Originally published at: FAA Funds Electric Taxi Initiative - AVweb
APU powers electric motors on landing gear wheels
Would be really really good on days when everyone is deicing or there are ground holds. No having to return to the gate for more fuel after exceeding a holdover time. And nice to have some extra weight available for pax and bags.
It makes some sense but seems complex, expensive, and potentially heavy and adds failure points.
Maybe just use tugs? A small diesel engine on the tug would use much less fuel than the jet engines, and probably less than the APU which is also a turbine.
Sure it would save some fuel during taxi. But the additional weight would also cost fuel during flight. And there will be additional maintenance needed for electric motors.
There is no free lunch. Every engineering decision is driven by these tradeoffs. I can’t believe that airplane manufacturers and airlines haven’t already considered such a system.
The motors might not be fast enough, but I wonder if this could also be used to spin the wheels up before landing to help with tire wear?
What added weight? Every upgrade is a failure point. The backup would be to taxi with jet engines.
That’s been researched for decades. The additional weight isn’t worth the small benefits.
Zero is the least of the options.
Right but the point of my comment is that with the system in this article the hardware would already be there to do it.