Dissatisfied with existing designs, a small Amherst, Mass., company called Skyacht Aircraft is working on building a better hot-air balloon. Actually, Skyacht is touting its project as a "personal blimp"–that is, "a hot-air balloon that can be maneuvered in nearly perfect quiet," according to the company’s Web site.
The latest version of the aircraft, dubbed Alberto, passed a milestone in October, when it made its first flight.
Alberto, named after aviation pioneer Alberto Santos-Dumont, is 102 feet long and has a 70-foot diameter. Since October, it has completed 10 hours of Phase I flight testing to meet Federal Aviation Authority requirements.
Skyacht foresees personal blimps being used for a variety of tasks, from diamond prospecting to research into forest canopies and from ecotourism to filmmaking. The appeal of the design isn’t just its low noise output; the airship would also be more affordable and more maneuverable at low speeds, and it would require a smaller ground crew (it folds "much like an umbrella") than do blimps and zeppelins, the company says.
"No other aircraft can accomplish the seemingly straightforward task of picking off the top-most leaf from a particular tree," Skyacht says.
The experimental aircraft, which has been in the works for about five years, still needs at least one more year of research and development. The current design doesn’t yet live up to the company’s standards of quiet flight.
In initial flight tests, Alberto uses a conventional gas-powered motor. Once the early tests are done, the airship will be fitted with electric motors, along with quieter hot-air burners.
Although a number of design refinements, as well as FAA certification, lie ahead, Skyacht says it expects the airship to be priced between $100,000 and $200,000.
That’s about the cost of a new, small airplane and much less the the $2 million price tag on the cheapest helium airships, to say nothing of the $12 million for a high-end Zeppelin NT, according to the company.
Mike Kuehlmuss checks out the propane burners from the two-person cockpit as Alberto lifts off for a tethered flight test in summer 2006. Kuehlmuss does mechanical design and fabrication for Skyacht, as well as being a pilot.
In its flight tests, the airship has been several hundred feet in the air, but it’s mostly been kept to about treetop level. How fast can it go? "Frankly, we don’t know for sure yet," acknowledges the Skyacht FAQ. At 25 percent of full power from the current 24-horsepower engine, the airship has chugged along at about 6 miles per hour. Eventually, Skyacht plans to install a larger, lightweight 80-horsepower motor, which could boost the top speed to almost 20 mph. Also on the drawing board is a second, sleeker design.
Via CNET
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