The Aerospace Engineering Podcast Highlights Contra-Rotating Electric Propulsion

AnalySwift is excited to be partnering with the Aerospace Engineering Podcast, where Rainer Groh highlights exciting developments in aerospace engineering. More than 15,000 people visited the Aerospace Engineering Blog last month to learn something new about aerospace engineering. The most recent episode, sponsored by AnalySwift, is on a company developing a contra-rotating propeller system for the light aircraft market.

Contra-rotating propeller systems typically use two propellers mounted in series that spin in opposite directions. The fact that props are spinning in both directions alleviates many of the attitude and control problems when flying aircraft.

Contra-rotation has rarely found its way onto modern, gas-powered aircraft because the variable-pitch requirement for efficient operation has made the system overly expensive, complex and maintenance intensive. By changing the power source from fossil fuels to electrons, however, many components of the modern aircraft can be designed differently. With new electric motors it is now possible to build a much simpler, fixed-pitch, contra-rotating propulsion system for light aircraft.