimination of consumption of fuels and resultant emissions and pollution" it doesn't deal with all the problems of battery and solar cell disposal and recycling, which currently may be worse than with other powerplant types. It also doesn't address the problem of where line-current rechargeable (as opposed to solar cell rechargeable) battery-powered aircraft get their power from - if it from coal-burning powerplants then it certainly doesn't eliminate consumption of fuels. If it from nuclear electrical generation plants then there are all kinds of other problem with nuclear waste etc. The disadvantages section on range seems to be plain WP:OR. I think that this whole section is so incomplete, misleading and unreferenced that it shouldn't be returned to the article with being expanded, made more balanced and properly referenced. The article is better without it. - Ahunt (talk) 12:38, 15 July 2010 (UTC)

I agree. As it stands, this article works well as a History of electric aircraft, but if we want to talk about design and operations (including advantages and disadvantages) then we would have to completely re-sequence the material into the various types of electric aircraft such as manned or UAVs, solar-powered or battery/fuel cell. Each of these have utterly different characteristics, and in my opinion, would work better as separate articles. Hallucegenia (talk) 16:52, 15 July 2010 (UTC)

It was good that all of these unsourced claims were removed from the article. The article is much better today for the cleanup. Thanks all! N2e (talk) 22:13, 17 November 2010 (UTC)

Popular culture ?

The 1980s anime The Mysterious Cities of Gold had a really interesting concept of ancient civilisations using solar aircraft (The Golden Condor, a huge solar-powered mechanical bird / ornithopter.) --EvenGreenerFish (talk) 02:28, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

As explained at WP:AIRPOP Pop Culture sections are no longer used in these types of aircraft articles, instead they have all been moved to Aircraft in fiction for real-world aircraft used in fictional works. You can list this there, provided that you can supply a reliable reference to go along with it. For made-up aircraft that don't exist in the real world the place is List of fictional aircraft. - Ahunt (talk) 10:59, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

Article is now substantially well-sourced

Status of improvement of references in the article, which has been an ongoing project of many over the past year or so: The article is now substantially well-sourced on all significant assertions in the article, at least at the paragraph level. (this was not the case, say, in December 2009). I have therefore removed the refimprove tag from the article. If we all work to source each new claim, and changes to the numbers, then we can keep this article in good condition over time. Cheers. N2e (talk) 22:15, 17 November 2010 (UTC)

Piloted aircraft

Looking into the Green Falcon (see Talk:Unmanned_aerial_vehicle#Firefighting, and wondering about on which article to place it, I found that this article includes UAV's aswell as piloted aircraft. I was wondering whether we should focus this article strictly on piloted aircraft and move the (electric) UAV's to a new section at Unmanned_aerial_vehicle 91.182.237.234 (talk) 14:50, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

I would think that all electric aircraft should be mentioned here, whether manned or not, they are still aircraft and thus fit the article's scope. - Ahunt (talk) 16:00, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

Article organisation

This article looks like a list of projects rather an overview of the field. It needs to be reorganised around the problems/issues/technologies. pgr94 (talk) 11:50, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

Agreed. One aspect of this is that I tried to edit the following line:

The potential of electric and hybrid-electric propulsion remains limited for general aviation heavyweight Textron Aviation as the specific energy of electricity storage is still 2% of aviation fuel.

to remove "heavyweight Textron Aviation". While the article referenced this specific company, the point is more generally applicable. Apparently the original author of this line just listed this name, and the adjective "heavyweight," from the article; but this breezy, journalistic style is not appropriate for wikipedia. My edit was later reverted. This is not a fight I care much about, but the reversion does not help the article and I invite others to weigh in if you agree.ScottForschler (talk) 00:42, 25 September 2018 (UTC)

@ScottForschler: Obviously you are not responding to a 2011 article organisation subject but about one particular adjective use. You didn't just removed the adjective (which was done 6 hours later and I was fine with that, it doesn't appear anymore) but also "Textron Aviation" - and this was the main point, Textron being the largest GA manufacturer, it does know its market.--Marc Lacoste (talk) 06:34, 25 September 2018 (UTC)

@Marc Lacoste: Obviously I was responding & objecting to both the adjective and the rest of the specific phrasing. Saying "...remains limited for Textron" implies that this particular company won't use it, but heck, maybe that's just something peculiar to their situation. However I apologize for apparently having looked only at the reversion before commenting, assuming that this was still the current text; the latter was apparently later changed to "according to Textron," which of course is unobjectionable, so the issue is resolved.ScottForschler (talk) 21:04, 25 September 2018 (UTC)

From WP:TPO : "Cautiously editing or removing another editor's comments is sometimes allowed, but normally you should stop if there is any objection." As Marc so objects, having reverted my deletion of our exchange above, I will let his mistaken description of my objections stand for all eternity, even though the original issue is resolved and hence this discussion is no longer germaine to the subsection, and indeed completely pointless. Jeez.ScottForschler (talk) 16:26, 26 September 2018 (UTC)

potential resource

Flight of the Warbots; How a save-the-earth maker of solar-powered aircraft became the world's most prolific manufacturer of military drones December 07, 2011, 11:10 PM EST BusinessWeek by Brad Stone.

