Rolls-Royce To lead EU’s New Clean Aviation project UNIFIED To Transform And Decarbonise Aviation
The title of this post the same as that of this press release from Rolls-Royce.
These two opening paragraphs add a few details.
Rolls-Royce has been selected by the European Union’s Clean Aviation programme to lead one of 12 groundbreaking new projects aiming to decarbonise aviation. These initiatives, which include new aircraft concepts and innovative propulsion technologies, will receive funding of about €945 million.
The Clean Aviation Joint Undertaking (CAJU) is the European Union’s leading research and innovation programme for transforming aviation towards a sustainable and climate neutral future.
I asked Google AI about the European Union’s Clean Aviation programme and received this reply.
The European Union’s Clean Aviation programme, part of the Horizon Europe research initiative, is a public-private partnership aimed at developing disruptive, climate-neutral aviation technologies, including hydrogen-powered, hybrid-electric, and ultra-efficient aircraft, to achieve net-zero emissions by 2050. Launched in 2022, it has a budget of €4.1 billion (€1.7 billion from the EU, €2.4 billion from private partners) and focuses on technologies that will be integrated into a new generation of short- to medium-range aircraft with a target entry into service by 2035. Key goals include a 30% reduction in CO2 emissions and energy efficiency compared to 2020 standards for new aircraft by 2030, with a long-term objective of climate-neutral aviation by 2050.
Note.
- Only someone like Trump would think that the key goals in the last sentence were not worthwhile.
- €4.1 billion in the right place could be a very good start.
- There is a Clean Aviation web site.
The press release says this about the UNIFIED project.
UNIFIED – Ultra Novel and Innovative Fully Integrated Engine Demonstrations
The UNIFIED consortium is led by Rolls-Royce and contains key industrial, academic and research partners across France, Germany, the Netherlands, Norway, Spain and the United Kingdom. Subject to successful completion of grant preparation, the project will enable ground testing of an UltraFan® technology demonstrator at a short to medium range thrust class for future narrowbody aircraft and also enable the preparation of key activities towards future flight test of the UltraFan architecture.
I am not surprised Ultrafan is mentioned.
The Wikipedia entry for the Rolls-Royce Trent has a section about the UltraFan, which starts with these two paragraphs.
The UltraFan is a geared turbofan with a variable pitch fan system that promises at least 25% efficiency improvement. The UltraFan aims for a 15:1 bypass ratio and 70:1 overall pressure ratio.
The Ultrafan keeps the Advance core, but also contains a geared turbofan architecture with variable-pitch fan blades. The fan varies pitch to optimise for each flight phase, eliminating the need for a thrust reverser. Rolls-Royce planned to use carbon composite fan blades instead of its usual hollow titanium blades. The combination was expected to reduce weight by 340 kg (750 lb) per engine.
Note.
- 25 % is a very good efficiency improvement.
- No thrust reverser.
- A saving of 340 kg. in weight per engine.
It should also be noted that October 2028, will see the hundredth anniversary of Henry Royce sketching the R-type engine in the sand on the beach in Sussex.
The R-type was the engine that won the Schneider Trophy outright and enabled Rolls-Royce’s engineers to design the unrivalled Merlin engine that powered Hurricanes, Spitfires, Mosquitos, Mustangs and Lancasters in World War Two.
World’s Tallest Wooden Wind Turbine Starts Turning
The title of this post, is the same as that of this article on the BBC.
This is the sub-heading.
What is made from the same wood as a Christmas tree, held together by glue and manufactured in a Swedish factory for assembly later?
These three paragraphs outline the design of a revolutionary wind turbine tower.
If that calls to mind flat-pack furniture and meatballs, you’re wrong.
If you answered “a wooden wind turbine”, you could be a visionary.
According to Modvion, the Swedish start-up that has just built the world’s tallest wooden turbine tower, using wood for wind power is the future.
I feel that it is not as revolutionary as some people might think.
Forty years ago, I built an extension on my house that included a swimming pool and a barn. The swimming pool roof was based on laminated wood beams and the barn was constructed using traditional wooden beams, that were bolted together.
But surely the most amazing wooden structure of the last century is the DH 98 Mosquito.
