Everything You Wanted To Know About Electric Powered Flight

[AEAJR]

I would like to bring to the attention of the readers of this e-book the work of Ken Myers, President EFO. Ken has taken this e-book, added some editorial work to it and has produced it in .pdf format so it can be downloaded.

Ken has reorganized some of the chapters, shifting the focus from the electric power system, my original focus, to create an overall guide to the new and experienced electric pilot.

This is the reason I published this in e-format rather than paper. The electronic format allows us to work together to take the work of one and build upon it. Ken, job well done.

You can find the .pdf format here. It is 49 pages and contains work by Ken as well as my own. http://theampeer.org/everything-e-power.pdf

Ken, on behalf of the electric community, we thank you for your time, effort and your contribution.

Edit: 12/3/12 - Note that this .pdf version, while very very useful is not updated regularly while the on-line articles are updated from time to time. It should still be very valuable but you may find some minor variations between the articles on-line vs. the .pdf. But the differences should not be a concern as the basic information is the same. Links may be out of date and references to costs may be out of date but the basic content is sound.

[wrather1]

Very nice compilation - that's an awful lot of typing!

Great job, and thanks!

[AEAJR]

A lot of typing is nothing compared to the time to write it all. Believe me, I know.

One article can take 10-30 hours. Multiply that by the number of articles and you have hundreds of hours invested in the articles themselves.

Then Greg took them, edited for spelling, grammar and reorganized them to present the content in a different logical flow from how I posted them here. Then he finally formatted the whole thing.

There is a lot of work and a lot of time in this thread and a lot of time invested in the downloadable .pdf file.

Hopefully people will benefit.

[watergirl]

Thanks for all of the info, I'm looking to get my son involved in flying and this is a great resource!

[LCRob]

This is a great read!
"Everything You Wanted To Know About Electric Powered Flight"
is also in another thread but is longer.

Can someone tell me where I can find the E-book or .pdf file?

thanks,

[Turner]

The link is in post #51 above.

Here it is:

http://theampeer.org/everything-e-power.pdf

[AEAJR]

Originally Posted by LCRob

This is a great read!
"Everything You Wanted To Know About Electric Powered Flight"
is also in another thread but is longer.

Can someone tell me where I can find the E-book or .pdf file?

thanks,

Glad you found it useful.

[LCRob]

Originally Posted by LCRob

Can someone tell me where I can find the E-book or .pdf file?

Thanks, got it. Much easier to read this way..

[Mattjito]

This is great info. Thanks. Very hand forums.

[Dimeflyer]

It helps to be able to keep all this info onhand to quick reference if you aren't in front of the cpu to type in the ref.!!!!
Thank you to much !!!!
George

[Porkchop]

Mr. Anderson,
Wonderful posts. I am an old time nitro flyer who is getting into electric. Your article has helped me immensely.

[AEAJR]

Glad you found the book useful.

[wemetrc]

questio I have a Super Cub with Float and
the question is I am on the lake ready to take off and when i have full trutle the plane swing to the right still on the water so I have to cut the power and I dont see were my problem is ther is no water in the right foat the test run at slow speed is oh right and left
if youhave a tip to resolve myproblem I would appreciate
thank you

[AEAJR]

Sorry, that is out of the scope of this discussion. I would suggest you post this in one of the huge Super cub discussions. Likely others have flown the cub off the water.

[moorinee]

Ed,
Your comment on the Electrics Tutorial Course you wrote was that it may not satisfy Engineers.
Well, I hold a Master's Degree in Electrical Engineering from Johns Hopkins University. I think you did a great job on writing that manual. Too many engineers want to make things more complicated than need be.
Your explanations are correct, concise, with realistic examples.
I am just entering Electric RC Flying, and my mentor sent me right to your post.
Elmer

[Dimeflyer]

I'm still trying to get the time to read it guys -I printed it out but it's sitting on the shelf in my craft room that I never get to use any more ?
George

[flymess]

What a fantastic resource for newcomers to this exciting sport/pastime/obsession. Thank you for your knowledge and your willingness to pass it on. You have taught me just about everything I now know on the subject. (except which shop to trust, they're all salesmen you know!-) Cheers from OZ.

