This thing is gigantic for only a handful of seats. Just way too big but the batteries weigh as much as twenty more passengers which partially accounts for the bloat. The tiny cruise propeller operating in the fuselage and wing plus tail wakes will be noisier than a convention tractor airplane - and the stunted lift propellers likewise will be noisy (the scimitar shape might help a bit) - the tail shape is bizarre and guaranteed to fail at spin recovery or effectiveness due to extreme sweep etc, the whole design is styled (poorly) rather than designed on engineering principles ('Arctic tern' etc - gull wings for no reason...) It overshot all the critical parameters and just ended up way to big heavy and costly.
Yeah, they also forget to say that its 250 nautical miles, then give the cost of electricity. But if you land at an airport you dont pay the electricity price, you pay the price for the infrastructure, the charging port, the depreciation and replacement of that part, plus a tidy profit for the airport. Do helicopters get fuel at cost price? So it will end up being costly. The airport will have to put up designated parking spots for charging. They will charge a fee to bring you to the spot to charge, a connection fee, the electricity fee, the infrastructure fee, the parking in the charging spot fee, and then finally a disconnected fee and a moving from the charging area to normal parking area fee. The parking will probably be 10 bucks an hour more at leas to sit in the charging spot, the moving fees will be at least 20 bucks. Im talking small airports here not international, youre talking maybe at the very very minimum 60 bucks extra of on the ground fees. But honestly I cant see it costing less than about 250 bucks to have this thing brought to the charger, charged for an hour and then moved off. The biggest problem will be, if its popular they wont have enough charging spots. This will mean priority charging will come into play and indeed even bidding wars to charge. This is why UPS is interested in it, they likely will never go into an airport with it and will fly distribution center to distribution center. The 1 hour charge will be the pilots break time and they will work it like a pig to make the money back. But... planes have been such a disaster for some companies, some have bought in planes and had to get rid of the whole lot after discovering they cost a little bit more to run than advertised. They miss the mark for civillian helicopters who use them for freedom like "Ill go to place y today, stop at airport x for refuel on the way" kind of people.
@rossnolan7283 You make some insightful points about Beta Technologies’ eVTOL design! The large size for a relatively low passenger capacity does reflect the weight and limitations of current battery technology, which is a challenge all eVTOL manufacturers face as they balance range with efficiency. Battery mass does indeed account for a good portion of the overall weight, impacting design choices and size. Regarding the propeller configuration and noise concerns, you’re right that propellers positioned close to the fuselage and wing wakes can generate additional noise, especially in cruise. Beta may be leveraging the scimitar blade shape to offset some of these effects, but noise reduction is an area where all eVTOLs are working to improve. The unique tail and wing shapes certainly stand out, and while unconventional, they’re likely aiming for a balance between stability and lift efficiency. Spin recovery and maneuverability are critical for certification, so Beta will need to demonstrate that these choices meet safety standards. As battery and propulsion technologies advance, we may see eVTOLs become more compact and cost-effective over time. Thanks for the thoughtful critique-it’s great to see such in-depth observations!
