KR20220001027U - A airship - Google Patents

Abstract

An air bag is formed in the frame of the airship, and the air bag is attached to the intake nozzle for suction and injection of the ballast tank so that air does not leak. let there be
Alternatively, by forming a hydrogen or helium generator in the frame of the airship, in the case of hydrogen, electrolyzed water is sprayed by a servo motor or a solenoid valve, or the exhaust port formed in the airship frame is opened and closed to the outside of the airship. The amount of hydrogen in the aircraft to raise or lower the gas by controlling the
In addition, solar cells are formed on the wing of the ship to receive the necessary power.

Description

Airship {A airship}

The technical field of the present invention is an airship.

No propellers? I don't have any problem. This airship flies alone with buoyancy

Phoenix turns up and down movement into thrust.

On a cold March night in Portsmouth, England, last March, an entirely new type of aircraft flew for the first time along the dimly lit 120-meter corridor of a cavernous building that was once used to build minesweepers for the British Navy.

This is the Phoenix, an airship without an engine but without a crew that moves forward by changing buoyancy and direction. The prototype has a length of 15 m, a wingspan of 10.5 m, and weighs 150 kg (330 lbs) when fully loaded. It flew the entire length of the building, and each flight required about 5 up and down waves.

There are advantages to flying in this strange way. First, it requires very little energy, allowing the spacecraft to be used on long-term missions. Also, the absence of buzzing rotors and compressor blades, vigorous exhaust flow, can be potentially hazardous to people or objects on the ground and in the air. Finally cool: airships that move like sea creatures.

This propulsion concept has been around since 1864, when a patent for technology applied to airships was granted to Solomon Andrews of New Jersey (U.S. Patent 43,449). Andrews called the ship Aereon, and proposed using hydrogen to elevate the ship. A ship can descend by releasing some of the hydrogen, reducing its buoyancy. Then dump the ballast aboard a gondola suspended below the airship, allowing it to return to buoyancy that is lighter than air.

The pilot will take control of the ship's stance as it walks along the length of the gondola. Walking forward shifted the center of gravity forward rather than the center of buoyancy, causing the airship's nose to point downwards. When you walk backwards, the nose rises.

Andrews suggested that these two methods could be used together to propel an airship on a sinusoidal flight path. Raising the nose on ascent and lowering the nose on descent forces the combination of aerodynamic forces along with buoyancy (when lighter than air) or weight (when heavier than air) to have a vector component along the flight path. This component provides thrust except at the top and bottom of the flight path, which is transmitted solely by thrust. The flight tests we performed were walking speeds, so the aerodynamic forces would have been very small. There is always a component of buoyancy or weight along the flight path.

The method Andrews describes in his patent means that the flight must be terminated when the airship runs out of hydrogen or ballast. Later, he used cables to compress or re-inflate the gas to create a second airship. This allows the airship to move up and down without spraying ballast. His approach was sound: the key to unlocking this idea and creating useful aircraft is the ability to change buoyancy in a sustainable way.

This variant of the propulsion mode has been successfully demonstrated underwater in remotely operated vehicles. Many of these "gliders" use compressed air to expand and contract flexible bladders, varying the amount of water they displace. These gliders were used as regular award-winning long-distance survey vehicles to upload the data they collected. Because water is nearly 1,000 times denser than air, this robotic submarine does not require significant changes in the volume of its bladder to achieve the necessary buoyancy change.

AeroMACS: IEEE 802.16 standards-based technology for next-generation air transportation systems AeroMACS: IEEE 802.16 standards-based technology for next-generation air transportation systems

An aerial version of this variable buoyancy concept was tried. The Institute of Physical Sciences at New Mexico State University implemented a demonstration project called the Aerobody in the early 2000s. But all anyone could do was prove that this strange form of propulsion worked. Until now, no one has taken advantage of the commercial potential offered by ultra-long-duration applications.

The Phoenix project began as a small demonstration system developed by Athene Works, a British company specializing in innovations funded by the British Ministry of Defense. The system has been so successful that it has drawn interest to Innovate UK, a government agency dedicated to testing new ideas, and the Aerospace Technology Institute, a government-funded agency that promotes innovative technologies in air transport. These two organizations have invested half of their £3.5m budget in Phoenix. The rest were supplied by four private companies, five universities, and three government agencies dedicated to high-value manufacturing.

My colleagues and I developed many configuration technologies in less than four years, many of which were custom solutions, building and testing new technologies. Many organizations were involved in the project, and the Center for Process Innovation managed the entire collaboration. I worked as a senior engineer.

