Search results

Yes, that's why I suggested battery tech would have to improve. If they could get 2+ hour endurance including reserve, that would be enough in many cases for an airplane to fly its whole route and back to base with VFR reserve before needing to recharge. We're not there now, but it's not beyond...

That makes sense, unless they're able to extend the battery life. I wonder, however, if there's an advantage in dispatch rate. Electric planes do have to recharge for an hour or so between lessons, but with their simpler powertrains, they should also be available much more often, rather than...

Harbour Air in Vancouver is another interesting example. Their conversion of a DHC-2 Beaver to electric propulsion was more of a publicity stunt than a meaningful prototype, but it is true that they have a business where 10–20 minute flights make up a lot of their operations, flying people and...

My understanding (not a chemist or engineer) is that degradation in li-ion battery capacity is primarily linked to charge cycles, not calendar time. So if you're using your EV to commute 150 km round trip to work every day and then plugging it in every night, the capacity will fall sooner than...

Thank you for that clear explanation. So if I'm IFR in the US, I'm already within a TAA, and I hear "cleared for the approach" with no other instructions attached, then I can immediately descend below my previously-assigned altitude to the appropriate TAA altitude? (In real life, of course, I'd...

You make some great points about EVs and battery tech in the rest of the post, but "tremendous amount of power" sounds like a red herring. Pipestral's fast charger draws a maximum of 20 kW for each plane while actually charging; a high-end clothes dryer or convection oven draws 5 kW. So a flight...

At least Canada and the U.S. both give altimeter settings and wind speeds the same way — no QNE vs QNH vs QFE alphabet soup for the altimeter, and no wind speeds in metres per second — so we generally manage to avoid leaving smoking craters in each-others' runways. :)

I think there are certain niches they could take over fast, like short flights (fire patrol, inter-community hops, etc) up north where avgas is hard to find and there are no roads, or even initial flight training if it turns out that the cost difference is really enough to give a flight school a...

In Canada that would mean the same thing, because direct SOMFX and crossing it at 3,000 was part of the approach clearance. I'm talking about when they say just "cleared for the XXX approach" with no other instructions at the same time. Ideally, with your example, a Canadian controller would...

And, just to be clear, an approach clearance in the U.S. doesn't cancel any previous heading or altitude restrictions? Fortunately, that's never come up for me flying U.S. approaches, because ATC has always been more explicit (maybe they're used to Canadian callsigns in the U.S. Northeast and...

There are lots of small details that can cause confusion between countries. For example, the first time I flew to the U.S. (VFR) 18 years ago, I was shocked to hear that tower was clearing more than one airplane to land on the runway at the same time, and actually asked for clarification because...

If Canadian ATC says "cleared for the XXX approach" with no other instruction, then all heading and altitude restrictions are canceled and you are expected to begin descending to the minimum usable IFR altitude (typically MSA), and join the approach in an expeditious manner, which may mean...

Unfortunately (and I don't think I've seen it in this thread), a lot of people get the comparison wrong, because they cite the total energy density of batteries vs avgas, which isn't a meaningful comparison for two reasons: An ICE engine — especially the older tech in our planes — is lucky if...

Absolutely — please don't assume this is a "pilots in country X are better than pilots in country Y" thing. My point is only that "cleared for the approach" (without any other instructions) just happens to have a simple and clear meaning in Canada, which seems to be a bit different from the...

My takeaway from this thread is that while "cleared for the approach" by itself is perfectly standard (and well-understood) in Canada, if I ever hear it when I'm flying in the U.S. again after the pandemic, I'll query the controller and ask for clarification.

That's just it. The Pipistrel Velis Electro has two batteries that weigh >150 lb each. Do we really expect an 18-year-old line guy or harried instructor to hoist those out and hoist charged ones in, in just a few minutes between lessons, maybe 5–10×/day without damaging the plane, failing to...

Really, there shouldn't be a debate. Whatever you believe about the theoretical limits of battery tech, it's extremely improbable that we'll see an all-electric plane with the speed, load, and endurance of a high-performance ICE single in the lifetime of anyone reading this thread. On the...