Rolls-Royce concludes testing of plane technology set to break electric speed record

Rolls-Royce Motor Cars Limited has announced on its blog that the company has completed testing of the technology it plans to use in its line of electrically powered planes—one of which they expect will break speed records for electric airplanes.

The new plane will be one of the core products of the company's ACCEL initiative, whose main objective will be to produce zero-emission planes and engines for other plane makers, and to be net-zero by 2050. The testing was done with a plane segment featuring a full-scale model of the front of the fuselage of the ionBird plane. It was fitted with a 500-horsepower electric engine backed up with 6,000 cells—enough, the company claims, to power supply 250 houses—which will keep the future plane going for approximately 320 km. The engine is also expected to deliver enough power to fly the plane at 480 km/h—which would be a record for an electric airplane.

Rolls-Royce has been working with electric motor maker YASA and Electroflight, an aviation start-up, and luxury watch company Bremont, which assisted with dashboard design, and which will also be the timekeeper when testing the speed of the plane.

Read more at Tech Xplore

Image Credit: Rolls-Royce

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