This paragraph introduces the Wikipedia entry for this amazing aeroplane.
The de Havilland DH.98 Mosquito is a British twin-engined, multirole combat aircraft, introduced during the Second World War. Unusual in that its airframe was constructed mostly of wood, it was nicknamed the “Wooden Wonder”, or “Mossie”. Lord Beaverbrook, Minister of Aircraft Production, nicknamed it “Freeman’s Folly”, alluding to Air Chief Marshal Sir Wilfrid Freeman, who defended Geoffrey de Havilland and his design concept against orders to scrap the project. In 1941, it was one of the fastest operational aircraft in the world.
One of my friends from the twentieth century, had been an RAF Mosquito pilot in the 1950s and felt it was an unequalled design of aircraft.
The airframe of the Mosquito was built using similar materials and methods as Modvion’s turbine tower.
I have just found out, that the de Havilland Aircraft Museum, where the prototype Mosquito is displayed, is open at least until the 7th of January.
I shall be going by public transport and if anybody would like to accompany me, use the Contact Page to get in touch.
Is Volodymyr Zelenskyy Planning A Mosquito Moment?
Just imagine the scene in Berlin on January 30th, 1943, which was the tenth anniversary of Adolf Hitler’s rise to power.
A celebration had been planned with speeches by Goering and Goebbels to the Nazi faithful, which would be broadcast over the radio.
But precisely as Goering started to speak, three RAF Mosquitos arrived over Berlin.
This article on The Smithsonian Magazine, which is entitled When the RAF Buzzed Over Germany to Drown Out Nazi Broadcasts, describes the interruption like this.
When the bombs and the British engines intruded on the broadcast of Goering’s speech, radio engineers cut his feed and scrambled for safety. A bewildered German public instead heard the cacophony of bombers, which was soon replaced on their radios with a crackly recording of marching band music. It was more than an hour before a furious Goering returned to the airwaves.
Hours later, three more Mosquitos, gave Goebbels a similar treatment.
Wikipedia gives this quote from Goering about the Mosquito.
In 1940 I could at least fly as far as Glasgow in most of my aircraft, but not now! It makes me furious when I see the Mosquito. I turn green and yellow with envy. The British, who can afford aluminium better than we can, knock together a beautiful wooden aircraft that every piano factory over there is building, and they give it a speed which they have now increased yet again. What do you make of that? There is nothing the British do not have. They have the geniuses and we have the nincompoops. After the war is over I’m going to buy a British radio set – then at least I’ll own something that has always worked.
He was lecturing a group of German aircraft manufacturers.
It has been reported that Vlad the Mad is planning a spectacular parade on Victory Day, which is May 9th, 2022.
I can imagine that Ukrainian planners are working on ways to interrupt any speeches.
A drone spraying blue and yellow paint would be intensely funny and totally within the expertise of high-quality special forces.
France’s Aura Aero Unveils 19-Seat Electric Aircraft Development Plan
The title of this post is the same as that of this article on Flight Global.
This is the introductory paragraph.
French aerospace firm Aura Aero is intending to develop a 19-seat electric-powered regional aircraft, as it looks to certify its two-seat Integral R light single.
For a better picture and more information, look at this article in The Times, which is entitled French Electric Airliner Will Take To The Skies In Five Years.
Some clues as to the specification from the article and around the web.
- Nineteen seats.
- Maiden flight by 2024 and in service entry in 2026.
- It has six electric engines.
- Three hundred mile range.
- Hybrid power will be used to extend the range to 500 miles.
- A freighter version will be available.
This paragraph is from The Times article.
This week the company began production of a new two-seater plane made of carbon-wood, a lightweight composite material. It is confident that it can meet its ambitious timetable in a race to beat rivals in Europe, the US and Israel and overcome the formidable weight and range barriers to commercial electric passenger flight.
A carbon-wood airframe hints at possibly the world’s most successful composite aircraft; the wooden De Havilland Mosquito, which was light, strong and very fast.
- In fact, it was so fast, one aircraft could bomb Germany twice in one night, with two crews and a refuelling and a rearming in between.
- It could also carry a bomb load not far short of that of a Boeing B17 Flying Fortress.
