New energy technology provides a new idea for flying cars
Electrification makes vertical take-off and landing, distributed propulsion possible,
Intelligence lowers the barrier to entry for operating a flying car
Democratization is possible
Flying cars, so close and so far
Reporter/Yang Zhijie
Published in China News Weekly on November 22, 2021
In 1940, Henry Ford, the founder of Ford Motor In the United States, made a high-profile prediction, "Remember my words: the combination of airplane and automobile is about to come out." You may smile when you hear it, but it will come. But Henry Ford did not wait for the advent of the flying car era in his lifetime, and for a long time afterward, the concept remained in the science fiction and wizarding world.
But recent developments in many flying cars are sending a signal to the outside world: flying cars seem to be about to "fly" into reality. In late October, Xiaopeng Motors released a concept video of the sixth generation of Xiaopeng Huitian flying cars, which can realize the integration of flight and land travel. Founder He Xiaopeng said that the flying car aims to achieve mass production in 2024, and the sales price is controlled within 1 million yuan.
"EHang 216" conducted a manned flight demonstration at the Digital China Construction Summit. Photo/Courtesy of respondents
Not only Xiaopeng Motors, but also flying cars are becoming a new outlet for many startups, car companies and aviation giants around the world to compete for layout. In this round of stories, urban traffic congestion is getting worse and worse, and urban air traffic represented by flying cars is the new solution. Several manufacturers have designated around 2025 as an important time node, and flying cars will be commercialized. German consultancy Roland Berger predicts that by 2050, 98,000 flying cars will be flying in the air in 95 major cities around the world.
But compared to the optimism of tech companies, some industry experts believe that the future of flying cars should remain "cautiously optimistic." Before large-scale promotion, the technology, regulations and systems related to flying cars are the first problems to be solved by the industry.
Two booms in flying cars
Flying cars have been hot in the recent past, and Zhang Yangjun has a deep understanding. In mid-September, he attended the "Third World New Energy Vehicle Conference" in Hainan, where flying cars were the most talked about topic besides chips. The conference even held a themed summit dedicated to flying cars to explore solutions and development prospects.
At the meeting, The chairman of the summit, Zhang Yangjun, made a speech on "Research on the Development of Flying Vehicles and New Energy Power Technology", a professor of the School of Vehicles and Vehicles of Tsinghua University, the executive deputy director of the State Key Laboratory of Automotive Safety and Energy Conservation, and has been focusing on flying vehicles since 2010. The Great Wall Aero Engine Innovation Center is the first national collaborative innovation platform in the field of aero engine design in mainland China, and recently, relying on the School of Vehicle and Vehicle Delivery of Tsinghua University, a new aviation power sub-center was established, specializing in the study of flying cars and aviation new energy power, and Zhang Yangjun served as the director of the sub-center.
The sudden upsurge in the concept of flying cars stems from a recent wave of investment. In early September, Shanghai Shi Technology, which developed manned eVTOL (electric vertical take-off and landing vehicle), announced that it would complete two rounds of financing within one month, totaling tens of millions of DOLLARs, less than four months after the company's establishment. On September 18, Fengfei Aviation Technology, another eVTOL product R&D manufacturer in Shanghai, completed a round of financing of US$100 million, setting a record for the largest single financing obtained by a domestic eVTOL company at that time.
The record was quickly broken a month later. On October 19, Xiaopeng Huitian, an ecological enterprise of Xiaopeng Automobile, announced the completion of more than 500 million US dollars of A round financing, with a pre-investment valuation of 1 billion US dollars. In early November, Beijing Weihang Technology completed an angel round of financing of tens of millions of yuan, which is committed to providing power propulsion technology support for urban air-efficient travel flying vehicles. Not only in China, since August, the United States eVTOL manufacturer Joy Aviation, the German eVTOL manufacturer Lilium, and the American flying car company Archer have successively listed on the backdoor, and the market value has increased significantly, causing concern.
This isn't the first time flying cars have been sought after. Zhang Yangjun told China News Weekly that in 2016, Uber Elevate, the air taxi division of Uber in the United States, released a white paper proposing the concept of "urban air transportation" (UAM) (UAM), believing that three-dimensional space can be used to alleviate urban traffic congestion, and the solution is to develop flying cars such as airbuses and air taxis.
