Author: Chen Chen
Wang Hanyang, the founder of the open source autonomous flight framework GAAS, once described the common narrative in the early days of Speed: “A group of people wasted resources to do something that is doomed to be hopeless out of madness or ‘flickering’.”
Moeller and his flying car｜Photo Network
In the past few months, eVTOL (electric vertical take-off and landing aircraft), which is often referred to as a “flying car”, has been extremely active.
There are more than 260 projects engaged in eVTOL development worldwide. Toyota, Uber, and Tencent have deployed one after another. A number of domestic start-up companies including Weihang Technology, Volant, and Time have received financing, and overseas Joby, Lilium, and Archer have been successfully listed. …
At the end of October, Xiaopeng Huitian announced the hiring of Li Ming, the former deputy chief of the National Defense Science and Technology Key Laboratory. Not long before, it just set the mass production time of the new generation of aircraft in 2024, and raised 500 million US dollars to become the industry “unicorn” in the A round.
After repeated hopes and disappointments, eVTOL has once again opened up people’s imagination to three-dimensional travel. The favor of capital and more and more participants seem to herald a revolution in transportation. The eVTOL craze that occurred during this period is not a matter of course, but in fact some preparations have already been made.
Technology development brings new possibilities
“There used to be a helicopter tour project along the Huangpu River, but it was later called off because of the noise.” This example is often used in the opening of eVTOL introductions.
Helicopters rely on a huge rotor to provide lift. “The noise generated when a single rotor rotates at high speed is precisely at the frequency that is enough to annoy everyone.” And if the rotor fails, it is easy to crash directly. It can be seen that the single-rotor configuration cannot meet the safety and low noise requirements of urban flight. These two points are also the advantages of eVTOL over helicopters.
The configuration of eVTOL mainly includes multi-rotor and multi-duct (ductfan), the “multi” setting is to provide safety redundancy. Multi-duct is currently mainly in the verification stage. Most of the eVTOLs that have been produced currently use the configuration of multi-rotors. The reason is that multi-rotors have been verified on UAVs and have more applications.
The multi-rotor structure was designed by the British George Kay during the Opium War, but it was always at a disadvantage in the early competition with helicopters. The mechanical structure of the multi-rotor is simple, but controlling several rotors at the same time, sensing and adjusting the attitude has extremely high requirements on the accuracy of the sensor. This problem has not been solved in the first few decades.
Benefiting from the development of electronic technology, processors can gradually meet the computing requirements of multi-rotors, and the miniaturization of sensors has become possible. The preference of cybernetics experts for multi-rotor direct drive mode has further promoted the development of flight control technology.
In 2005, Arduino-based open source flight controllers were released, and the subsequent open source flight controllers APM (ArduPilotMega) and PX4 came out one after another. The drone industry has exploded, while the technology is still advancing, accumulating, and looking for new application opportunities on eVTOL.
Distributed Electric Propulsion System (DEP) is another decisive technology in reducing noise and improving safety.
The distributed propulsion system is a power system composed of multiple motors and flight controllers, which can better manage the operating conditions, and like multi-rotors, it also provides a certain degree of safety redundancy: even if one or more motors fail, the vertical take-off and landing aircraft Can still maintain the flight.
In addition, the distributed propulsion system converts the energy of the engine and provides it to several fans, propellers or other devices distributed on the wings or fuselage to generate power. It can be integrated into the airframe structure, optimize the flow field around the airframe, greatly reduce fuel consumption, reduce emissions, while reducing the weight of the aircraft, reducing drag and noise.
In 2009, Joe Ben Bevirt, who studied under Moeller, founded Joby Aviation. It has been nearly 20 years since he judged that the teacher’s dream had no technical conditions and left the flying car. After returning to the flying car industry for many years, some people say that it was some key technological developments that made him see the possibility.
“Technology Spillover” of Electric Vehicles
In addition to the emergence and maturity of the above-mentioned technologies, the smart electric vehicle industry is a more concentrated technology spillover pool, providing a more mature upstream industry of three electric systems, parts, intelligent systems and corresponding hardware equipment for the research and development of eVTOL. Chain preparation.
When asked about the relationship between eVTOL OEMs and the upstream supply chain, an investor in the eVTOL industry felt that, in terms of order, it must be that the main engine precedes the supply chain. “This is the same as Tesla’s big sales, and then the three electric car companies in China have risen, and your era has become very powerful.”
After Tesla has made a breakthrough in the field of smart electric vehicles, new forces are also eager to try, especially with the support of policies of various countries, the smart electric vehicle industry is booming.
As the intelligent electric vehicle industry enters a period of rapid development, the “three powers” have also become an important track in the field of parts and components. Supply chain companies and car companies have seen opportunities and have also increased their investment and application in high-power motors, high-density lithium batteries, and autonomous driving technologies.
Take batteries as an example. While cooperating with many suppliers, Tesla also self-developed and produced power batteries to promote technological innovations such as diaphragms and electrolytes. The Promise 4680 battery released at the end of September this year can increase the energy density by 5 times while improving the cost. The battery is currently being trial-produced in Japan.
Tesla’s 4680 battery without pole ears｜Tesla
In addition to the improvement of performance, the expansion of the use of new technologies and the increase of participants, production costs and prices will also decrease accordingly. According to the observation of the aeronautical engineer Theodore Wright, every time the output of lithium batteries is doubled, the cost will be reduced by 10% to 15%.
Whether it is performance improvement or price reduction, eVTOL has benefited a lot.