Sadly, we didn’t realise the full potential of this aircraft in World War II, but if we had, fewer aircrew and civilians on the ground would have died, as waves of Mosquitos could have knocked out important targets with precision and surprise. I wrote about one of their precision raids in The Kunstzaal Kleizkamp Raid.
Conclusion
I think the mathematics and regulations point to an aircraft with the following specification, being the right plane to develop.
- Nineteen seats
- 300 mile range
- Versatile interior
- Sustainable aviation fuel range extender
It appears that both the Aura Aero Era and the Faradair BEHA are aimed at this market, with the Cessna eCaravan and the Eviation Alice aimed at a smaller number of passengers.
Note.
- Sustainable aviation fuel doesn’t need any specialist handling and can be delivered to the aircraft in a normal bowser.
- I suspect that one electric aircraft manufacturer or electric vehicle support company will develop a charging system, for the batteries, that is based on a vehicle that just plugs into the aircraft during loading.
I think this segment of the aviation market could be a big one and I wouldn’t be surprised to see other companies bringing forward 19 seat/300 miles aircraft.
Although, the market could be a bit squashed from the top. Airbus have proposed a ZEROe Turboprop, which I wrote about in ZEROe – Towards The World’s First Zero-Emission Commercial Aircraft.
This would be capable of carrying up to a hundred passengers over a thousand nautical miles, with no emissions except water.
The Bombing Of Dresden
I could not leave Dresden without commenting on the Bombing of Dresden by the Allies in World War II.
Some feel it was a war crime and many say it was justified. This is the first paragraph in the Wikipedia section describing the background to the bombing.
Early in 1945, after the German offensive known as the Battle of the Bulge had been exhausted — including the disastrous attack by the Luftwaffe on New Year’s Day involving elements of eleven combat wings of the Luftwaffe’s day fighter force — and after the Red Army had launched their Silesian Offensives into pre-war German territory, theGerman army was retreating on all fronts, but still resisting strongly. On 8 February 1945, the Red Army crossed the Oder River, with positions just 70 km from Berlin. As theEastern and Western Fronts were getting closer, the Western Allies started to consider how they might aid the Soviets with the use of the strategic bomber force. They planned to bomb Berlin and several other eastern cities in conjunction with the Soviet advance—to cause confusion among German troops and refugees, and hamper German reinforcement from the west.
It is a sensible argument, but I feel that decisions earlier in the War meant that to cause the required confusion, they had no alternative.
Churchill and others were also worried about what the Russians would do with the territory they captured. And he was right, as their colonisation and subjugation of Eastern Europe happened and it was something of which no-one can be proud.
In some ways it’s a pity that the German leaders in 1944, didn’t know how close we were to perfecting the atom bomb. But if they had,would the likes of Hitler ever surrendered? I doubt it! When you’re dealing with the really mad, all logic goes out of the window.
So could there have been an alternative to the bombing of Dresden and Leipzig?
What my father had been involved with in the war, I know not! But he was a passionate believer in the abilities of the de Havilland Mosquito. My father was well-connected in some way to John Grimston, who later became the 6th Earl of Veralem. In the 1950s and 1960s, Grimston’s company, Enfield Rolling Mills, was my father’s biggest customer. I know he was well-connected because when I needed a vacation job, my father rang the Earl and called in a favour, which got me three months extremely useful work in the Electronics Laboratory. My father did move in some unusual circles before and during the war. At one time, he was even working at the League of Nations in Geneva.
I have just read the section in Wikipedia about the Inception of the Mosquito. To say it was a struggle to get de Havilland’s wooden design accepted and then built would be an understatement. My father and others have said that there was scepticism in the Air Ministry about sending out crews to bomb Germany in a bomber with no defensive armament, which was built out of ply and balsa wood and stuck together with glue.
You have to remember that together the RAF and the USAAF lost hundreds of thousands of crew bombing Germany with four-engine heavy bombers. So was it the right policy?
One of my late friends, was a Mosquito pilot, who flew the aircraft in the RAF in the late 1940s. Several times we discussed the bombing of Germany in the 1970s. He had flown many types of aircraft, but in his view nothing compared with the amazing Mossie. The only flying problem, was an engine failure on take-off, which as a pilot with several hundred hours on a Cessna 340A, I know is a serious problem on any piston-engined twin. Luckily it never happened to either of us!