99.19.45.160 (talk) 00:15, 17 December 2011 (UTC)

Ionic wind

http://news.discovery.com/tech/alternative-power-sources/ionic-wind-power-jet-engines-130408.htm

Can we have a mention of this? Hcobb (talk) 15:11, 6 June 2013 (UTC)

Electric conversions

A few factory and kit planes in civil aviation have been converted to electric. Classic example is the electric version of the Long-ez. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rutan_Long-EZ#Variants These planes aren't originally designed with electric engines and power systems in mind, but are still going to play a large part in electric civil aviation. What do you think? Worth including? Only problem is, once you include one electric variant, you'll probably have to start maintaining a list of every possible aircraft that's had it's engine swapped out. I'll check back again in 6months or so. Hopefully an experienced editor will have made a decision by then. 2.102.188.231 21:53, 19 July 2014‎ (UTC)

Diamond Aircraft DA36 E-star

worth including ? see https://www.siemens.com/press/en/presspicture/?press=/en/presspicture/2011/corporate_communication/soaxx201125/soaxx201125-03.htm&content[]=CC&content[]=IDT&content[]=Corp&content[]=PD — Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.247.149.138 (talk) 14:00, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

Notable concepts section

The aircraft mentioned in this section have no development or construction plan ongoing, these are just ideas people have thrown out for future aircraft, using future powerplants that don't exist today. There is no evidence any will ever be built; this is closer to science fiction than first flight. I think this whole section falls afoul of WP:CRYSTALBALL and should be removed. - Ahunt (talk) 20:46, 20 June 2015 (UTC)

Okay with no objections for a week now I will remove this. - Ahunt (talk) 20:11, 28 June 2015 (UTC)

I missed this discussion,Ahunt. What you did is fine, given that you had no feedback to the contrary.

However, now that I look at it, I'm not so sure. Some of the other stuff in the article (which were not listed as concepts) are clearly concept aircraft, and have never flown. And yet some concepts are notable per verifiable sources (e.g., the Puffin).

I think the WP:CRYSTALBALL guideline is more that Wikipedia is not an encyclopedia for unverifiable speculation. An example would be making a statement that concept xyz is going to revolutionize airplane design, or that concept abc will be economically important in the future, or etc. It does not appear to me that verifiable statements about conceptual constructs, by established folks with good sources is not fair content for Wikipedia. If it was, we'd have no articles on manmade, sustainable fusion reactions, or cold fusion, or space colonies, etc. N2e (talk) 14:37, 17 July 2015 (UTC)

No problem, we can always revisit these sorts of things. I thing a couple of key concepts from WP:CRYSTALBALL are "Individual scheduled or expected future events should be included only if the event is notable and almost certain to take place." and "Wikipedia is not a collection of product announcements and rumors." To my understanding these rule out listing wild ideas that some guy is planning to do some years in the future. Future aircraft need to be more than just vague plans. When they start actually building the aircraft and that gets covered then it could be added, but really not before. - Ahunt (talk) 22:40, 17 July 2015 (UTC)

Two thoughts:

1. Another editor once told me that in Wikipedia, one could have an article on a balsa wood carved scaled model of a fictional aircraft, just as long as it met WP:V and WP:GNG with reliable secondary sources. I would agree.
2. I think that this article really is better with the more narrow scope, a scope that covers just electric aircraft that have flown, and those in active development. That would just leave other notable electric aircraft concepts, or proposals vying for funding, for other articles, and not this one. It might, however, be a good idea to clarify that scope (limitation on coverage) in the lede of the article, because that is not done currently. Such a description would help keep the article in the state as currently limited by this Talk page section.

Cheers. N2e (talk) 20:35, 1 February 2016 (UTC)

I agree with your last idea there. If you want to take a crack at adding that to the lede go ahead! - Ahunt (talk) 23:05, 1 February 2016 (UTC)

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Article fork needed

This article is becoming a list of battlegrounds for aircraft salesmen. I think it needs to fork off a separate List of electric aircraft and refocus on the more general principles, history, etc. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 18:34, 18 May 2016 (UTC)

I agree!! - Ahunt (talk) 19:16, 18 May 2016 (UTC)

There has been no objection this proposal and no action yet either. I am prepared to carry this out, but wonder if Category:Electric aircraft doesn't cover and thus duplicate everything that would be in List of electric aircraft anyway? If the category suffices then perhaps we could just trim this article instead of splitting it? - Ahunt (talk) 20:23, 22 December 2016 (UTC)