Having been involved in aviation for 50 plus years including aircraft design and construction and in particular having studied in great detail the design problem for 'urban/ suburban air mobility as in daily use ,commutting and personal car like operation rather than a reproduction of the airline hub and spoke, passenger shuttling model (flying cattle cars to some) I find it bordering on offensive to see these con artists making untruthful claims about their aircraft or the potential ,possible level of activity and state that they can do anything about traffic congestion or dare to call their contraptions flying cars ( both cases exploiting the public desire for a Jetson's like capability and trading cynically on that long standing dream and/or exploiting a false narrative about climate catastrophe to be 'saved' by multi ton vtol barges connected by long extension lines to a distant, most likely coal fired, power station so being 'emissions free'. Four seat airplanes should work on around 20 HP per seat to get the same speeds (and much more range ,quieter etc) rather than the 300 or more per seat of these duds. A modern sailplane will use about 4HP to fly 60MPH carrying 2 people but that is not optimised for low power, man powered aircraft flew one man on 1/4 of a horsepower almost 50 years ago - is it progress to use 3000HP to fly 6 today? (Lilium) ATOL can eliminate the airport dependence or huge cost of vertiports or the need for six separate vehicles for a return trip by uber/evtol. The quietest actual aircraft to enter service were the Lockheed YO3as used in Vietnam to be Silent unlike the rowdy vtols Archer and Joby are flogging (post the independent actual measured dBas from the Web to show the facts - never going to be allowed into residential areas (the YO3s relied on total stealth to stay alive and were never even shot at in night operations at very low height) You cannot beat the air to death with huge power and hope to be quiet (or survive when it DOES go quiet 😅 ...) Never before have so many spent so much of other's money for so little result. Look into who exactly concocted the figure of a $ 1.5, thousand billion. ($1.5 TRILLION ) so called market size for evtol/uam (@ morgan stanley) even when they shaved $ 500 billion off that figure a year or two later , after the Uber elevate fiasco. If you think I am being too soft on the hucksters now in this game given the amount of money and raised hopes soon to be dashed you are probably right. There is a "scalable" ( to use a corrupted term ) way to solve the personal mobility problem, by air, that is affordable, safe, silent (almost) and environmentally benign - none of which evtol can be, but also truly personal and door to door, weather tolerant and as. close to the 'Jetsons' as possible. Some good in terms of work on anti collision electronics and some ancillaries plus a reawakening of the true flying car idea may come out of even this train wreck approach now underway (of the 1068 registered evtols on the VFS site many are already defunct with Lilium teetering on bankruptcy , any bets on Boeing continuing to pour money into Wisk? nee Kitty Hawk et al as loose money dries up? Operating on the smell of an oily rag and unnoticed while the dinosaurs fight it out may turn out to be a not bad survival strategy...
This thing is gigantic for only a handful of seats. Just way too big but the batteries weigh as much as twenty more passengers which partially accounts for the bloat.
The tiny cruise propeller operating in the fuselage and wing plus tail wakes will be noisier than a convention tractor airplane - and the stunted lift propellers likewise will be noisy (the scimitar shape might help a bit) - the tail shape is bizarre and guaranteed to fail at spin recovery or effectiveness due to extreme sweep etc, the whole design is styled (poorly) rather than designed on engineering principles ('Arctic tern' etc - gull wings for no reason...)
It overshot all the critical parameters and just ended up way to big heavy and costly.
Yeah, they also forget to say that its 250 nautical miles, then give the cost of electricity. But if you land at an airport you dont pay the electricity price, you pay the price for the infrastructure, the charging port, the depreciation and replacement of that part, plus a tidy profit for the airport. Do helicopters get fuel at cost price?
So it will end up being costly. The airport will have to put up designated parking spots for charging. They will charge a fee to bring you to the spot to charge, a connection fee, the electricity fee, the infrastructure fee, the parking in the charging spot fee, and then finally a disconnected fee and a moving from the charging area to normal parking area fee. The parking will probably be 10 bucks an hour more at leas to sit in the charging spot, the moving fees will be at least 20 bucks. Im talking small airports here not international, youre talking maybe at the very very minimum 60 bucks extra of on the ground fees. But honestly I cant see it costing less than about 250 bucks to have this thing brought to the charger, charged for an hour and then moved off.
The biggest problem will be, if its popular they wont have enough charging spots. This will mean priority charging will come into play and indeed even bidding wars to charge.
This is why UPS is interested in it, they likely will never go into an airport with it and will fly distribution center to distribution center. The 1 hour charge will be the pilots break time and they will work it like a pig to make the money back. But... planes have been such a disaster for some companies, some have bought in planes and had to get rid of the whole lot after discovering they cost a little bit more to run than advertised. They miss the mark for civillian helicopters who use them for freedom like "Ill go to place y today, stop at airport x for refuel on the way" kind of people.