It is useful to compare the performance of a Mosquito to a B-17 Flying Fortress.
The following words are taken from the Bomber section in Wikipedia for the Mosquito.
In April 1943 it was decided to convert a B Mk IV to carry a 4,000 lb (1,812 kg), thin-cased high explosive bomb (nicknamed “Cookie”). The conversion, including modified bomb bay suspension arrangements, bulged bomb bay doors and fairings, was relatively straightforward, and 54 B.IVs were subsequently modified and distributed to squadrons of RAF Bomber Command’s Light Night Striking Force. 27 B Mk IVs were later converted for special operations with the Highball anti-shipping weapon, and were used by 618 Squadron, formed in April 1943 specifically to use this weapon. A B Mk IV, DK290 was initially used as a trials aircraft for the bomb, followed byDZ471,530 and 533.[108] The B Mk IV had a maximum speed of 380 mph (610 km/h), a cruising speed of 265 mph (426 km/h), ceiling of 34,000 ft (10,000 m), a range of 2,040 nmi (3,780 km), and a climb rate of 2,500 ft per minute (762 m)
And the Flying Fortress had a maximum speed of 287 mph, a cruise speed of 182 mph and a range of 1,738 miles with a 6,000 bomb load. In addition it needed a crew of ten, as against the Mosquito’s crew of just two.
I have seen statistics that Mosquito bombers could sometimes do two trips to Germany in one night with different crews and that they had the highest safe return rate of any Allied bombers.
So why did we not use Mosquitos to bomb Germany?
The statistics and according to my friend, the crews, were in favour, it’s just that those that made the decisions weren’t!
If we had been using a substantial number of Mosquitos, then a totally different strategy would have evolved, as the Allied Air Forces wouldn’t have lost so many experienced crew and the number of bombing raids would have increased and would have been of a much higher accuracy.
A serious mathematical analysis may or may not have been done since the war, but if it has been, it could have given surprising results.
This strategy could have meant that the destruction of Dresden and Leipzig might not have happened. If nothing else Mosquitos could almost have reached the German lines on the Eastern Front to support the Russians, from bases in South Eastern England.
As an aside here, after having visited Dresden, I have seen how the historic centre is all along the River Elbe, with the railway, which surely was an important target to disrupt traffic and cause confusion behind German lines, slightly further away from the river. As any pilot, who has flown at night by the light of the moon as I have, will tell you, rivers stand out like nothing else and it would have been very easy to find the historic centre of the city to drop bombs.
So I feel strongly, that the crude, misplaced philosophy of four-engined heavy bombers contributed to the destruction of Dresden. There were raids for which these bombers were ideal, like the destruction of dams, U-boat pens and V-missile sites, but carpet-bombing cities was not one of them!
To sum up, I have also heard arguments from former Mosquito pilots like my friend, and others, that properly used Mosquitos could have shortened the war by several months.
An Amazing Tale
The remarkable story of the wartime exploits of Ken Gatward was flagged up in The Times today. This is his Wikipedia entry.
His raid on Paris was the classic idea to wind up the Nazis.
I am reminded of the Mosquitos that after bombing Germany used to go through the streets of Dutch cities at tree-top heights, whilst the Dutch threw their hats in the air and cheered. Whilst visiting Ballast Needham in Amstelveen, I got talking about it with one of their engineers. He said his father had told him about the amazing sight and noise as they echoed through the houses.
So,etimes these days, we seem to have lost sight of the maxim told me by an old Colonel – In case of war, burn all rule books.
Ball Bearings, The Mosquito Airliner and The Gay Viking
This story from Coast last night was fascinating, as it told the story of how the British ran the German blockade of Sweden during the Second World War to obtain essential supplies of ball bearings and other advanced technology.
I have been fascinated by the Mosquito, de Havilland’s Wooden Wonder, since I was a child and after reading the definitive book on the aircraft about thirty years ago, I realised just what a superb aircraft it was. Last night, they showed rare film of Mosquito airliners of BOAC, running the blockade to Sweden to obtain the ball bearings.
