Captain Piccard's Solar Impulse starts runway testing
By Vlad Savov 
posted November 24th 2009 6:41AM
posted November 24th 2009 6:41AM
posted November 24th 2009 6:41AM
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It's finished, yet they will wait 2 more years? or did I miss something?
@Jean I would probably give it a bit of testing before jumping onboard for flying around the world
Make it so.
@dicobalt ...by Daedelus. Great song.
Nice knowin' ya.
Sky, the final frontier
JET?
What are the four fans on the front for then, to cool passing birds?
Anyway, an Electric Jet? what would it use as reaction mass?
@DaveJO. ...And here was me thinking I was the only one anally retentive enough to comment on the fact there are no jets on this aircraft. Keep up the good work DaveJO!
@DaveJO - yes, "Jet" should be fixed.
@DaveJO Maybe this is one of those things where all planes are called jets. Like how it is in some states when you order a coke:
"Can I have a coke?"
"Sure, what would you like?"
"Root beer please."
"Coming right up."
"Nice jet, what's the propulsion system?"
"Electric motors."
"Nice. You'll save a ton of money on jet fuel."
@DaveJO
That's the first thing I thought as soon as I read this. Kudos.
Not good enough, dammit. NOT GOOD ENOUGH!
@stephend
"How long?"
"20 minutes, Sir"
"20 minutes?"
Enemy UAV is online....
Counter-UAV up
Its mission: To seek out the friendship of Al Gore and other alien life forms. Boldly going where no solar vehicle has gone before.
If you move fast enough, the sun doesn't go down.
@John Stracke
Can that thing really move that fast though? If you start at a point, you would have to circumnavigate the Earth in 24 hours to be able to continuously see daylight. Worst case scenario is you start at a point 7am at sunrise, make the trip in 36hours (24+12 hours) and land at 7pm the next day, just as the sun is setting. That still requires you to go 691mph. That thing must have some battery back up to allow it to fly overnight.
@John Stracke +++++ for you lolol
@John Stracke
that would mean going 40,075.02 km in about 36 hours (start in the morning and end in the evening) or 1113 kmph. Not happening with that little thing!
@John Stracke hmmm. It takes a commercial airliner about 6.5 hours to go coast to coast in America... which is three times zone... which means the sun "travels" the same distance in three hours.
So this thing is twice as fast as a commercial airliner? Wow those four 10 hp "fan-cooled" electric "jet" engines must be something.
To keep up with the sun you have to fly about 900 mph. Not going to happen in a propeller-driven plane (all sorts of crazy things happen when you try to go faster then the speed of sound on a propeller driven aircraft).
It has a 400kg lithium-polymer battery pack to provide power at night.
Mach 1.5 would be about fast enough. Not in this plane though.
I'm impressed.....
Absolute Name WIN
@abracadvr8 Yeah, probably not; I was just trying to be funny.
dig, dig...right, here's the Wikipedia entry:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_Impulse_Project
Top speed is 70 kph (!); they've got LiIon batteries in the wings. The plan is to make five legs of 3-4 days each, switching pilots for each leg.
@John Stracke
I figured you were being facetious. I just remember a reddit thread where someone was hypothetically asking how fast to continuously travel in daylight. That's actually impressively fast, since it only weighs the size of a car.
And why the heck aren't my own comments showing up to me...
THERE ARE FOUR LIGHTS!
@tylersmyler
awwww that was meant for the "sun not going down" comment
Not a jet.
@(Unverified) wow. four posts ended up in the wrong thread. Unlikely that four people in a row clicked on the wrong "reply" button.
Guess this bug hasn't been fixed with the "new improved" engdaget.
I used Firefox for my post, what about the rest of you?
@tmarks11 and the bug just keeps on rolling, since this was in reply to the four comments parked under Jeepers above.
Stop making your website pretty, and FIX the broken comment system already!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I have a simple two step plan for you.
Step 1: FIX
Step 2: IT
Got it?
@(Unverified)
I'm guessing they only take off on sunny days, and once you break thru the clouds, stay with the sun and fly as long as you want. As for descent, just glide on down...
Hopefully in ten years solar panels will become more efficient to be able to put this technology on a Cessna sized personal plane. I would like one of those.
The $20-$40 per hour in fuel would add up after a while.
@rcappo
you actually believe solar panels are able to substitute $20-40 in fuel every hour?
It seems like this solar powered airplane works, so it is replacing the gasoline with solar panels. They just need to design it like a fighter jet or B-2 to get more surface area and a shorter wingspan.
And, just as solar panels aren't 100% efficient, neither is the burning of fuel.
@(Unverified)
i did some calculations, if you put a lot of solar panels on a plane you would have 10m^2 of them and if we assume that in 10 years we will have solar panels with 100% efficiency (but we won't), they could produce 12 kW of power.
gasoline contains 8.89 kWh/liter of energy so
@(Unverified)
you seem to own the other Unverified. well done
When sun goes down..the plane goes down as well! :)
Title Fail: Should read "Captain Piccard's Solar Impulse Engages runway testing".
> When sun goes down..the plane goes down as well! :)
Yes, but slowly. With that much wing area, even weighing as much as a medium-sized car, it should have a pretty good glide ratio.
We had solar planes for over 20 years now. I would like to see one that could carry passengers.
Solar panels have increased in efficiency, newer materials have become lighter and stronger, and motors have become faster and more efficient.
Good luck with your first meeting with tubulence....
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NASA_Pathfinder#Crash