A list in table form would have half a dozen or so data columns that a Category lacks, and also sortability on date, status, etc. I have forked to current list to List of electric aircraft, where it can be further tidied. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 11:00, 30 December 2016 (UTC)

Thanks for your response and also for starting the list article! Were you going to pare down this article to take out all the aircraft listed? - Ahunt (talk) 13:36, 30 December 2016 (UTC)

I would hope that only those types which have verifiable historic or technical significance will be kept - and merged into the main narrative. The rest should go. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 14:38, 30 December 2016 (UTC)

I agree with that concept. Are you going to tackle that? - Ahunt (talk) 14:50, 30 December 2016 (UTC)

As time and memory allow. I am already getting into trouble for spending time on it, ahem. There must be plenty of fanboy entries that could simply be snipped out, but I would need to check each one out first. Any help would be much appreciated. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 18:46, 30 December 2016 (UTC)

Doing Wikipedia instead of washing the Christmas dishes? I'll see if I can do some chipping away at that as well. - Ahunt (talk) 20:17, 30 December 2016 (UTC)

Now refactored. Besides my physique (Ouch!) this also apples to the article. PS thx for the barnstar. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 09:19, 3 January 2017 (UTC)

It is looking really good now, despite the "apples ". - Ahunt (talk) 16:39, 3 January 2017 (UTC)

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Electric flight training aircraft

Tell me more! What other models are out there? And why does the Spectrum article claim that "sport" aircraft aren't certified for flight training? Beisdess Pipistrel, what others are there? Are they actually flying, or still just demos at air shows? --Wtshymanski (talk) 15:55, 20 September 2017 (UTC)

There *was* Airbus E-Fan but that got cancelled. Lots of overlap with the Sunflyer, though two engines, not one. How can Bye Aerospace succeed where Airbus can't go? It would seem to be a prudent investment for an airliner manufacturer to ensure lots of training aircraft are available. --Wtshymanski (talk) 16:00, 20 September 2017 (UTC)

Specific aircraft types were all shifted a while ago from this article to List of electric aircraft because there are so many of them now that this article was flooded with them. The Bye one is not very notable, way behind the Pipistrel Alpha Trainer to market (which is already in production) and hasn't even flown yet. Even if we were still listing every electric aircraft here, it wouldn't be added until flown. Basically it's WP:NOTCRYSTAL. - Ahunt (talk) 16:02, 20 September 2017 (UTC)

Specific energy comparisons between hydrocarbon fuels and batteries

We have a couple of sufficiently sourced statements giving huge ratios between the energy stored per weight of fuel, and the energy stored per weight of battery. These are important, but the analysis used in each of the numbers are bogus because they ignore the efficiency of the engine. If I take the most recent example, Li battery 160 Wh/kg, fuel 12500 Wh/kg. But the efficiency of the electric motor and motor controller is around 80-90%, the efficiency of the pathetic old engines they use in planes is 10-20% or so (it doesn't need to be that way but that's how it is). So the real comparison is 160*.85 vs 12500*.15, taking the midpoints of the efficiencies I gave. That's about a 14:1 advantage to hydrocarbon fuels, nothing like 50:1 Greglocock (talk) 19:56, 7 June 2018 (UTC)

The best thing to do would be to get a ref for this to avoid WP:OR. I remember an article in Leeham News. To indulge in OR, I would add that electric chain efficiency is more 90%+ and batteries packaged could reach 200Wh/kg, but fuel engines are way better than 10-20%: Current Rolls-Royce engines have a 42–49% thermal efficiency and Rolls aims for 60% (propulsive efficiency is the same), so the comparison should be more like 200*.9 vs 12500*.5 (28:1).--Marc Lacoste (talk) 06:00, 8 June 2018 (UTC)

Ref found and added.--Marc Lacoste (talk) 06:12, 8 June 2018 (UTC)

I was basing my sums on the crummy engines typically used in Cessnas (best case 280 g/kWh, at the absolute optimum, generally significantly worse). Your ref says the efficiency chain for electric is 85%. I know they can be better, indeed my successful electric motor is 98.4% efficient, and motor controller efficiency is largely $$$ for better FETs. But $$$$ is the issue. Greglocock (talk) 07:44, 8 June 2018 (UTC)

For Cessnas, Lycomings reach 243g/kWh (34% efficiency) and you can get an aero diesel for 210 g/kWh (40%), 10-20% efficiency is for bad microturbines, even two stroke engines reach 425 g/kWH (19.3%). And most air passengers are moved in Airbuses of Boeings, with the quoted 42–49% efficiency.--Marc Lacoste (talk) 15:35, 8 June 2018 (UTC)

For the foreseeable future the realms where large efficient gas turbines dominate are unlikely to be taken over by batteries. Obviously. Greglocock (talk) 01:15, 9 June 2018 (UTC)

Suggestions for new additions

As an employee of Pipistrel company I would like to suggest a few additions to this article. My opinion is that some important facts are missing, but since I represent the company, I will rather list them here and the community can decide which ones should be added or not.