But they could not carry very much, although they were successful despite being unarmed.The airliners had a pressurised cabin, so they could go very high and remember that at the time the Mosquito was one of the fastest aircraft in the world. So they relied on height and speed for defence.
This was where the Gay Viking and her siblings came in. They were fast motor gun boats, built by Camper and Nicholsons, who are more well-known for their yachts for the rich and famous. They could bring in forty tons of cargo. The trips are described on Gay Viking’s Wikipedia entry.
Was It Right To Bomb Germany As We Did in the Second World War?
I have felt for a long time that the bombing of German cities by the RAF and the USAAF was rather a pointless exercise driven more by vengeance and revenge than any strategic purpose to defeat the Nazis.
Remember, I was brought up in London and many of my relatives experienced the bombing first hand. My grandfather’s premises close to the Barbican, where he worked as an engraver, were completely destroyed in the Blitz. Many of these people weren’t too bothered about the bombing as it just made them angry and anyway they survived. Others might have felt different, but most just felt that you had to deal with what happened and get on with life. Supposedly, one of the reasons for bombing civilians was to break their moral and hopefully get them to turn against the government. I think that London and other British cities that were bombed showed that it didn’t work. If anything it just stiffened their resolve to carry on.
Was it any different in Germany, when we bombed their cities? I’ve only met a couple of Germans, who endured the bombing from the RAF and the USAAF and they didn’t seem to react any differently to the way we did. And they probably suffered a lot more.
But also remember that a 250,000 from both the RAF and the USAAF either died or went missing in the bombing of Germany. So in some ways we lost the trained personnel that we really needed to support the invasion.
I also remember reading the history of the de Havilland Mosquito. Initially this superb design wasn’t really wanted by the RAF, as they felt who in his right mind would want to fly across to bomb Germany in an unarmed aircraft built out of ply and balsa wood. To them and the USAAF, a heavily armed four engined bomber would obviously be better. But statistics proved them wrong, as the Mosquito, which carried virtually the same bomb load as a B-17, but with a crew of two instead of ten, had a much higher return rate and much lower losses of crew. It was also much faster and could bomb Germany twice in one night.
In my view it should have been used strategically to take out German infrastructure, such as important factories and rail junctions. Wikipedia says this.
Mosquitos were widely used by the RAF Pathfinder Force, which marked targets for night-time strategic bombing. Despite an initially high loss rate, the Mosquito ended the war with the lowest losses of any aircraft in RAF Bomber Command service. Post war, the RAF found that when finally applied to bombing, in terms of useful damage done, the Mosquito had proved 4.95 times cheaper than the Avro Lancaster.
Yesterday, the obituary of Flight Lieutenant Don Nelson was published in the papers.
He was an RAF navigator, who helped to plan the destruction of German infrastructure in the run up to D-Day.
This is an extract from The Times.
In the spring of 1944 Bomber Command under its redoubtable but stubborn leader, Air Chief Marshal Sir Arthur Harris, was ordered to divert a proportion of its energies from the strategic bombing of Germany, of which Harris was the architect, to attacking targets in northern France and Belgium — railways, bridges, tunnels, marshalling yards — whose destruction would materially expedite the forthcoming Allied invasion of German-occupied Europe.
Although Harris dug his heels in against what he was convinced was a misuse of his strategic bomber force, a trial raid against a railway centre at Trappes, south west of Paris, in early March resulted in such spectacular destruction and dislocation of rail traffic that it became evident that a sustained assault by Bomber Command would be capable of virtually paralysing the German capacity to move troops against whatever beach heads the Allies might establish before, and not after, the projected invasion. This was a vital discovery. In spite of Harris’s protests his best bomber squadrons were from then until June 6, 1944, and afterwards, employed on this momentous interdiction work.
The Telegraph tells a very similar story.
Looking back with 20/20 hindsight, I think we probably could have done better in our bombing campaign against Germany, by bombing infrastructure important to the war effort, rather than the general population.
We also never learn from the past, as if we look at Iraq, Afghanistan and now Libya, we continue to make the same mistakes we always do. Inevitably vengeance seems to get mixed up with the simple objective of defeating a vile and hideous regime and its leader.
The Anonymous Widower 