On November 6th, the audience visited the flying cars in the auto exhibition area of the 4th CIIE. Figure/New
For a time, the concept of UAM was detonated. Zhang Yangjun noticed that at that time, about 40 companies in the world came up with plans for flying cars, and even some companies began to accept orders. The most concerned is the acquisition of Terrafugia, an American flying car star company, by China's Geely Automobile in 2017. Terrafugia, which means "escape from the ground" in Latin, was founded in 2006 and has launched two generations of flying car products, and after being acquired Chinese called "Taili Flying Car". In addition, Daimler, Toyota, Hyundai, GM, Volkswagen, Aston Martin, Rolls-Royce and other car companies, as well as aircraft manufacturers Boeing and Airbus have also begun to lay out flying cars. Tech companies Intel and Tencent are even involved in developing or investing in flying cars.
Venture capital is also targeting the eVTOL space. According to statistics, in 2016, there were 15 related investments around the world, with a total amount of nearly $130 million, and by 2020, 13 investments raised more than $1.1 billion, mainly concentrated in Joby and Lilium.
Proponents are betting on the future, arguing that flying cars could provide new solutions to intractable urban traffic congestion. More importantly, advances in technology have made people see the feasibility. Over the past 100 years, generations of dreamers have tried to put wings on cars and fly safely in the air, all of which have failed. Zhang Yangjun introduced that around 2017, new energy technology provided a new idea for flying cars, electrification made vertical take-off and landing, distributed propulsion possible, intelligent improvement of safety, lowered the threshold for operating flying cars, popularization became possible, "electrification, intelligent technology appeared, the design of aviation aircraft is a revolution."
Four years later, the technology and application scenarios of flying cars gradually became clear. Xie Jia, senior vice president of Shanghai Fengfei Aviation, introduced to China News Weekly that in the past two years, electric vertical take-off and landing aircraft, whether it is batteries, motors or electronic controls, including distributed generation and other technologies have matured a lot and have been widely used. In addition, the eVTOL of many manufacturers at home and abroad has been put into use in scenarios such as tourism, logistics and transportation, medical emergency, and fire emergency, resulting in a relatively large outbreak in the industry this year.
Zhang Yangjun noted that there was a voice controversy about whether flying cars are the future trend, and this year the industry has reached a consensus on this, turning to discussion on "how to achieve breakthroughs in technology and applications". In the new round of scientific and technological revolution and industrial change, the cross-border integration of technology and industry has become an important development trend, and the flying car is the intersection of the three major fields of automobile, aviation and new energy, and it is also an important application scenario for new materials, artificial intelligence and a new generation of information technology in the future. Car companies and aircraft manufacturers do not want to miss the opportunity to lay out future industries, and the research and development of flying car technology, "dimensionality reduction" can also be used for their respective industries, which is a "cost-effective" investment.
Battery safety is more important than battery life
In the movie "Blade Runner 2049", the police car that takes off in the air freely shuttles through the urban space, which is the imagination of many people for the future flying car. But at present, the mainstream flying car, there is no four-wheeler, no chassis, the essence is only an autonomous aircraft, not a "car" at all.
Taking The Chinese eVTOL company EHang Intelligence as an example, the appearance of the manned eVTOL "EHang 216" is a two-seater cabin with 8 axes and 16 propellers underneath, like an enlarged version of a multi-rotor UAV. The manned eVTOL, which Joby Aviation is developing to provide air taxi services, looks like a small helicopter with six rotors on top and can carry up to four passengers in addition to one pilot. These are two common shapes of flying cars today.
Therefore, it is collectively referred to as "flying cars", which is controversial in the industry. Zhang Yangjun explained that it is called "flying car", because eVTOL is oriented to urban air traffic, the scale is large, and the traditional aircraft is not an order of magnitude, and the future will exist in the order of magnitude close to the car. The scale of general aviation aircraft is small, and the distance from people's lives is far, which is difficult to attract attention and attention. Secondly, the industrial chain of eVTOL relies on automobiles, and flying cars must be produced on a large scale in the future, which must be low cost, and its production and supply chain must make full use of the automobile industry. In addition, the current eVTOL is only a stage of development of flying cars in the future three-dimensional intelligent travel era, and it will also have ground driving functions in the future.