As it moves up and down, the gas takes air into its internal "lungs" and compresses it, making it heavier than air. It then releases compressed air, which again becomes lighter than air. Think of it as a creature that inhales and exhales as the aircraft moves forward.

The 15-meter-long fuselage, filled with helium to gain buoyancy, has a teardrop shape that represents a compromise between the spheres (which would be an ideal shape for maximizing the amount of gas it can enclose with a given material). Long and thin needles (minimize drag). At the relatively low speeds that such a spacecraft can aspire to, the teardrops are streamlined enough to avoid the vortices that form when the boundary layer of air next to the airship's surface moves away. from it. With a teardrop, the only drag is generated from the friction of the air flowing smoothly over the surface.

The skin is made of Vectran [PDF], a fiber strong enough to withstand internal pressure and tight enough to seal the helium with a thermoplastic polyurethane coating. The point is, you need to be strong enough to hold the right. Even when the airship's internal bladder is inflated

Whether ascending or descending, the aircraft must control its attitude. So, to control the roll of the aircraft, it has wings with ailerons at the tips. At the rear is a cruciform structure with a pair of horizontal stabilizers integrated with an elevator to control how the airship tilts up and down, and a similar pair of vertical stabilizers with a rudder to control how left or right to yaw. These flying surfaces have much in common with the wood, textile and wire parts of pioneering airplanes of the early 20th century.

Two carbon fiber spars span the wings for added strength. Airfoil-shaped ribs are distributed along the spar, and each rib consists of a foam sandwiched between carbon fibers. Thin skin wraps around this skeleton, creating the shape of the wings. We designed the horizontal and vertical tails to be identical to each other and identical to the outer panels of the wing. So we limited the types of parts to make them easier to build and repair.

Photo of the assembling and testing of the photoelectric system of the wing and horizontal tail. Photo of a person testing a component. A person inspecting a component. Photo of an airship above people.

The onboard power system provides the electricity needed to operate the pumps and valves used to inflate and deflate the internal bladder. It also supplies energy to the various actuators needed to steer the flight control surfaces and maintains the functionality of the aircraft's autonomous flight control system. A rechargeable lithium-ion battery with a capacity of 3 kW per hour meets these requirements even in the dark. During the day, a flexible array of solar cells (mostly on the top of the wing and the rest on the top of the horizontal tail) charges the battery. We've demonstrated that Phoenix can be fully energy self-sufficient by ground testing under the sun, confirming that these solar cells can power all aircraft systems simultaneously and recharge batteries in a reasonable amount of time.

We also considered using hydrogen fuel cells, but they were not suitable for indoor flight tests due to fire safety requirements. I plan to add this second power later for redundancy. Also, if hydrogen is used as the lift gas, the fuel cell could be used to replenish the hydrogen lost through the airship's skin.

So how well did you fly? For testing, an autonomous flight control system was programmed to follow a sinusoidal flight path by actuating a valve and compressor connected to the internal bladder. In this respect, flight control systems have more in common with the buoyancy control of a submarine than the flight control of an airplane.

During the indoor tests, strict height limits had to be set to avoid contact with the roof and floor of the building. In normal operation, the aircraft is free to determine the amplitude of its up and down movements and the length of each undulation to achieve the required speed. This requires complex calculations and precisely executed commands. It's far from winding back and forth in a wicker gondola that Andrews did.

While experiments so far have only been testing previously unproven concepts, the Phoenix could now serve as a prototype for a commercially valuable aircraft. The next step is for Phoenix to get flightability certification. This requires passing a flight test in the open air. When we planned the project, this certification had a set of weight thresholds, with 150 kg being the upper limit approved by the British Civil Aviation Authority under the “Flight Permit”. Had it been heavier, it would have required the approval of the European Union's Aviation Safety Agency, and the effort to obtain it exceeded our budget in both time and money. If the UK leaves the European Union completely, the certification will be different.

Commercial applications of such aircraft are not difficult to imagine. A good example is a high-altitude pseudo-satellite, a spacecraft that can be deployed at will to deliver radio signals to remote locations. Existing aircraft designed to fulfill this role all require very large solar arrays and large batteries, adding both to the weight and cost of the aircraft. Because the Phoenix requires only a small array of solar cells on its wings and a horizontal tail, it can be made at a cost a tenth the cost of a solar-powered plane designed for this purpose. It is an inexpensive, near-disposable alternative with a much higher weight-to-payload ratio than alternative aircraft. And our design for the much larger version of the Phoenix shows that it should be able to lift a 100kg payload to an altitude of 20km.