Under the paragraph "Light Aircraft":

• in 2007 Pipistrel announced the 2-seat Taurus Electro (maiden flight 21. 12. 2007 ) which was not only the first two-seat electric aircraft commercially available on the market, but the first fully electric 2-seater ever to fly. For this, the American magazine Popular Science listed it among 100 best innovations of 2008

• on 31. March 2015 Pipistrel unveiled the Alpha Electro (still under its prototype name WATTsUP) with the announcement news on their website The model was described in detail by many European paperback aviation magazines, scans of the articles and .pdf-s are located here:

• Alpha Electro under its commercial name entered serial production in 2017. Pipistrel presented the opening of their first production line, dedicated fully to electric aircraft, as a part of their 2017 During 2017 Alpha Electro was in a process of certification and as a part of this it was presented at EASA Headquarters in Cologne. I'm not sure how reliable source social networks are, but this is EASA's own publication . Meanwhile Alpha Electro received a Special Certificate of Airworthiness from Australia’s Civil Aviation Safety Authority (CASA) on 31. October 2017 and took first flight in Australia as a certified electric aircraft on 2 January 2018 On Wikipedia the Alpha Electro is described as a version of the Pipistrel_Alpha_Trainer#Alpha_Electro.

• The paragraph correctly states that "The first the NASA Green Flight Challenge took place in 2011 and was won by a Pipistrel Taurus G4 on 3 October 2011". In my opinion it should be added that the Taurus G4 was world's first fully electric 4-seat aircraft ever to fly.

Ymmo (talk) 09:22, 8 January 2019 (UTC)

Hello, thanks for your insights and for respecting WP:COIEDIT. Your propositions are unclear as the article text is not distinguished from the proposed text. Note that world's first [X] are borderline WP:WEASEL words. pipistrel.si as a ref is best avoided as it would be a WP:PRIMARY source, except maybe for announcements. Too much details on Pipistrel aircraft would give them WP:undue weight. Please use WP:citation templates (like {{Cite web}}) not WP:bare urls for references consistency and details. Thanks--Marc Lacoste (talk) 14:37, 8 January 2019 (UTC)

Hello and thank you for all the corrections. Since I am not really "the right person" to edit Wiki articles, I do not have much experience in the correct way of doing so. I will try to heed your warnings in the future. Just one question - if the aircraft was world's first in certain category, how can I prove it really was so? Ymmo (talk) 11:21, 9 January 2019 (UTC)

You can propose modifications here, just make it easy to understand and reuse as explained (distinguish text, cite templates). If it is difficult to prove a statement, that's maybe because it's not so important. The good way is to let the reliable sources report information. You lobbying will be more effective with usual news outlets than a tertiary source like here.--Marc Lacoste (talk) 11:53, 9 January 2019 (UTC)

I have made a major change to my primary talk. I tried to fix the links in a way as you recommended and I also replaced some links with more reliable ones (such as a .pdf scan of the actual certification document). However, you say If it is difficult to prove a statement, that's maybe because it's not so important. My personal opinion is that if an event is the first in the world it is not only important for the company, but for the entire history of aviation. I hope that a magazine such as Popular Science with its 146 years of history is a reliable enough source for this claim. Thanks.- Ymmo (talk) 13:36, 9 January 2019 (UTC)

Fixed. Adding source dates (not access dates, that's for dynamic websites) would be neat. Still, it's unclear what do you want. just state it clearly, not as if someone else is going to rewrite it. I'm feeling the importance is low, and WP:weight would be too much, and there is too much WP:primary refs. Maybe more useful in respective pipistrel aircraft articles, but not obvious for the present article. Popular Science is still a generalist magazine, almost sensationalist, with an editorial line closer to the guiness book than Nature or Science. There are better references for aircraft. "world's first four-seat" or "world first's two-seat" lies around weasel-words: what's next step? "world's first three seater with retractable gear and TCAS?"--Marc Lacoste (talk) 16:07, 9 January 2019 (UTC)

Ouch. :( Oh well, there goes my effort... And yes, I AM writing it as if someone else will have to rewrite it, because it will. I'm not allowed to, or at least, the rules state I'm "strongly discouraged from editing affected articles". So here in talk section I point out the topics which in my opinion should be changed, I state the missing or wrong information and then leave the community to decide if and in what way they will do so. All of my attempts to form the exact text for change, direct or indirect, didn't end well at all throughout all the five years I've been here. So I don't do it anymore and rather leave it to the experts. Ymmo (talk) 06:24, 10 January 2019 (UTC)

Sorry it hurts. Starting with the most important: What is wrong? Then we can study what's missing. Note nobody here should claim to be an WP:expert, some people are knowledgeable, but everyone have to rely on WP:RS. And if you want to better understand wikipedia's editing process, maybe you could try to edit areas where you have no COI. [note that I'm certainly not against Pipistrel, I personally think it's one of the most innovative and efficient light aircraft designer]--Marc Lacoste (talk) 07:30, 10 January 2019 (UTC)

Discussion on commented out refs

@Marc Lacoste: and @DoubleGrazing: Given the recent editing in this article, I thought it was time for a formal discussion on the use of "commented out refs" in aviation articles and this one in particular. I have my own issues with this practice, in particular that it is not supported or recommended in WP:RS and that it creates a lot of WP:INLINECLUTTER. I think we need a proper discussion and consensus on this practice. Shall we do it here or on Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Aircraft?

