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The project involves professionals from the Faculty of Engineering of the National University of La Plata (UNLP) and the company Aviem Aeronautics. The AVIEM 100 Epower is a two-seater experimental aircraft.
AVIEM 100 Epower, the first electric aircraft developed in the country by professionals from the Faculty of Engineering of the National University of La Plata (UNLP) and the company Aviem Aeronautics, made its first experimental flight nearly three weeks ago in the town of General Rodríguez, in the province of Buenos Aires.
According to UNLP, the three-blade propeller craft uses lithium batteries, weighs about 750 kilos and has the capacity to transport a payload of 180 kg, that is, two people.
With a flight range of one hour, it is designed for a niche market in pilot training courses.
According to the manager of AVIEM Aeronautics, engineer Ernesto Acerbo, during training flights, "a student has a maximum performance after half an hour and from there he begins to decline. After 45 hours he has to be taken off the plane because the next thing he does is do everything wrong."
Regarding the experimental flight, Acerbo said: “We have to consider that we are doing something we rarely do, which is that when we build a new aircraft, the engine has already been tested. And here everything is new, the design of the aircraft and the engine with a totally new installation.”
“We had considered that the aircraft could maintain flight with about 45-50 kW and it is maintaining it with 35 kW. This means that it will have a much greater autonomy at the time that we had calculated. It is much more efficient than we had thought,” he said.
The flight had the corresponding authorization from the National Civil Aviation Administration (ANAC). |