We are now starting to develop such a Phoenix successor. Perhaps one day you'll see a dot in the sky popping motionless or languidly to a new position above your head.

This article appears as "This Blimp Flies on Buoyancy Alone" in the July 2020 print issue.

A very unique looking airship is being tested in a warehouse in Portsmouth, England. Developed by the Phoenix Consortium, the 15-meter-long Phoenix is the main character, and the most unique part is that it generates propulsion by buoyancy alone, without the need for other power devices such as propellers or jet engines. It may sound absurd, but in fact, the principle appeared already in the 19th century.

In 1864, Solomon Andrews living in New Jersey applied for a patent with the US Patent and Trademark Office (U.S. Patent 43,449), which described that an airship could be moved using buoyancy and wings. The airship itself uses hydrogen to create buoyancy, and when it rises above a certain altitude and releases hydrogen to reduce its buoyancy, it glides like a glider and flies forward. It is the principle of ascending by charging hydrogen again after descending sufficiently. Of course, this would continue to lose hydrogen, so Andrews also patented a way to store hydrogen again, but either way was difficult to implement with the technology at the time.

Since then, although this method has been tried often, it has not received much attention as interest in airships has declined. But recently, the mood has been reversed again. This is because the advantage of not consuming a lot of energy while staying in the air for a long time is being highlighted. The Phoenix Project is a buoyancy-powered airship project funded by UK government agencies, private companies and universities with a budget of £3.5 million.

A 15m long prototype airship, the Phoenix is less buoyant than hydrogen, but uses safer helium to create its buoyancy and glide using its 10m wide wings with solar panels. Solar cells can produce enough energy for systems that contain and refill helium and control airships. At night, a 3 kWh lithium-ion battery is used to control the airship.

Although flying using buoyancy, the purpose of the Phoenix is not to move at high speed, but to verify that it can be used as an aerial monitoring and communication relay system while floating for a long time. However, the current version of the Phoenix cannot fly that high. The payload cannot exceed 150 kg. The research team is planning an autonomous flying craft that can ascend to an altitude of 20 km and carry a payload of about 100 kg and can act like a low-altitude satellite in the air for long periods of time.

Whether this will be feasible remains to be seen, but I think it's one of those really simple and clever ideas.

[Source] Airship that moves only by buoyancy without propellers? |by Gordon

And

The exact principle of a greenhouse is that the temperature inside the greenhouse rises by absorbing sunlight by the ground, and then the glass (or vinyl) prevents the heated air from diffusing.

The goal is to provide an airship that moves only by buoyancy.

The solution to this task is to form an air bag in the frame of the airship, and the air bag is attached to the intake nozzle for suction and injection of the ballast tank so that air does not leak. and also make it possible to spray.

Alternatively, by forming a hydrogen or helium generator in the frame of the airship, in the case of hydrogen, electrolyzed water is sprayed by a servo motor or by a solenoid valve, or the exhaust port formed in the airship frame is opened and closed to the outside of the airship. The amount of hydrogen in the aircraft to raise or lower the gas by controlling the

In addition, solar cells are formed on the wing of the ship to receive the necessary power.

The effect of the present invention is that the airship flies by buoyancy alone.

It converts up and down movement into thrust, and when it rises by buoyancy and descends by gravity, it can move horizontally by aerodynamic force.

1 is a frame of an airship.
2 is a conceptual diagram illustrating horizontal movement by an aerodynamic force when it is raised by buoyancy and descended by gravity.

When the specific contents for carrying out the present invention are described in detail using the drawings,

An air bag is formed in the frame of the airship, and the air bag is attached to the intake nozzle for suction and injection of the ballast tank so that no air leaks. It allows for suction compression and also for spraying.

Alternatively, by forming a hydrogen or helium generator in the frame of the airship, in the case of hydrogen, electrolyzed water is sprayed by a servo motor or by a solenoid valve, or the exhaust port formed in the airship frame is opened and closed to the outside of the airship. The amount of hydrogen in the aircraft to raise or lower the gas by controlling the

In addition, solar cells are formed on the wing of the ship to receive the necessary power.