Hi, I took the practice from Wikipedia:Citations in medical articles (an essay not a policy), but it seems to be deprecated now. Wikipedia:Citation underkill#Hidden citations (also an essay) states If consecutive sentences are supported by the same citation, it is better for them to be all visibly shown. I'm okay to show them all, altough it will look like more cluttered. If needed, we can have a more thorough discussion in Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Aircraft or maybe Wikipedia talk:Citation underkill?--Marc Lacoste (talk) 08:57, 31 October 2020 (UTC)

Since you seem to be the only editor adding commented out refs like that we may not need any further discussion. If, as you note, it is deprecated then perhaps we can just slowly fix them over time as they are found in old articles. WP:CITETYPE says An inline citation means any citation added close to the material it supports, for example after the sentence or paragraph, normally in the form of a footnote and WP:CITEFOOT adds The citation should be added close to the material it supports, offering text–source integrity. If a word or phrase is particularly contentious, an inline citation may be added next to that word or phrase within the sentence, but it is usually sufficient to add the citation to the end of the clause, sentence, or paragraph, so long as it's clear which source supports which part of the text. WP:INTEGRITY also says When using inline citations, it is important to maintain text–source integrity. The point of an inline citation is to allow readers and other editors to check that the material is sourced; that point is lost if the citation is not clearly placed. The distance between material and its source is a matter of editorial judgment, but adding text without clearly placing its source may lead to allegations of original research, of violations of the sourcing policy, and even of plagiarism. That section has many more examples and additional guidance. I think in general we can just remove the "comment out" tags and leave the refs where they already are, unless there is an unbroken string of text that is all supported by one single ref, in which case the duplication of refs in adjacent sentences can be removed. - Ahunt (talk) 11:51, 31 October 2020 (UTC)

I'm going to remove the comments and to leave the refs for each sentence.--Marc Lacoste (talk) 13:14, 31 October 2020 (UTC)

Okay, sounds good. I'll leave it to you to address this particular article and I'll fix other ones as I come across them over time. - Ahunt (talk) 13:35, 31 October 2020 (UTC)

Bias, batteries and pov.

Marc - Back in the 1930s, diesel for aircraft was all the rage, and no wonder, it got much better fuel economy than gasoline engines, and so could carry less weight in fuel despite diesel fuel being heavier. However, its promise soon fizzled. It had problems. It was heavy, it vibrated, smelled funny, and many were not very reliable. The same comparisons, and the exact same problems apply with gasoline engines today, when compared to battery-powered systems. Gas engines are heavy, vibrate badly, smell funny, and aren't reliable. You should see the list of common failures afflicting the R-985, which despite your protestations is still in widespread use, along with O-235s, O-290s, and others, and turbines are not a cost effective option, either in maintenance costs or in running costs. My brother spends his working days hoping his R-985 will keep running. A case only existed in the minds of those who think the fuel is the only element, to the exclusion of all else. The weight of the batteries may exceed that of gas, but gas weighed more than diesel, and we see which one won. There are many of these engines still out there, needing to be replaced, and new certified gasoline engines can't compete with the relics in use. Hate to break it to you, but gas powered aircraft also need fuel reserves. The R-985 powered DHC Beaver, for instance, has reserves to cover a 10 minute warm up (not needed by an electric aircraft), climb to 5,000 ft (which would take less time than for the R-985 since it has significantly more power, which generally translates into an improved climb rate) and a 45 min emergency reserve - per the POH, so needing a battery reserve is irrelevant POV noise. Also, for nearly every component you add for a battery powered aircraft there is an equivalent in a gas one, that is often heavier. Fuel lines, oil lines, oil coolers, filters, extra structure, fuelproofing, fireproofing, etc. In only one area does having a load of flammable/explosive liquid on board help, as some aircraft use it with engine heat to help keep ice off the wings. One more thing, the extra power provided by the electric motors can also be used to increase the aircraft's payload, compensating for any losses from carrying batteries, and all it takes is some reinforcement on the struts and their mounts, and several other locations - which is what my sister-in-law does for a living. Indeed, once they have certified versions of the batteries used in cars which are a generation ahead of what Harbour Air is using, (not even the better batteries coming from research labs even now), and a motor whose weight is more comparable to the competition, the maximum load could be higher than for the gas version. We aren't there yet. Now I see that you have argued your POV about battery energy densities before, always as if it is the sole factor. Meanwhile no effort at all in the capacitor section. Capacitors can be discharged slowly enough to use them the same way as batteries but without the limits of charge-recharge cycles, which isn't mentioned in the battery section, but while research is now finally seeing funding, the energy density is currently much lower than for batteries - but is climbing rapidly, and we will have to see which actually peaks higher. I can only conclude from the energy you devote to preserving the severe bias in this article, that either you:

a: have an undisclosed conflict of interest (oil industry, or a company threatened by them, or are building then and don't want competition)

b: are a boomer/dinosaur/Luddite who can't deal with the world changing.

