Yi-Hang, Airbus, and Volocopter are all racing to provide consumers with passenger drones. As an engineer, I am fascinated with the concept, but is it practical? Transportation is a must in our busy society. Traffic jams, stop lights, speed limits, and long commutes chip away from people’s precious time. Any time saving transportation would be beneficial.
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Flight Time:
If it wasn’t for lithium ion technology, drone technology wouldn’t have progressed as fast as it has. The Ehang drone boast a 23-minute flight time. Not too bad, but what about the return flight? Battery technology would need to improve. The difficulty is not providing enough power to lift people, but having enough power to sustain flight for extended periods of time. Eventually, power density will improve as the battery industry demands drive technological advancements.
Acceptance:
Ultimately, it is up to the public to get over the fear of using a new technology that could result in death if failure occurs. Only 5 percent of US adults surveyed said they would feel safe in a drone.
Failsafe:
Airplanes have the inherent ability to glide even if the engines fail. Helicopters can glide when they lose engine power by a method called autorotation which can allow the helicopter to keep the rotors spinning during decent allowing the helicopter to glide. Drones don’t have any inherent glide capabilities. The failsafe is redundant thrust motors and redundant battery packs. If a motor or circuit were to fail, computers would initiate an emergency landing procedure.
Piloting:
Airplanes and helicopters require highly trained pilots to fly. Drones however rely on computers to balance many thrust motors to control elevation, speed, pitch, roll, yaw, etc. Even if a drone had a manual control, flight couldn’t be accomplished without computers.