Gordon Moore, one of Intel’s founders, predicted that the number of components that can be accommodated on an integrated circuit will double approximately every 18-24 months, and performance will increase, while the cost remains the same. Doubled. The “Moore’s Law” that summarizes the speed of information technology progress has also been verified by facts time and time again.
“Any technology can become an exponential technology as long as its’power’ rises and its price continues to drop.” The rapid advancement of the IT industry is like this, and the development of power batteries and three-electric systems also demonstrates their potential. .
Regardless of whether it is in electric vehicles or eVTOL, what is more innovative and valuable is that some exponential technologies begin to merge and interact with each other.
The powerful computing power spawned by the artificial intelligence revolution, the carbon fiber and alloy materials in material science, and the intelligentcell phoneSensors, global positioning, visual imaging in war…In eVTOL, we can see the shadow of many technologies.
EVTOL, which has undertaken and integrated various technologies, is also developing new technologies based on it. Such as the aerodynamic design technology of tilting wings and ducts, and a new type of hydrogen fuel cell using a new proton conductive membrane.
In the opinion of Chen Zhijie, academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering, “the normalization of technology cross-domain integration will bring more possibilities for the management and development of low-altitude airspace.”
The next question is: how will technology merge in the future? Which industry will be the new export? How will the speed of technological evolution and the potential for subversion develop in the next stage?
Perhaps we can adopt a bolder “Moore’s Law”.
Aviation industry ushered in “electrification”
“The development of everything is inseparable from the background of the times”, this is what the history teacher taught us. In addition to the analysis of the path of technological evolution, the prefix “e (electric)” of eVTOL also gives it more possibilities for interpretation.
The most profound and far-reaching development trend in this era should be “energy saving and emission reduction.” In this context, as “electrification” enters the production and consumption process of all walks of life, the transformation and upgrading of the energy structure is inevitable.
Global car companies are accelerating the “electrification” process. Volvo announced that it will only sell battery electric vehicles from 2030; Jaguar plans to only produce all-electric vehicles by 2025. All models of Jaguar and Land Rover brands will provide pure electric vehicles by 2031. Electric version; General Motors announced the construction of a second battery plant; Mercedes-Benz is seeking to develop its own batteries; Volkswagen announced that it will invest about 60 billion euros in the next five years to develop next-generation technologies such as electrification and digitalization.
Following digitization, the aviation industry is also entering a new round of electrification revolution.
Rolls-Royce “Spirit of Innovation” completes its first flight in the UK｜Photo Network
When Rolls-Royce (hereinafter referred to as “Rolo”) put forward the concept of “EVTOL” at the Farnborough International Aerospace Exhibition in the United Kingdom, it regarded it as an important part of the “advocacy of electrification” strategy.
At the 26th United Nations Climate Change Conference held a few days ago, Rolls-Royce demonstrated the “mtu zero-emission fuel cell system” for the first time. Prior to September, Rolls-Royce’s “Spirit of Innovation” fully automatic aircraft successfully flew for the first time, and the advanced batteries and propulsion technology developed for the project can be applied to eVTOL and commuter aircraft.
Electricity-driven eVTOL is an important symbol of decarbonization in the aviation sector. The emission reduction needs and difficulty of the aviation industry also give investors the opportunity to invest.
Under the general trend of energy structure transformation, not only electricity, but other sustainable energy sources are also creating development opportunities for each industry.
There are many shadows of car-making forces in these opportunities. Volkswagen announced that it will invest 40 million euros by 2025 to build solar and wind power plants in Europe. Xiaopeng Motors recently announced that its distributed photovoltaic project in Zhaoqing, Guangzhou has been successfully connected to the grid.
Will eVTOL use other “new energy sources” in the future, and how to “reducing emissions” while “energy saving” will develop into the next proposition.
“Flying Cars” Waiting for Breakers
In 2016, Uber released the “Elevate” urban air traffic white paper, and plans to start UAM operations in 2020. At the end of 2020, Joby acquired the “Elevate” project. At this time, the founding team of the project has already gone to different things, but the two complementary concepts of eVTOL and UAM have been circulating in the capital market and disseminated to the public.
Industry insiders comment: “Uber’s greatest achievement or contribution to the eVTOL industry may be the creative combination of eVTOL, a simple aviation technology with UAM application scenarios, and the creation of an extremely A grand narrative.”
Regarding the future traffic scenes after eVTOL, some aircraft manufacturers have described and rendered many times. The idea of saving commuting time and even changing the existing transportation network structure, thereby changing the urban form and business life, is undoubtedly exciting and even transformative.
Xiaopeng Huitian imagined the future use of flying cars | Xiaopeng Huitian
However, after experiencing the initial curiosity, the public’s attitude towards “flying cars” is more skeptical. The two most common words in related news reviews are “painted pie” and “circle money.”
“The promotion of technology to society depends on the level of society’s use of technology.” Only the more users, the greater the contribution of technology products to society.
Many eVTOL companies have publicly determined the time nodes for mass production and commercialization, but how far is it from their planned commercialization to the real entry into our lives?
When an investor was asked about his investment expectations on the eVTOL track, he said, “In 25 or 26 years, there are excellent companies, no matter who they are, do it.” “When the time comes, we will look at the most suitable What is the scene like?”
Peter Demandis, the author of “The Future Is Roaring”, said: “The best way to foresee the future is to create it.” eVTOL is waiting for a breaker like Tesla.
Reference article:
“Leaving the Ground in the Past Ten Years: From a Flying Camera to a Flying Car”, Wang Hanyang
“Why do people believe in flying cars”, Wang Hanyang