c: are horribly misinformed.

Is there a d:? - NiD.29 (talk) 11:11, 16 April 2021 (UTC)

Wow. WP:Wall of text and WP:No personal attacks. You don't know me, although I'm not anonymous and you can easily check on me. You'd be surprised on my opinions. Just be factual. Defending the electric propulsion is nice, but you have to avoid WP:OR and prefer synthetic sources, not cherry picked examples, eg: what is the average kw/kg of electric propulsion systems? what would be the % of an aircraft weight? and so on. I remember there is a good series of Bjohrn's corners in leeham news.--Marc Lacoste (talk) 11:44, 16 April 2021 (UTC)

I was asking a question, not attacking you, but if the shoe fits...

The industry average is not even close to being relevant, because it is a specific subset of the industry, specifically those with reciprocating engines.

Leeham News"? LOL, sorry, blogs are not sources. Wiki 101. See WP:UGC. Also, the comparison isn't to a turbofan, or turboprop but to the piston engines used in GA aircraft for personal flying, air taxi work, bush flying, parachute drops, tourism, banner towing, and for flight training, the very areas that battery power will win first. You misunderstood what I wrote. No-one expects electric motors and batteries to replace turbofans but an excessive amount of that section is on that one fringe use. It would be comparable to a page on global warming being 90% conspiracy nonsense. Read WP:PROPORTION.

I was talking specifically about reciprocating engines, the ones with pistons going in and out, up and down, back and forth, as opposed to spinning turbines. The largest economical reciprocating engine is the R-985, which can be replaced in some instances, but not others with a turbine. Few engines smaller than that can be replaced economically with a turbine but most of them can be replaced with electric motors and batteries with the current state of the technology - and significantly improved batteries have been announced. Nearly all electric motors for aircraft are in its range or smaller. Information is needed in the page on that, and really, little to no call beyond one line for the absurdities about replacing engines in Airbus class aircraft. My statement is common knowledge, and you arbitrarily deleted it with an incorrect assertion. I add references utterly destroying your claim and you sling bs about cherry picking, while butchering the addition into meaninglessness, so you deserved a retort. If the page doesn't discuss the primary niche that it is working in, it is incomplete and biased, and obstructing constructive changes makes you a problem. You repeatedly slammed yourself down on the scale, hard, in favour of maintaining the imbalance. - NiD.29 (talk) 15:58, 16 April 2021 (UTC)

Please keep things short, thanks. To resume to the discussion subject: could you replace the anecdotal data points you came up with synthetic data? Thanks for your concise answer, and WP:Avoid personal remarks.--Marc Lacoste (talk) 09:08, 17 April 2021 (UTC)

No anecdotes left, and all comparisons are from sources. Meanwhile, entire sections of this page are entirely devoid of sources. - NiD.29 (talk) 03:43, 18 April 2021 (UTC)

Wondering if you read ANY of the changes I made, because it is pretty clear you did not when you reverted my edits. ps - just a reminder, because it seems you need it, but you do not own this page. The templates were removed because they were no longer relevant, which you would have known had you read it, and I don't need your permission to either make changes, or delete a now obviously obsolete template. - NiD.29 (talk) 13:58, 18 April 2021 (UTC)

I came here following a Project request for more eyes. As far as I am aware, electric aircraft propulsion is a fast-changing field and opinions within the industry differ widely as to how viable different sectors might be. My best suggestion would be to avoid too much citation of anticipated trends, per WP:CRYSTAL, and stick more to the here and now; there are plenty of well-documented projects to tell the world about. This will also help reduce the risk of wildly conflicting sources. As far as the present editing conflict goes, it seems at root to be a genuine difference in perception of the sources. However, simply observing the letter of WP:AGF, WP:EW and so on is all very well, but I do find that a positive and pro-active approach to WP:CIVIL always helps. For example I always try to remember to WP:APOLOGIZE, whether I feel it technically justified or not. OK, I'll put away my pompous old git hat now. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 14:43, 18 April 2021 (UTC)

