NASA Puffin Low Noise, Electric VTOL Personal Air Vehicle
Sign in to YouTube
Sign in to YouTube
Sign in to YouTube
Uploaded on Nov 11, 2009
Conceptual design focusing on the ability of a redundant electric propulsion system to provide new capabilities for Vertical Takeoff and Landing aircraft. Specifically utilizing electric motor variable rpm to accomplish a low tipspeed prop-rotor (400 ft/sec tip speed at hover and 200 ft/sec at cruise) to accomplish an order of magnitude reduction in community noise for close proximity operations (30-40 db reduction). The variable rpm capability also achieves a 25% improvement in prop-rotor efficiency through operation at optimal advance ratios.
-
Category
-
License
Standard YouTube License
Loading...
Loading...
Loading...
Loading...
-
6:01
A Plane You Can Park in the Garage: The ICON A5by FORA.tvFeatured
357,534
-
3:00
Fabrication of Low Cost NASA Personal Air Vehicle Conceptby NASAPAV
174,034 views
-
3:47
NASA Five Person VTOL Business Jetby NASAPAV
141,775 views
-
0:58
NASA Spiral Duct ESTOL Conceptby NASAPAV
511,307 views
-
0:42
Dual Spiral Wingby NASAPAV
170,011 views
-
VTOL
4,235 videos36
-
3:46
SkyFly Personal Ultralight VTOL Aircraft!by Mark Rumsey
286,454 views
-
19
videos
Play all
X - Space Scienceby ihometech
-
1:22
***********MIKE! YOU'RE THE MAN!***********by polishedbrother
876,769 views
-
1:21
DARPA/Boeing DiscRotorby theworacle
995,510 views
-
5:00
Alien Jump Jet the coolest new aircraftby taoistflyer
5,178,123 views
-
0:17
Crazy Mirage F1 Low Passby Aviation
1,014,550 views
-
10:02
THE STORY OF THE HARRIERby RADLETT2
895,543 views
-
2:38
Eclipse 400 - a 1,35 million $$$ personal jetby Varnenski Glarus
605,922 views
-
3:38
Why We Don't Have Flying Cars, Yetby Mark Proffitt
1,584,927 views
-
5:02
Voo de Instrução Paratrikeby Ricardo Chapolim
266,424 views
-
2:47
NASA Samarai hybrid-electric VTOL personal-aircraft conceptby theworacle
77,440 views
-
7:58
VTOL GFS-short NEWby GerbinoFlightSystems
61,484 views
-
1:45
Aesir Coanda-effect VTOL UAVby theworacle
662,006 views
-
2:38
Dean of Invention- The Puffin - Personal Flying Machineby Planet Green
392,136 views
-
1:09
NASA Puffin Electric VTOL1/3 Scale Initial Hover Testsby NASAPAV
38,182 views
-
3:04
NASA Goes Hypersonic - Scram Jetby bry3500's channel
3,124,330 views
- Loading more suggestions...
Uploader Comments (NASAPAV)
manofsan 10 months ago
I've seen a number of small turbofan projects on Youtube. If you do a search for "RC turbofan" you'll find various videos.
Have you considered that a pair of small gas-powered turboprops or turbofans could work well for the Puffin concept? At least they'd have a higher power-to-weight ratio than electric motors with batteries.
Sign in to YouTube
Sign in to YouTube
NASAPAV 10 months ago
No you really don't want to attempt to apply JetCat or other small turbines - it would be a terrible match up. The fuel consumption on these small turbines is terrible, the reliability is terrible, the required gear reduction would be huge and the gear box weight would be large. The better idea, which we are looking at is the use of a small turbine to directly spin an alternator at very high rpm (so the alternator is very light), and for that electricity to then directly power the prop motor
Sign in to YouTube
Sign in to YouTube
NASAPAV 10 months ago
By doing this, the battery weight could be made very small as only a backup short duration source. Essentially the turbine/alternator becomse a very light 'battery', even when you account for the fuel weight. We are specifically looking at applying a new turbine/alternator developed for DARPA that can burn heavy fuel (bio-fuel) and use a recuperator to increase the efficiency. But small turbines have a long way to go - I'm anxious to apply them if we get them working, but in the right way
Sign in to YouTube
Sign in to YouTube
manofsan 10 months ago
I see - but isn't that 2 conversion steps instead of one? Fuel --> Electricity --> Mechanical
What about small Wankel rotary engines? Those tend to have pretty decent power-to-weight ratios.
Sign in to YouTube
Sign in to YouTube
NASAPAV 10 months ago
Yes, and going to electric has at least 5% penalties in each direction with even the best advanced electric motors. But that is still better than attempting to have these small turbines directly turn a low rpm shaft. You realize the differential in rpm is at least 40x? What do you do to throttle - these little turbines can't perform well off the one design point. By connecting to a high speed alternator you can optimize for running at a single speed efficiently and reliably.
Sign in to YouTube
Sign in to YouTube
NASAPAV 10 months ago
Now for rotaries - ugh. Have you run one? I have for UAV projects - small rotaries are almost as much of a pain in the ass as small turbines. They drink fuel, make a crap load of noise, have a glowing red hot exhaust, and have seal maintenance problems. They spin at crazy high rpm 10 to 15K that require a gearbox. Yes,the gearbox is easier on a rotary because the gears are only being beaten up by the prop instead of both the prop and recip engine with intermittent loads.
Sign in to YouTube
Sign in to YouTube
Top Comments
NASAPAV 1 year ago
Really? Do you know what the Lift/Drag ratio is for a helicopter? Between 4 and 5 - incredibly inefficient devices. Do you know what the L/D of this aircraft is? At 100 mph it's 17.5, at 150 mph it's 14.5. So about 4x the aerodynamic efficiency. Do you know how complex a helicopter rotor is and why heli's are so expensive? The hub mechanism on this is incredibly simple and low cost. Sorry, not quite...
Sign in to YouTube
Sign in to YouTube
LWJCarroll 1 year ago
I suspect thatg during flight face down, holding your head up will cause a fatigue problem (sore neck) , hence a recumbent position for the pilot would be better.??...Laurie
Sign in to YouTube
Sign in to YouTube
Video Responses
All Comments (609)
DeathofaGasGuzzler 1 month ago
I want one of these! ;)
Sign in to YouTube
Sign in to YouTube
vladimirpanovru 2 months ago
Шея будет болеть!
Sign in to YouTube
Sign in to YouTube
projectdelta50 3 months ago
Now how the fuck do you get out of it
Sign in to YouTube
Sign in to YouTube
bruzote 3 months ago
The pilot had better hope the A/C and defogger systems don't malfunction. That flying bed with a sunroof would overheat people rather quickly on a sunny day.
Sign in to YouTube
Sign in to YouTube
7013032 4 months ago
I can imagine count Dracula flying this thing :D
Sign in to YouTube
Sign in to YouTube
Illus Wing 4 months ago
flying coffin
Sign in to YouTube
Sign in to YouTube
galipblj06 5 months ago
Deffinately a bad idea for civilian use. The crashes would be baaad
Sign in to YouTube
Sign in to YouTube
Stefano La Commare 10 months ago
That there is one hell of a claustrophobic, uncomfortable ride...
Sign in to YouTube
Sign in to YouTube
Edjean Dorvil 10 months ago
Dear Santa,
Sign in to YouTube
Sign in to YouTube