eVTOL is the mainstream technology solution of the current flying car, the aircraft does not need a special runway, can take off and land like a helicopter. Geely's Taili Flying Car generation TF-1 also uses the traditional taxi take-off, looks like a small aircraft, after landing through the folding wings into a car, but its second-generation products have also been changed to eVTOL. "Flying cars are vehicles for urban air traffic and future travel, and sliding is limited by urban space, and it is certainly not the way to fly cars in the future." Zhang Yangjun said.
eVTOL has other advantages. Compared to the huge noise of helicopters, the eVTOL new energy engine is quieter. According to reports, the take-off and landing noise of eVTOL is about 70dB, and the cruising noise is about 50dB, which is much lower than that of helicopters with take-off and landing and cruising noise of about 140dB and 90dB, respectively. In addition, electrification makes distributed propulsion possible, the current development of flying cars by various enterprises, have multiple rotors or propellers, Intel and German flying car manufacturer Volocopter cooperation in developing a product, even has 18 rotors, compared to helicopter single rotor, eVTOL safety redundancy is higher, propulsion efficiency has also been improved, experts say "is three times the helicopter." After electrification, the structure of the flying car is simplified, which can achieve lower cost of the flying car.
But there are still many technologies to be broken, and like the current electric vehicles, the eVTOL released by many domestic and foreign companies also has endurance anxiety. At present, a number of companies have launched test flight products for eVTOL. EHang intelligent pure electric manned autonomous vehicle, the maximum load of 220 kg, the maximum range of 35 kilometers, the recently exhibited two-seater manned autonomous vehicle VT-30, the design range of 300 kilometers, endurance of 100 minutes. The recently exhibited Traveler X2 by Xiaopeng Huitian has an endurance time of 35 minutes and a maximum speed of 130km/h. Fengfei Aviation's V1500M has a cruising speed of up to 200km/h and a maximum range of 250km. Foreign flying car companies are no exception, and Joby Aviation's aircraft recently achieved a range of more than 241 kilometers, lasting 1 hour and 17 minutes.
The short range and flight time of the flying car stem from the lack of battery energy density. EHang Intelligent told China News Weekly that battery technology is an area of great concern to the entire industry. The battery technology of aircraft is more complex than that of automobiles, requiring batteries with high energy density, high power density, wider temperature range and high safety. Autonomous vehicles require a high discharge rate of the battery to support the take-off and landing of the aircraft, and also consider the impact of battery weight on the aircraft.
Shen Haijun, a professor at the School of Aeronautics and Mechanics of Tongji University, further explained that unlike automobiles, from the perspective of mechanics, aircraft have very strict weight requirements, and electric vehicles can be equipped with larger battery packs, but aircraft cannot, so the industry needs to break through in the direction of high energy density of batteries.
In Zhang Yangjun's view, in terms of batteries, what is more important is the safety issue - the use of new energy power in flying cars will bring new aviation safety issues such as electrical safety, thermal safety, and hydrogen safety. Although various flying car manufacturers have expressed their emphasis on safety and accumulated data after many test flights, Zhang Yangjun believes that the safety design and seaworthiness research on key components such as motors, batteries and electrification systems in the industry is very lacking, and the existing electrification systems need to do a lot of work to meet the safety requirements of the navigation level.
"I think that in the current situation of facing many bottlenecks such as rules, the application of flying cars should carry things first and then people." Logistics is the best scenario for the current demonstration application of flying cars, which can achieve large-scale applications while the requirements for safety and so on are relatively low. The data and experience accumulated in logistics applications will provide an important basis for improving the safety of flying cars. Manned demonstration applications, starting from professional special fields such as emergency rescue and then moving to the field of mass transportation, may be a more suitable way of manned demonstration applications. Zhang Yangjun told China News Weekly.
Industry insiders believe that ground traffic is mixed with people and cars, in contrast, the air traffic environment is simpler. However, Zhang Yangjun stressed that the meteorological environment will seriously affect the safety of low-altitude flights. For example, when a small manned aerial vehicle is running, a sudden gust of sidewind nearby may affect safety, and these microclimate environments are difficult to perceive.