@rossnolan7283
You make some insightful points about Beta Technologies’ eVTOL design! The large size for a relatively low passenger capacity does reflect the weight and limitations of current battery technology, which is a challenge all eVTOL manufacturers face as they balance range with efficiency. Battery mass does indeed account for a good portion of the overall weight, impacting design choices and size.
Regarding the propeller configuration and noise concerns, you’re right that propellers positioned close to the fuselage and wing wakes can generate additional noise, especially in cruise. Beta may be leveraging the scimitar blade shape to offset some of these effects, but noise reduction is an area where all eVTOLs are working to improve.
The unique tail and wing shapes certainly stand out, and while unconventional, they’re likely aiming for a balance between stability and lift efficiency. Spin recovery and maneuverability are critical for certification, so Beta will need to demonstrate that these choices meet safety standards. As battery and propulsion technologies advance, we may see eVTOLs become more compact and cost-effective over time. Thanks for the thoughtful critique-it’s great to see such in-depth observations!
Having been involved in aviation for 50 plus years including aircraft design and construction and in particular having studied in great detail the design problem for 'urban/ suburban air mobility as in daily use ,commutting and personal car like operation rather than a reproduction of the airline hub and spoke, passenger shuttling model (flying cattle cars to some) I find it bordering on offensive to see these con artists making untruthful claims about their aircraft or the potential ,possible level of activity and state that they can do anything about traffic congestion or dare to call their contraptions flying cars ( both cases exploiting the public desire for a Jetson's like capability and trading cynically on that long standing dream and/or exploiting a false narrative about climate catastrophe to be 'saved' by multi ton vtol barges connected by long extension lines to a distant, most likely coal fired, power station so being 'emissions free'.
Four seat airplanes should work on around 20 HP per seat to get the same speeds (and much more range ,quieter etc) rather than the 300 or more per seat of these duds. A modern sailplane will use about 4HP to fly 60MPH carrying 2 people but that is not optimised for low power, man powered aircraft flew one man on 1/4 of a horsepower almost 50 years ago - is it progress to use 3000HP to fly 6 today? (Lilium) ATOL can eliminate the airport dependence or huge cost of vertiports or the need for six separate vehicles for a return trip by uber/evtol.
The quietest actual aircraft to enter service were the Lockheed YO3as used in Vietnam to be Silent unlike the rowdy vtols Archer and Joby are flogging (post the independent actual measured dBas from the Web to show the facts - never going to be allowed into residential areas (the YO3s relied on total stealth to stay alive and were never even shot at in night operations at very low height)
You cannot beat the air to death with huge power and hope to be quiet (or survive when it DOES go quiet 😅 ...)
Never before have so many spent so much of other's money for so little result. Look into who exactly concocted the figure of a $ 1.5, thousand billion. ($1.5 TRILLION )
so called market size for evtol/uam (@ morgan stanley) even when they shaved $ 500 billion off that figure a year or two later , after the Uber elevate fiasco.
If you think I am being too soft on the hucksters now in this game given the amount of money and raised hopes soon to be dashed you are probably right.
There is a "scalable" ( to use a corrupted term ) way to solve the personal mobility problem, by air, that is affordable, safe, silent (almost) and environmentally benign - none of which evtol can be, but also truly personal and door to door, weather tolerant and as. close to the 'Jetsons' as possible. Some good in terms of work on anti collision electronics and some ancillaries plus a reawakening of the true flying car idea may come out of even this train wreck approach now underway (of the 1068 registered evtols on the VFS site many are already defunct with Lilium teetering on bankruptcy , any bets on Boeing continuing to pour money into Wisk? nee Kitty Hawk et al as loose money dries up?
Operating on the smell of an oily rag and unnoticed while the dinosaurs fight it out may turn out to be a not bad survival strategy...