The Otto Aviation Celera 500L

[AggieMike88]

https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zo...volutionary-celera-500l-aircraft-may-fly-soon

More than two years after The War Zone was first to report on a mysterious bullet-shaped aircraft appearing at the Southern California Logistics Airport near Victorville, a refined version of the plane has conducted taxi tests and looks to be getting close to its first flight. Even though much about its design and purpose remain unclear, we do know now that the aircraft, which is called the Otto Aviation Celera 500L, is definitely focused on potentially game-changing high-efficiency flight that has the potential to disrupt the aerospace marketplace.
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The author also comments on the patent claims...

The patent goes on to describe a notional aircraft that would cruise between 460 and 510 miles per hour at an altitude of up to 65,000 feet, yielding a fuel efficiency rate of between 30 and 42 miles per gallon. To put this in perspective, the Pilatus PC-12, a popular light, single-engine turboprop aircraft has a service ceiling of 30,000 feet, a cruising speed just under 330 miles per hour, and still burns, on average, 66 gallons of jet fuel per hour, for a fuel economy of roughly five miles to the gallon. Even going to a Learjet 70, which has similar speed performance to what's stated in the Celera patent documents, but still nowhere near as high a ceiling, we are talking about roughly three miles per gallon of gas at cruise. So, Otto Aviation is talking about performance that is at least 10 times more efficient than existing light business jets with similar cruise capabilities.

 

[Velocity173]

500 hp in an airframe that big. My prediction is 230 kts cruise at FL250...and they’re gonna scrape the crap out of that bottom stinger.

 

[GeorgeC]

Who flies first, Celera or Raptor?

 

[Piperonca]

My prediction is 230 kts cruise.

With 130 kts stall speed.

 

[donjohnston]

Who flies first, Celera or Raptor?

Celera.

 

[Velocity173]

I don’t know, I think the Raptor might fly with the next couple weeks. I believe they said their test pilot was to show up this weekend.

 

[GeorgeC]

Celera.

Well, at least there will be Otto Pilot jokes.

 

[iflyvfr]

Piaggio Avanti.

 

[donjohnston]

I don’t know, I think the Raptor might fly with the next couple weeks. I believe they said their test pilot was to show up this weekend.

There are just too many unproven components on that plane. The engine being the biggest, IMHO. I don't know enough about that redrive system, but a single belt driving the prop seems... something. And not a good something. If he had gone with a Continental or Lycoming, I think they would already be flying.

 

[MountainDude]

A propeller at 65,000 ft?

 

[GRG55]

The patent goes on to describe a notional aircraft that would cruise between 460 and 510 miles per hour at an altitude of up to 65,000 feet, yielding a fuel efficiency rate of between 30 and 42 miles per gallon.

That anybody actually believes this is a testament to the decline in our public education system.

(btw, I believe I have a 100 mpg carburetor somewhere in the basement. Fits any pre-'73 Oldsmobile or Buick, as I recall. It's a real collector's item because the oil companies apparently bought up all the rest of them. )

 

[Datadriver]

I don’t know, I think the Raptor might fly with the next couple weeks. I believe they said their test pilot was to show up this weekend.

The test pilot looked at the Raptor this weekend and took a pass - Peter posted a long video on YouTube with the details yesterday.

 

[Velocity173]

The test pilot looked at the Raptor this weekend and took a pass - Peter posted a long video on YouTube with the details yesterday.

Yep. Just got done watching it. Bit of a setback. Three main issues. 1) possibly some aero elasticity with the winglets/ tip sails being so long. 2) possible pitch control issues with the Fowler elevator. 3) single ECU.

 

[Chris Scherry]

I'm not sure how you get that goofy looking egg off the ground with one propeller on the backside

 

[steingar]

And if me mum had wheels she'd be a wagon.

 

[3393RP]

Piaggio Avanti.

An overinflated Avanti!

 

[FormerHangie]

I have to think that the propeller on that one will be seeing a terribly disturbed airflow.

 

[donjohnston]

And if me mum had wheels she'd be a wagon.

I think you meant "bike".

 

[Tantalum]

This thing reminds me of the Lear Fan... a cool bird but ultimately was a failure due to fuselage crack pressurization issues and the FAA not liking the reliability concerns of the two turboprops feeding via gearbox into one drivetrain

 

[Kenny Phillips]

500 hp in an airframe that big. My prediction is 230 kts cruise at FL250...and they’re gonna scrape the crap out of that bottom stinger.

The stinger needs a wheel grafted on to it.

 

[Kenny Phillips]

Yep. Just got done watching it. Bit of a setback. Three main issues. 1) possibly some aero elasticity with the winglets/ tip sails being so long. 2) possible pitch control issues with the Fowler elevator. 3) single ECU.

All minor issues, and easily solved with hope and wishful thinking.

 

[Kenny Phillips]

A propeller at 65,000 ft?

All turbofan jets are essentially propeller driven, and routinely fly in the fifties.

 

[Kenny Phillips]

Piaggio Avanti.

The Avanti is fast, reliable, beautiful, and available. That last one is kind of important.

 

[GeorgeC]

https://www.bbc.com/news/business-48630656

 

[Tantalum]

"Even assuming huge advances in battery technology, with batteries that are 30 times more efficient and "energy-dense" than they are today, it would only be possible to fly an A320 airliner for a fifth of its range with just half of its payload, says Airbus's chief technology officer Grazia Vittadini."
Yup..

Why you will only ever see this as a niche product for local routes.. a novelty really

How much down time does Cape Air plan to have between flights?