"Flying cars to really achieve popularity, like the cluster control of civil aviation, that is, it is useless to have people on the ground, how to deal with sudden changes in the climate and environment, I think is the biggest safety challenge facing flying cars." How sensors perceive, make decisions and manipulate, to be solved by technology, this is the focus of the next step. Only automotive companies and startups may not have the technical conditions and need more researchers to solve it through technology. Zhang Yangjun said.
Aerial regulation will be a conundrum
In 2010, Zhang Yangjun visited the Shanghai World Expo-GENERAL MOTORS Pavilion and was attracted by an animated video depicting the city's intelligent transportation in 2030, one of the most important means of transportation. "It's like a very small payload compartment, people use mobile phones to locate, call a car, after take-off, all the orders in the ground and air are automatically paired according to the line, and the cars of the same line converge into a train, and when they arrive at the destination, they separate." The car in the video is a collection of electrified and intelligent shared means of transportation, Zhang Yangjun and his peer professors discussed the traffic after 2030, believing that after electrification and intelligence, the next step of the car will be land and air integration. Since then, he has become more concerned about flying cars.
But flying cars aren't just as simple as cars flying into the sky, and once realized, they will disrupt the way humans travel. Zhang Yangjun believes that at present, flying cars are still in the early stages of moving from research and exploration to commercial application, and the popularization of flying cars is not a problem of two products, nor is it just a matter of enterprises, it is closely related to policies, involving flying car design and manufacturing, airworthiness certification, urban management and low-altitude airspace management, etc., and it is necessary to study and formulate corresponding regulatory standards and regulatory systems.
Just as ground traffic has traffic lights, different lanes, and traffic rules, the future of flying cars into reality also needs to have waterway planning and regulations, in addition to ensuring flight safety, low-altitude flight also involves protecting the privacy of residents, but there are currently no laws and regulations for urban air traffic in the world.
Shen Haijun mentioned that China's laws and regulations on airworthiness certification for flying vehicles are still blank. In addition, China's airspace control is the strictest in the world, in the past by the Air Force supervision, with the reform of low-altitude airspace, some areas open low-altitude pilots, but in reality, the supervision is more stringent, in addition to the civil aviation department control, the public security department also joined. In recent years, it is difficult to declare UAV flights, and if the future flying cars are integrated into ground transportation, they also need the management of the traffic management department, and air supervision will be a problem. In the future, flying cars will be integrated into ground transportation, or will change the existing road system, how to adjust and transform, will also be a huge system engineering.
The relevant domestic authorities have begun to formulate some standards. EHang introduced to China News Weekly that EHang is the first pilot unit approved by the Civil Aviation Administration of China for the airworthiness of manned autonomous vehicles, and is cooperating with the Civil Aviation Administration to formulate airworthiness certification standards.
Although the standard has not yet been issued, many flying car companies have rushed to set a clear commercialization time node. Joby plans to achieve commercial service in 2024, Xiaopeng Huitian claims to mass-produce flying cars in 2024, which can run and fly; Lilium plans to achieve operations in 2025. Xie Jia once mentioned that there is a consensus in the industry that there is hope for eVTOL to be commercialized within five years.
"Commercialization means that the company's ability to provide some airborne human mobility services, such as lines between some key traffic nodes in the city, or replacing the role of helicopters on very congested lines, is not a large-scale popularization, and may have a significant increase in penetration." Xie Jia told China News Weekly. Before 2025, what eVTOL has to do is to continue to test flights, accumulate flight data, and obtain manned airworthiness certification.
Academic attitudes toward flying cars are cautiously optimistic. Zhang Yangjun predicts that in the future, flying cars will go through three main stages, and in 2025, flying cars can achieve demonstration commercial operation, logistics, fire protection and emergency rescue are the recent application scenarios. It is expected that around 2030, the era of urban air traffic will be ushered in, and the technology and application scenarios in this period will give priority to supporting the air flight function attributes of flying cars and highlighting the advantages of flight mode. With the cross-border penetration and integration of automobile and aviation electrification and intelligent technology, the continuous development and improvement of intelligent transportation facilities, the ground driving functional attributes of future flying cars will be realized and strengthened. Perhaps, in the future, all cars will fly up and achieve three-dimensional intelligent travel by around 2050.
Duty Editor: Wang Lin