Low-altitude economy is a comprehensive economic form that takes various low-altitude flight activities of various manned and unmanned aircraft as the traction and radiates the integrated development of related fields. At present, the main products in the low-altitude field are eVTOL, unmanned aerial vehicles (consumer grade, industrial grade), helicopters, traditional fixed-wing aircraft, etc., but the hot low-altitude economy in recent years is mainly due to the leading development of eVTOL.
On April 22, 2024, the Vertical Flight Association, the world's leading non-profit organization dedicated to advancing vertical flight, released the latest edition of the World VTOL Catalog, in which the number of electric aircraft eVTOL concepts has exceeded 1,000 and has been designed by more than 430 designers. When the world's first eVTOL symposium was held in 2014, the number of known eVTOL projects at that time was only about six, 100 in July 2018, 200 in September 2019, 400 in January 2021, more than 600 in January 2022, 800 in April 2023, and the 1,000th work was added in April this year, the Doroni Aerospace H1-X two-seat personal eVTOL aircraft.
Historically, it takes 7 to 9 years to develop a new aircraft, and in the field of electric aircraft eVTOL, domestic and foreign players are trying to shorten its development cycle, which is also accompanied by a large amount of capital investment, according to a statistic from NASA, electric aircraft from concept design to complete product development certification investment of up to 1 billion US dollars, so the global electric aircraft participants have experienced multiple rounds and a large amount of financing, and led to including European and American civil aviation, the United States Air Force, European and American car companies, Cooperative development in many industries, including carbon fiber composite material suppliers.
As of the beginning of 2024, more than 20 provinces (autonomous regions and municipalities directly under the central government) have written the relevant content of the low-altitude economy into the local government work report in 2024, and according to a statistic, as of 2023, there are 17 electric aircraft eVTOL original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) in the Asia-Pacific region, including as many as 10 in China.
Due to safety and energy efficiency considerations, there is an urgent need for lightweight and novel design concepts for electric aircraft eVTOLs, such as carbon fiber monocoque fuselages. Representative applications of carbon fiber composites in electric aircraft eVTOLs include:
- 1) Main structure: including fuselage, wings, rotor shells, landing gear, and various control structures such as flaps, rudders, elevators and ailerons
- 2) Propulsion system: including rotor blades, propellers and nacelles
- 3) Internal structure: including wall partitions, seat backs, storage compartments, floors, and door and ceiling covers
- 4) Panels, covers, and communication applications: including access doors, cargo boxes, antennas, and antenna covers
- 5) Power system: battery rack and battery box
For more knowledge about the characteristics of carbon fiber composites in the field of electric aircraft, the characteristics of carbon fiber materials and representative applications, you can read the previous article "The Next Growth Point of Carbon Fiber: Comprehensive decryption of typical applications of advanced composite materials in electric aircraft systems at all levels》 (Read https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s?__biz=MzU3MTY0MDgyNA==&mid=2247501766&idx=1&sn=4e77dbac42fac469f19646153dbc873a&chksm=fcdf9951cba81047f7872cd1c4d06fd5ac6c36240c88ddb3c196813e34595eb0260c5f776073&payreadticket=HHkQ4DpfFs8oJGAWWksuN-y_6VMsuY5-P6DgtGkTuYTJdsoLolTMgDlu8GLmG9nnocGb428&scene=21#wechat_redirect).
According to statistics, at present, a large number of carbon fiber composite materials are used in the structural materials of foreign electric aircraft, and the aviation-grade carbon fiber composite products that have been finalized by Toray of Japan, Hexcel of the United States and Solvay of Belgium are the main products.
At present, the carbon fiber composites used in electric aircraft are still dominated by carbon fiber thermoset composites, and some companies' products such as the Joby electric aircraft use the traditional autoclave process with higher costs, but with the subsequent increase in the productivity of electric aircraft and the expected large-scale production after 2040, carbon fiber thermoplastic composites will be used in large quantities.