[AEAJR]

Glad you guys found this helpful

[Dimeflyer]

I'm still trying to find time to read it ?!?!
Maybe tomarrow evening ???
George

[TLudeke]

I'm new to electric and this series of articles is extremely helpful. Thank you.

In the second article you state: "A 1100 mah pack has double the capacity of the 650 mah pack, so it should
last "about" twice as long."

Is that math correct? (2 x 650 = 1,300)

[AEAJR]

You are correct. My math was wrong.

[AEAJR]

ESTIMATING BATTERY RUN TIME

Since this comes up so often it is worth posting by itself.


CALCULATION METHOD

Note that a 1300 mAH pack = 1.3 AH pack

m = mili which means 1/1000. Just two ways of expressing the same number.

Capacity in AH / amp draw X 60 = minutes of run time.

1.3 AH / 8 amps = .1625 hours

.1625 X 60 = 9.75 minutes at 8 amps.

This assumes you use up all the useful battery capacity, not that you are running the battery to zero voltage. It also assumes that the battery can actually deliver its total rated capacity before the LVC, low voltage cut-off, kicks in to keep you from running it too low. See the end for more on this.

Normally you don't run at full throttle all the time. For mixed flying that is probably more like 15 minutes. I usually estimate mixed flying time at 150% of the calculation but your actual experience will differ based on how you fly.

When estimating useful flying time out of a pack, be conservative, then watch it over several flights to get your true number. This calculation is for planning purposes.

If you are sizing a power system for a plane, part of that sizing should include the duration of the battery pack.



QUICK ESTIMATE METHOD

Above is the more precise way to calculate run time. However I usually use this quick estimate method.

If the battery can delvier 1.3 amps for one hour then it can deliver 13 amps for 1/10 of an hour ( 6 minutes )

In this example, we are only drawing about 2/3 of that ( 8 amps) , so the run time will be about 1/3 longer than 6 minutes, about 8 minutes. Just a quick estimate method I use. Not as exact, just a quick approximation that I can do in my head.

However, your actual run time will vary by battery quality, how hard you are pushing the pack, the LVC setting on the ESC and how much time you spend at what throttle setting.

For example, if you run your 20C pack at 20C you will get greater voltage sag then if you run it at 10C. The greater voltage sag will cause you to hit the LVC sooner than if you run the same pack at 10C.


THE EFFECT OF C RATING ON PACK PERFORMANCE

While several battery packs may be "rated" at a given C rating we can see significant variation on how well they actually work at this rating. The higher priced, higher quality battery packs tend to be better at running at this extreme end of their abilty. The lower cost packs may not live up to that rating quite as well. But it can vary from brand to brand and pack to pack.

I typically don't plan to run my packs at greater than 80% of their stated C rating. So if that 1.3 AH pack I used in the example ( possibly a Radian pack for example ) is rated at 15C then you would expect it could run at 15 X 1.3 amps or 19.5 amps and maintain a good voltage of 10.5 to 11.1 Volts for most of its useful capacity. Well some can and some can't.

I would look at that pack and say that I would plan to never run it sustained at more than 15 amps. This would put less stress on the pack and give me more useful capacity in the range that I want.

If you are running in a situation where you only need full power for short bursts, like a 30 second full power climb followed by running most of the time at about 2/3 throttle, than the pack might handle 19.5 amps quite well for those short bursts.

Some packs have sustained ratings and peak ratings. I ignore the peak ratings.

To understand more on batteries see chapters 5 and 6.

[LipoPilot]

What an incredible piece of work. Thank you for your time taken to do this.

[AEAJR]

Thanks you Lipo Pilot. Please share this with others who might find it useful.

[kenrcatt]

Hello All
I am new to electric, but have been flying a long time.
I have been reading the Great Articals by Ed Anderson, very helpfull.
Just wanted to say keep up the good work.

kind regards
Ken
Dover UK (It some times stop raining)