Raptor Composite Aircraft

Anyone following the YouTube videos on the construction of the prototype, 5 seat, sleek new "Raptor", 300 knots composite canard design aircraft? Looks like a Velocity. I've been watching with interest... I may abandon my a Cozy Mark IV project.

Raptor Aircraft Home

 

Last I heard it was DOA unless some other investor took it over.

 

Currently it is up and running and progress is reported twice a week right here https://medium.com/@RaptorAircraft The escrow account is set up and there are more than 1/3 (350+) of expected 1000 deposits are made. Looks promising but the offered price of $130,000 "complete" is kind of silly - However I already reserved my spot in the list and monitoring that project very closely with my folks from reaa.ru - we are all in favor of that Raptor project to get succeeded.

 

That is correct - the new team is in operation lead by Peter Muller of Australia/Silicon Valley baked designer - the business is relocated to KCNI (Cherokee County Regional Airport) in GA and my scientific estimate: the real prototype would be up in the air by the end of 2016. Will see.

 

I'm going to drop in on these guys, they are literally 20 minutes from where I live. Pretty slick website, very complicated plane!

 

I agree; some impressive work. If you do drop in, how about filling us in on their 3D Milling setup as well as the CAD software that they design and drive this with... Thanks

Blue skies,

Tom

 

Raptor Aircraft Design

Lots of claims here. Lots of reliance on "area ruling" for conclusions of drag reduction. Lots of reliance on simple vorticity plots for drag reduction and speed and fuel mileage claims.

Is this an offshoot of Velocity or just a sincere form of flattery?

 

Clearly it is a quantum leap forward in aircraft design. Just look at their performance specs: Raptor Aircraft Specifications A fraction of the price of a Cirrus, with much better performance. Note the range.

Also note that they have neither an airplane nor a developed engine.

But they do have a really nice web site!


BJC

 

Not too long ago (I guess in 2012) one of our colleagues Mr.canardlover has been discussing his project with us And the last year Silicon Valley baked designer (originally from Australia) Mr Peter Muller joined the forces with Mr canardlover (or Jeff Kerlo to be exact) for that outstanding idea. Peter is an IT guy and knows how to manage the complexity of the creation. So - the web site and the escrow.com idea among with the financial strategy is what we usually do for such complex delivery of our major IT solutions. I started the discussion with Russian/Ukrainian folks a few months back asking their opinion about technical side of the aerodynamics perspectives of that design. We did not come up with the final opinion yet. The real research I am doing in my lab comparing "The Raptor", "Velocity XL", Cobalt Co50 "The Valkyrie", "Phoenix /Orion", "Long-EZ", "VariEze" and "Jetcruizer". There is definitely a potentially interesting outcome from that line of ideas. The marketing variations are not available yet - we are using primarily all open source available information. And I would be ready to share with you guys some of estimated cost of the Raptor may be in a month.

 

That about sums it up. I know a lot of software PHD's because I am married to one. Not a single one of them could design an airplane in any way shape or form. In that group a mechanical engineer doesn't seem too nerdy.

 

Not that this has ever been done in aviation - Make ridiculous performance claims, create a web site filled with computer generated pictures and take deposits from the sheep at a low introductory price only if you act quick!


"Vaporware", sometimes synonymous with "vaportalk" in the 1980s, has no single definition. It is generally used to describe a hardware or software product that has been announced, but that the developer has no intention of releasing any time soon, if ever.

 

The plane is not that complicated from 2016 position of reviewing it. It is way too far from the reality if you look at it from 2001 point of view. There is a flying Cobalt Co50 Valkyrie that was announced back in November 2015 with more than 80 real orders on the Cobalt-Aircraft table as of today (only 6 months later). If you think of the complexity - The Raptor and The Valkyrie are compatible. However the Valkyrie is not offering pressurized cabin (only oxygen mask for all passengers) and the engine is the key: the Raptor Diesel GT - Audi 3.0L V6 TDI is just another field of an improvement.

