FeaturedNews

Skyfly, AeroVolt to Carry Out “UK’s First Airfield-to-Airfield eVTOL Flight with Electric Recharging” 

Skyfly, the man­u­fac­tur­er of the two-seat Axe eVTOL air­craft and Aero­Volt, an elec­tric charg­ing sta­tion com­pa­ny, are set to car­ry out the UKs first air­field-to-air­field flight in 2024 along­side a recharg­ing of the craft, reports a press release.

The release explains, “The Axe eVTOL boasts an impres­sive range of 100 miles in a ful­ly elec­tric con­fig­u­ra­tion or 300 miles in a hybrid con­fig­u­ra­tion — far more than most oth­er pri­vate eVTOLs, which are gen­er­al­ly sin­gle-seat air­craft with a range of lit­tle more than 20 miles. 

“How­ev­er, AeroVolt’s pub­lic charg­ing net­work fur­ther increas­es the flex­i­bil­i­ty of the Axe by enabling fast, has­sle-free charg­ing at var­i­ous major Gen­er­al Avi­a­tion air­fields such as Brighton City, Lydd, Dunkeswell, Bournemouth, Dunkeswell, Solent Air­port and Sandown (Isle of Wight).” 

Please Watch Video About Axe

Aero­Volt began installing its first batch of charg­ing sta­tions at air­fields across Eng­land last August. Present­ly, agree­ments have been signed for the instal­la­tion of 60 such sta­tions around the UK. 

Michael Thomp­son, CEO, Skyfly, com­ment­ed, “We are delight­ed to part­ner with Aero­volt. The com­pa­ny has devel­oped by far the most advanced air­craft charg­ing net­work in Europe, if not glob­al­ly. It shows the UK’s appetite for low cost, low emis­sion and low noise fly­ing.”

He con­tin­ued, “We can­not wait to demon­strate this capa­bil­i­ty on a real flight route which aims to prove to the non-believ­ers that elec­tric avi­a­tion is the future of mobil­i­ty.”

Michael Thomp­son

The part­ners are to con­duct test flights as part of a series of elec­tric air­craft demon­stra­tions. The tri­als will also con­firm the com­pat­i­bil­i­ty of the Axe with AeroVolt’s charg­ing and mon­i­tor­ing soft­ware. 

Jaap Rade­mak­er, CCO of Skyfly, remarked, “Aerovolt’s charg­ers are espe­cial­ly use­ful for train­ing organ­i­sa­tions. Our com­bined tech­nol­o­gy will cre­ate a method of tru­ly sus­tain­able, qui­et and cost-effec­tive flight train­ing — par­tic­u­lar­ly cir­cuit train­ing — which can be focussed on a sin­gle air­port with per­ma­nent charg­ing infra­struc­ture.”

Aero­Volt cur­rent­ly offers access to their charg­ing sta­tions via the sub­scrip­tion ser­vice, “Squadron.” Its Mem­bers are also enti­tled to hire AeroVolt’s Pip­istrel Velis Elec­tro fixed-wing elec­tric air­craft as well as book rental craft and charg­ing ses­sions at their des­ti­na­tion, or use the charg­ers for their own pri­vate air­craft.” 

An ID card is used to acti­vate the charg­ers and com­mence the charg­ing process. Updates are pro­vid­ed via text while under­way. Once the charge is com­plete, Aero­Volt pro­duces an invoice which can be paid lat­er on the company’s web­site, enabling pilots to charge an air­craft even at remote air­fields where poor inter­net con­nec­tiv­i­ty makes an on-the-spot pay­ment dif­fi­cult. 

Sandown Air­port, Isle of Wight Charg­er Instal­la­tion  

Mean­while, the Aero­Volt net­work will soon be acces­si­ble through Octo­pus Elec­tro­verse, a charg­ing app from lead­ing ener­gy sup­pli­er Octo­pus Ener­gy which is already well-estab­lished for elec­tric cars. Aero­volt has already start­ed work on ATIS and NOTAM inte­gra­tion for its charg­ing net­work. 

The company’s first batch of charg­ers are rat­ed to 22kW, while instal­la­tion of larg­er 44kW charg­ers begins this year. 120kW are also planned for the future. Mul­ti­ple air­craft and, in some cas­es, elec­tric vehi­cles, can use any one charg­ing sta­tion simul­ta­ne­ous­ly. Using AeroVolt’s charg­ers, the Axe eVTOL can charge in approx­i­mate­ly 3.5 hours. 

Please Watch Video About Aero­Volt Smart Charg­ing Net­work

https://videos.eaton.com/roadranger/detail/video/6338315951112/learn-from-a-project:-the-smart-aircraft-charging-network—aerovolt-uk

Alan Kings­ley-Dob­son, COO of Aero­Volt, said, “The Axe is a real­ly for­ward-think­ing design in the emerg­ing eVTOL mar­ket. The avail­abil­i­ty and usabil­i­ty of a charg­ing infra­struc­ture is key for their cus­tomers and future devel­op­ment and Aero­Volt is ready to offer sup­port how­ev­er we can.”

Fol­low­ing this year’s tri­als, Aero­Volt will then take deliv­ery of their own Axe eVTOL in 2025. The air­craft will be avail­able for Mem­bers of “Squadron” to hire, and will also be used by Aero­Volt for cus­tomer demon­stra­tions, net­work devel­op­ment and test­ing. 

Back­ground

Fol­low­ing two years of devel­op­ment, the Axe was offi­cial­ly launched in the sum­mer of 2022. In the months since, the eVTOL has secured dozens of orders and has attract­ed the atten­tion of investors. Skyfly is now build­ing its first air­craft, with manned test flights due to begin in Q1, 2024. Cus­tomer deliv­er­ies will fol­low at the end of this year, when UK cer­ti­fi­ca­tion is expect­ed. 

For more infor­ma­tion 

www.skyfly.aero

https://aerovolt.co.uk/home/

(Top con­cept image: The Axe eVTOL Air­craft)

eVTOL Insights is part of the Industry Insights Group. Registered in the UK. Company No: 14395769