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Airspeeder’s Mk3 eVTOL flying vehicle has been revealed and is now ready to race

Air­speed­er has unveiled the world’s first elec­tric fly­ing rac­ing vehi­cle — the Mk3, a full-sized, remote­ly-oper­at­ed eVTOL which is now ready to race. The first rac­ing series is set to begin lat­er this year.

A full grid of Mk3 elec­tric fly­ing cars are cur­rent­ly being man­u­fac­tured at Air­speed­er and Alauda’s tech­ni­cal HQ in Ade­laide, South Aus­tralia. More than 10 iden­ti­cal rac­ing vehi­cles will be pro­duced and sup­plied to teams in 2021, with final behind-closed-doors pre-sea­son tests hap­pen­ing before the start of an inter­na­tion­al rac­ing cal­en­dar.

Matt Pear­son, Founder of Air­speed­er and CEO of Alau­da Aero­nau­tics — and who is also recog­nised in the first eVTOL Insights Pow­er Book, said: “This is a land­mark moment in the dawn of a new mobil­i­ty rev­o­lu­tion. Com­pe­ti­tion dri­ves progress and our rac­ing series in has­ten­ing the arrival of tech­nol­o­gy that will trans­form clean-air pas­sen­ger trans­port, logis­tics and even advanced air mobil­i­ty for med­ical appli­ca­tions.

“The world’s first elec­tric fly­ing car rac­ing series will be the most excit­ing and pro­gres­sive motor­sport on the plan­et.”

Known as Speed­ers — each vehi­cle will be oper­at­ed remote­ly by a pilot on the ground. The ground­break­ing safe­ty enhance­ments include LiDAR and Radar col­li­sion avoid­ance sys­tems that cre­ate a ‘vir­tu­al force­field’ around the craft.

The Mk3 fea­tures a car­bon fibre frame and fuse­lage cho­sen for its strength, stiff­ness and light­weight prop­er­ties, which ensures manoeu­vra­bil­i­ty, per­for­mance and effi­cien­cy.

Its pow­er­train rep­re­sents a sig­nif­i­cant upgrade on the Mk2 proof of con­cept vehi­cle, with pow­er increased by 95 per cent and with only a 50 per cent increase in weight. A 96 kW elec­tric pow­er­train already sees the Mk3 oper­at­ing with a thrust to weight ratio above two, on a craft that weighs just 100kg unmanned. The Mk3 speed­ers will fly at speeds in excess of 120 km\h.  

In terms of manoeu­vra­bil­i­ty, the Mk3 speed­ers are laid-out in an ‘octo­copter X for­ma­tion’, pro­vid­ing sig­nif­i­cant advan­tages to pilots. When rac­ing, the pilot will be able to make the same sharp hair­pin style turns as a For­mu­la 1 car, but with the added third dimen­sion of being able to move ver­ti­cal­ly. 

And to facil­i­tate rapid pit stops, Alauda’s engi­neers have devel­oped an inno­v­a­tive ‘slide and lock’ sys­tem for the rapid removal and replace­ment of bat­ter­ies when on the ground.

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Jason Pritchard

Jason Pritchard is the Editor of eVTOL Insights. He holds a BA from Leicester's De Montfort University and has worked in Journalism and Public Relations for more than a decade. Outside of work, Jason enjoys playing and watching football and golf. He also has a keen interest in Ancient Egypt.

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