 

I am smiling a lot ara: I am a software engineer by accident - originally trained as a soviet space craft board-engineer specializing in the Electronics and Computer Hardware fields. Don't you think that I have a solid mechanical engineering background :depressed

 

I was very skeptical from the beginning myself. However I know how the escrow.com works. It is virtually impossible to loose your money in it. In details: The Raptor team does not have my money. Until they would deliver my order. The money is stored on escrow account. The fast delivery is in their business' interest to deliver the product soon - to get their pay back - and that explains a lot. That is why we (users-clients community) have our updates twice a week - and monitoring team's progress from the beauty and comfort of our office. Those folks are working hard - weekends and late nights are recorded daily. So - I am not advocating them - simply saying it is not any close to what we do when "Vaporware" is being created.:tired:

 

Would love to see a video of it in flight.

Have a link?

Thanks,


BJC

 

Sure - here you go Please don't tell any one - that is the Top Secret onder:

 

Software guys know absolutely nothing about project management of physical stuff you have to engineer, build, test and fly. You know, 8 bugs to solve doesn't work well if you killed 8 test-pilots. The biography of Elon Musk alludes to this quite a bit as well and I've met enough bright IT guys in engineering (both for the offshore and for aerospace) to know.
Despite his enormous achievements, Tesla was a lot harder than he anticipated. SpaceX was way beyond how hard he imagined it to be.

Unless you've designed, engineered, built, tested and flown a new design, you really don't have the slightest idea how much you didn't think of and how much you don't know.

This whole project, both the big lines and the details in the video are a setup for failure. A pity, because we could use something new. But then, investors prefer shiny new projects with heaps of promises and flashy earlier success in other sectors over solid, ground breaking designs. Both Bill's Privateer and the Lisa Akoya (both truly ground breaking) have run out of money.

That's why I fund my own design out-of-pocket...

They annouced the same thing in 2008 or so.

No. It's what dooms it. Name me one single airframe intended to go into production (kit or certified) that succeeded with a non-proven engine. Having seen what it takes to bring an automotive powerplant (also a diesel) in airworthy condition, it's outright ludicrousness...

 

I respect your knowledge but have one argument in favor of IT project managers - the amount of work that we do and have done during only the past 25 years covers all the failures from all the fields and all the disciplines of a mankind. Try to name any one industry that does not use any computer (hardware or software) at all and respectively support from one or many of us(IT folks). If you may think that today's aviation could be achieved without any computer technology cover and backup I would disagree with you. So the point here is: we are not re-creating the wheel, we are doing what you guys do but much faster and much better. In this particular event Peter Fuller (IT engineer) has met Jeff Kerlo (aviation engineer). They have started together and successfully still working together today on the same project that Jeff (aviation engineer) has failed before (several times as I may be noticed). I am (IT engineer) working with my mechanical engineering co-founders using my skills (IT PM) helping them to deal with their bugs. Have a lot of reaction from the legacy folks but we are moving along. Step by Step.

so what? we won't stop dreaming - that is simple as it is. And we succeed without any doubt.

Many of my colleagues are playing different games that they have created. Many of those games are simulators. Simulation is some sort or a kind of some real implementation of "designed, engineered, built, tested and flown a new design" but in a specific virtual world. Don't you think that once made and tested that process in virtual life neither one of us could do the real staff?

Yes I agree they did run out of money. Is that the proof that they have no idea of what they have been doing? I doubt . Sorry Boss. In my honest opinion the new creation could be successful only if a group of professionals from variety of industries could get together and move the project one step at the time. Similar of how the Open Source development in our IT world is doing. We are not stilling from anyone - we are contributing into that one project. The individualization of an aviation project too much of a private closed door proprietary activities lead to a failure. Run out of money is one of those. Failure of accepting an alternative opinion is another source of a problem. Not documenting and collecting test results is the third source of an issue here and so on so forth. Find the issue work on re-mediating it deliver - go to the next step and that is how you eat the Elephant: bit by bit, byte by byte oops - one bite at the time :dis:

And you have everything you may need - my respect for your success. Those of us in IT world - when succeeded - became contributors to other projects - without any payback or monetary rewards - read the Software Manifesto for your pleasure as an example. That is how in 30 years we have created your new brand new world.

 

The only top secret thing about the video is the commentary from the guy who shot it.

 

The knowledge is the power. And even in my reality we don't have many casualties from test case scenarios - our job sometimes is as hard as any other job of ATC dispatchers as an example. We are by far on a line of duty and on the frontier of a modern industrial battlefield than many other folks (respect for all of them - we learn from each other). Read an interesting topic by my colleague Doctor Phil Greenspun PhD from MIT as an example . My personal favorite reference about the iCon A5