Nothing pompous about that. I got irritated because TL-DR seemed to apply to all his reversions, while he has a double standard for the cruft removed vs. useful additions. I have only really been cleaning up the first sections and haven't looked at the rest other than to glance through it for other inconsistencies, but it seems to need a lot of work to make it an encyclopedia article anyone would want to read. - NiD.29 (talk) 00:03, 19 April 2021 (UTC)

So now you see what the problem is? Any attempt to fix this mangled hatchet job of a second-language page, with more issues than any one page should have get reverted. All Marc is capable of doing is obstructing any real effort to fix this page and grossly misunderstands every possible Wikipedia rule. He is the Dalek of Wikipedia. Undo Undo Undo. It is articles like what Marc wants that give wikpedia a bad name. This isn't a difference of opionion on a few sources, this is clearly a case of WP:OWN. - NiD.29 (talk) 21:10, 20 April 2021 (UTC)

The current battery section is still biased and with a lot of original research and speculation. --Ita140188 (talk) 08:31, 19 April 2021 (UTC)

Had a quick cleanup. Any better now? — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 13:11, 19 April 2021 (UTC)

Thanks - good work, although the deleted reference in <Batteries: de-dupe cite> was the only source that gave the size of the battery. - NiD.29 (talk) 19:22, 19 April 2021 (UTC)

Wow - really Marc? Getting absurdly petty now. There was no "established" date format as they were all over the place, nor was there one form of formatting used for the references, and since most were in the cite template, which is clear you don't understand. No change affecting CITEVAR was even made - the author= link is deprecated and last= and first= are preferred unless it is an organization or is unknown. Perhaps before you quote WP:CITEVAR to justify your vandalism you should probably understand it first. The references section has a standard format regardless, and the full citation should be in bibliography, not buried in the citations. The order the items are included in the template has no effect on how they appear - but it does impact how easy they are to read, and to determine if several are duplicates, which with the names buried near the end is very difficult. The names should come first in the listing as it makes them easier to sort properly, since this citation style sorts by last names, and title if there are no names, so it makes ZERO sense to place the url first, and bury the names and title. - NiD.29 (talk) 18:52, 19 April 2021 (UTC)

Oh, and once again you made a blanket revert without even bothering to look at what you were undoing - since among others, I added a considerable number of web archive links to rescue dead links, and tracked down page numbers and other information that was missing, but it is clear you don't care about anything other than thinking you are in the right. - NiD.29 (talk) 19:00, 19 April 2021 (UTC)

Commonscat boxout

This horribly behaved thing has nowhere sensible to go. It is not a reference and placing it in there messes up the display. As an external link it is on its own. Is there a standard way to place it in these circumstances? — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 20:08, 19 April 2021 (UTC)

The rule is in the last section on the page - but is doesn't usually get its own section, although I am not sure if that is a hard and fast rule or just by convention. Would the horizontal format work better? - NiD.29 (talk) 20:24, 19 April 2021 (UTC)

Other news

The Cessna Caravan has been converted back to PT-6 as that stage of the development program has been completed, but will continue in Australia - https://www.flightglobal.com/airframers/aerotec-selling-caravan-used-for-all-electric-project/142094.article and the battery pack in the Beaver has been upgraded to a much better battery - https://skiesmag.com/news/harbour-air-goal-operating-electric-seaplane-fleet/ . They also did a study comparing noise levels - https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/magnix-continued-flight-testing-reveals-electric-aircraft-significantly-reduce-noise-pollution-301264765.html . - NiD.29 (talk) 20:40, 19 April 2021 (UTC)

Attribution

@Steelpillow: why Wikipedia:Citing_sources#In-text attribution would be bad?.--Marc Lacoste (talk) 17:06, 22 April 2021 (UTC)

Read WP:INTEXT, don't just link to it. Look for the examples with the big red crosses and avoid that kind of writing. Do it like the examples with the green ticks. Basically, the source of the citation is nothing to do with the topic they are discussing. If somebody like Burt Rutan were to make a comment and lots of WP:RS went "Hey, look what Rutan said!" then that would be different. But for your edits to date, it isn't.— Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 17:26, 22 April 2021 (UTC)

Exactly. The first examples, with John Rawls argues... is indeed the attribution inside a sentence of material to its source, in addition to an inline citation after the sentence. The later examples are for the caveats to avoid.--Marc Lacoste (talk) 18:00, 22 April 2021 (UTC)

Heavens to Betsy! The example you describe is expressly "for biased statements of opinion" such as the Rutan scenario I just described for you. We have (or should have) no such biased statements of opinion in this article, so you need to pass that one by and take on board the examples which are relevant to the material we are discussing. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 18:32, 22 April 2021 (UTC)

Indeed. This 1:50 ratio makes electric propulsion impractical for long-range aircraft is the opinion of Collins Aerospace, not an undisputable fact reported by MRO; as is the best Li-ion batteries achieved 300 Wh/kg is Roland Berger's estimate, not a fact again; more so as MTU's estimate is 250Wh/kg. MRO itself is quoting those three because there is no general consensus.--Marc Lacoste (talk) 18:51, 22 April 2021 (UTC)