I also wonder what kind of considerations have been made for the source of the electric energy charging the planes .. most of our energy in the United States come from gas, oil, and coal.. so no free lunch. And while it may be cheaper now, I can imagine that if all our planes start being charged up from the grid we will see differences in pricing for the that

No free lunch!

Cool to see the tech though

 

[Tantalum]

It flew: https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zo...ry-aircraft-you-have-never-heard-of-has-flown

 

[Piperonca]

It flew: https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zo...ry-aircraft-you-have-never-heard-of-has-flown

Pics or it didn't happen

 

[3393RP]

This thing reminds me of the Lear Fan... a cool bird but ultimately was a failure due to fuselage crack pressurization issues and the FAA not liking the reliability concerns of the two turboprops feeding via gearbox into one drivetrain

View attachment 74957

One of the three Lear Fan test articles is hanging from the overhead structure at the Frontiers of Flight museum, which is located near the threshold of 31R at KDAL. When Bill Lear passed away before the prototypes flew, the program was thrown into uncertainty from which it never recovered.

Please indulge me in my journey into thread drift.

The FoF collection has expanded greatly over the years, and one of my favorites is the Chance Vought V-173 "Flying Pancake". It's been beautifully restored, and while looking it over, one realizes that test pilots employed to fly designs cooked up during WWII weren't paid enough.

The aircraft weighs 2,248 lbs and is powered by two Continental A-80 flat fours that produce 80 HP each. One wonders how those tiny engines were able to turn the huge 16' diameter propellers. I suspect every takeoff roll made during its brief career was quite exciting.

The workmanship is flawless. The handcrafted wooden propellers are works of art. Could these monsters even be duplicated today? So many aeronautical construction skills have been lost forever.

The spacecraft located next to the V-173 is the Apollo 7 command module, the first Block II module to fly, the first manned Apollo flight, and the first flight after the tragic January 27, 1967 fire on pad 34B which claimed the lives of astronauts Gus Grissom, Ed White, and Roger Chaffee. The mission was accomplished by Walter Cunningham, Walter Schirra, and Donn Eisele in this spacecraft between October 11 and 22, 1968.

 

[Matthew Rogers]

As a woodworker, I could recreate those propellers given time and the standard cost of aviation parts ($10,000 per blade). Those were certainly hand shaped and finished. Just a matter of taking it slowly and working a larger blank down to correct shape.
Having made spars for the Tiger Moth, the originals were not always perfectly made, so it is possible to make new ones “better than new”. A matter of going from a factory product to a custom product.

 

[steingar]

Does anyone know why this War Zone site has such a hard on for this aircraft?

 

[flightwriter]

Does anyone know why this War Zone site has such a hard on for this aircraft?

Just a WAG, but I get the impression that Rogoway (whose writing I enjoy) has succumbed to the Mojave mystique and the lure of being the first to break a "revolutionary" aviation story that no other industry publication (that I've seen) is paying much heed.

Odds are this experience will show him why that is.

 

[Kenny Phillips]

A propeller at 65,000 ft?

Yep. Heck, every biz jet flying in FL500+ has a propello\er. We call it a 'fan', but that's what generates most of the go power.

 

[wanttaja]

A propeller at 65,000 ft?

During my ~40 year career in the aerospace biz, I only worked on two aircraft projects, both for a short time.

The first was a high-altitude small aircraft. We were actually subcontracting the airplane to Schweizer, and the design had a lot of glider heritage in it. Had twin booms, kinda like a svelte low-wing C-119.

One version was manned, using a PT-6 and intended to fly at 45,000 feet.

The other was a UAV intended to fly at 65,000 feet...with a Continental O-200. Actually it was a Continental IOL-200, which, I believe, is what the Voyager around-the-world airplane used. I was told that the PT-6 had cooling issues that high up, and that it was thought the liquid-cooled engine would handle it better.

Ron Wanttaja

 

[asicer]

The other was a UAV intended to fly at 65,000 feet...with a Continental O-200.

What was sea level HP and what was it in cruise?

 

[wanttaja]

What was sea level HP and what was it in cruise?

Don't know...just remember it was an IOL-200, same engine that was used on Voyager. Don't remember a lot of the details, and Schweizer was doing the aircraft design work.

Ron Wanttaja

 

[Doc Holliday]

This thing reminds me of the Lear Fan... a cool bird but ultimately was a failure due to fuselage crack pressurization issues and the FAA not liking the reliability concerns of the two turboprops feeding via gearbox into one drivetrain
]

You do know that twin engine helicopters have two turbines feeding via a gearbox into one drivetrain.....and they're FAA certified.

 

[nauga]

You do know that twin engine helicopters have two turbines feeding via a gearbox into one drivetrain.....and they're FAA certified.

I suspect it wasn't so much *any* 2-to-1 gear/drivetrain as it was that specific implementation. It's dim memory and as such will remain unspoken, but I vaguely recall some of the details of the issues which lead me to understand it was not 'fear of the unknown' that prevented cert.

Nauga
and the devil in the details

 

[zaitcev]

A propeller at 65,000 ft?

Yeah, who could have thought.
https://www.airbus.com/defence/uav/zephyr.html

 

[Kenny Phillips]

You do know that twin engine helicopters have two turbines feeding via a gearbox into one drivetrain.....and they're FAA certified.

Soloy also make little 2:1 units for Cessna Caravan (Dual-Pac).

 

[Tantalum]

I'm

You do know that twin engine helicopters have two turbines feeding via a gearbox into one drivetrain.....and they're FAA certified.

I'm not the FAA and that's the reason Lear gave for why it didn't work out.