1: Frame of the airship

Claims (15)

An air bag is formed in the frame of the airship, and the air bag is attached to the intake nozzle for suction and injection of the ballast tank so that no air leaks. A buoyancy-only airship characterized in that it allows for suction compression and also for injection. By forming a hydrogen or helium generator outside or inside the frame of the airship, in the case of hydrogen, electrolyzed hydrogen is injected into the frame of the airship, or the amount of hydrogen in the aircraft is controlled by opening and closing the outlet to the outside of the airship formed in the frame of the airship. An airship that moves only by buoyancy, characterized in that it raises or lowers the aircraft. Using the greenhouse effect, the outside of the airship is formed with a transparent material outside the frame of the airship, and a means of reflection such as stainless steel is formed on one side of the inside of the airship. A hole is formed so that air of a relatively low temperature is discharged from the inside of the airship, and a means for opening and closing the outlet formed in the airship frame is formed on the upper part of the airship to control the temperature of the aircraft in the aircraft to raise the aircraft. Or an airship moving only by buoyancy, characterized in that it descends. Using the greenhouse effect, the outside of the airship is formed with a transparent material outside the frame of the airship, and a black material is formed on one side of the inside of the airship to increase the temperature by absorbing sunlight. It is heated and a hole is formed in the lower part of the airship so that air of a relatively low temperature is discharged from the inside of the airship, and a means for opening and closing the outlet formed in the airship frame is formed on the upper part of the airship to control the temperature of the aircraft in the airship. An airship that moves only by buoyancy, characterized in that it raises or lowers the aircraft by adjusting it. 5. The method of any one of claims 3 or 4
Using the greenhouse effect, the outside of the airship is formed with a transparent material outside the frame of the airship, and a heating means is formed on one side of the inside of the airship. When sunlight comes in, the inside of the airship is heated due to the greenhouse effect. By heating the heating means formed on one side of the airship, a hole is formed in the lower part of the airship so that air of a relatively low temperature is discharged from the inside of the airship. An airship that moves only by buoyancy, characterized in that it raises or lowers the aircraft by controlling the temperature of the aircraft in the aircraft. 4. The method of claim 3
Using the greenhouse effect, the outside of the airship is formed with a transparent material outside the frame of the airship, and a black material is formed on one side of the inside of the airship to increase the temperature by absorbing sunlight. It is heated and a hole is formed in the lower part of the airship so that air of a relatively low temperature is discharged from the inside of the airship, and a means for opening and closing the outlet formed in the airship frame is formed in the upper part of the airship to control the temperature of the aircraft in the airship. An airship that moves only by buoyancy, characterized in that it raises or lowers the aircraft by adjusting it. The bottom of the airship is formed into a cylinder or oval cylinder that can hold a foldable fabric.
By forming a hydrogen or helium generator outside or inside the frame of the airship, in the case of hydrogen, electrolyzed hydrogen is injected into the frame of the airship, or the amount of hydrogen in the aircraft is controlled by opening and closing the outlet to the outside of the airship formed in the frame of the airship. Thus, in raising or lowering the aircraft, the frame is formed by an independent cylinder or oval, and the independent cylinder or oval becomes a zigzag type so that it can be folded and unfolded by the servomotors formed at the joints of the zigzag type frame, and the inside of the frame is folded Airship characterized in that it is formed by a sky lantern that can be carried. 8. The method of claim 7
Airship, characterized in that a valve such as a solenoid valve is formed on the outside of the top of the frame of the airship. 9. The method according to any one of claims 1 to 8
An airship that moves only by buoyancy, characterized in that it receives necessary power by forming solar cells on the wings of the airship. 10. The method according to any one of claims 1 to 9
Airship moving only by buoyancy, characterized in that the suction outlet is opened and closed by a servomotor or a solenoid valve. 11. The method of claim 10
Airship moving only by buoyancy, characterized in that the airship is opened and closed by a servomotor or a solenoid valve of the intake outlet that opens and closes the intake outlet, and the auxiliary wing (aileton) of the airship wing is operated wirelessly. 8. The method of any one of claims 2 or 7
A water tank for electrolysis of water is formed on one side of the airship, and water moves only by buoyancy, characterized in that water is created in the water tank by using the condensation phenomenon caused by the temperature difference between the inside and outside. 13. The method according to any one of claims 1 to 12
Airship, characterized in that the propeller is formed on one side of the airship, or a jet engine or a rocket engine is formed. 14. The method of claim 13
Airship, characterized in that the exterior of the airship is formed of a light and hard material. 10. The method of claim 9
Airship, characterized in that the solar cells on the wings of the airship are formed by folding.

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