Open-Source Electric Paramotor

It's still in pre-order status for the current batch.

I'm interested in PPG, but not enthused about burning 2-stroke oil, so this sounds cool. XC might be limited unless there were a bunch of chargers and way to split up the batteries.. and compared to the energy in the US legal limit of FF of 5 gal / 19 L ( 30 lbs / 14 kg ) which equals ~2 hours of flight time.

Energy storage: An 18650 Li-ion cell weighs about 0.1 lbs, so 30 lbs for "gas" and 50 lbs for the less mass of the motor, which would be about 6.5kWh (80 * 10 * 3.7V * 2.2Ah). 10 cells provide a minute of thrust time, so 80 lbs (36 kg) would be 80 minutes of flight time. Battery packs are in 20 cell increments at the smallest, not sure what XsYp. Not a huge loss in flight time, but in refueling vs. recharge time (2-3 hours for 0.5-0.3C charge won't win any XC races).

Also, there's:

- no torque-rolling because of the 4x symmetric blades

- no worrying about restarting

- redundancy of multiple props

- ability to save energy by engine-off coasting whenever

- lighter rig

- less messy: no adding 2-stroke oil or doing 4-stroke oil-changes

Let's say electricity costs 20c/kWh and it takes 10kWh to recharge, that's $2.00 in electricity vs. $12.00 for gas ( equivalent of 3 gal of premium or 100LL costing $4). The only thing would be carrying around a couple of chargers and finding power, but there's a network of free EV places (PlugShare) and FBOs w/ power at no-tower airports (I would leave $5 for electricity).

Seems like a no-brainer to go electric unless doing XC races in a general (FF) race class. It would be cool if PPG XC races had an electric class.