Would you say they are "biased statements of opinion" with no basis in fact? If they are then you should never have added them, if they are not then the source should not be explicitly mentioned. Either way, it is out of the main content. As for the MRO material, I am sorry but I cannot recall it; could you post a diff to remind us? — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 19:31, 22 April 2021 (UTC)

Bias is only 1 in 3 cases presented in INTEXT: 1. should be used with direct speech 2. can be used when summarizing a source's position 3. should always be used for biased statements of opinion. Here, it's not a direct quote, neither an obvious bias, it falls in 2. summarizing a source's position. MRO has no opinion, it is the source magazine.--Marc Lacoste (talk) 05:57, 23 April 2021 (UTC)

INTEXT does not number its examples 1,2,3.... If you mean the second example, of Charles Darwin vs. John Smith, my Rutan example corresponds to Charles Darwin, while your named claimants correspond to John Smith. He gets the big red cross, so your claimants get the big red cross too.

This conversation is going far too deep down needless rabbit-holes. You are so tenaciously coming up with incorrect understandings of INTEXT that further discussion appears pointless.

Does anybody else have a view on whether peripheral names should routinely be mentioned in the text as well as in the citation of their comments?

— Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 09:49, 23 April 2021 (UTC)

It's not the examples but the first paragraph, presenting the use cases. You may recheck.--Marc Lacoste (talk) 04:46, 24 April 2021 (UTC)

Is the electric motors section unbalanced and does it contain original research?

Marc Lacoste or anyone,

As a layperson new to the subject I don't understand why the electric motors section is tagged. Although I see the comment "anecdotal data points, comparing an certified piston engine not produced since an long time and an experimental one, not comparing application for applications, and eluding inverter and reserve fuel weights". Please could someone explain in simple terms. Chidgk1 (talk) 17:12, 21 November 2021 (UTC)

• anecdotal data points: WP:cherrypicking some examples to make a point is misleading. The fair thing to do would be to show averages or ranges of power-to weight ratios.
• comparing an certified piston engine not produced since an long time and an experimental one the examples compare the weight of a Wasp Junior, a radial piston engine first ran in 1929(!), and an experimental Magni500 electric motor. Is it really fair? Why not comparing it to an experimental piston engine? Why not comparing with a certified electric engine? Or with a gas turbine? This is bias.
• not comparing application for applications Again, comparing an experimental aircraft, with very few operational constraints besides just flying, to a certified aircraft dedicated to a mission isn't really fair.
• eluding inverter and reserve fuel weights electric motors don't work on their own, they need an electrical inverter to feed them, of which the weight should be factored in a comparison, neither the reserve fuel weight: depending on the flight planning (VFR or IFR), an aircraft should carry 30 minutes to one hour or more of fuel in addition to the fuel required for its mission. This is mandatory deadweight, dependant on the type of propulsion selected. One hour of fuel represent a few percents of the aircraft weight. One hour of batteries can represent almost all the plane weight. This is the main limit for electric aircraft operations right now. A fair comparison should include this. The relative lightness of the motor itself is misleading when taken out of context.--Marc Lacoste (talk) 08:35, 22 November 2021 (UTC)

• Marc Lacoste Thanks for explaining. I deleted that example engine and amended the text to say "can partly offset the disparity" and also amended the last para. Is that enough to remove the tags or are there still problems? Chidgk1 (talk) 13:27, 22 November 2021 (UTC)

• Marc Lacoste Actually maybe the last para should be moved to the battery section as it is not really related to the motor? As fuel cells also consume fuel.Chidgk1 (talk) 13:56, 22 November 2021 (UTC)

Do we need sections for "weight" or "range"?

• Marc Lacoste Perhaps we need a new section called "weight" or "range"? Or two new sections? Chidgk1 (talk) 14:03, 22 November 2021 (UTC)

Charging?

I did a quick google search but could not figure it out. Could the charging section explain the difference (if any) with car charging? Chidgk1 (talk) 18:09, 21 November 2021 (UTC)

Outlanding

Under the heading "General Aviation" is the sentence: "The short range is not a problem as the motor is used only briefly, either to launch or to avoid an outlanding. "

The definition of outlanding here is unclear. Is it something specifically known in the glider community? If so, maybe a parenthetical to explain to the rest of us?

CaveShvig (talk) 15:58, 2 January 2022 (UTC)CaveShvig

Good point -  Done - Ahunt (talk) 16:47, 2 January 2022 (UTC)

Is the "shipment" section appropriate?

Giving that list its own section feels undue for now, as there is literally only one aircraft and four years of data. Would it be better if it is merged to other sections, moved to the aircraft's page, or remover altogether? —Mint Keyphase (Did I mess up? What have I done?) 03:39, 31 August 2024 (UTC)