Performance analysis of hybrid electric and distributed propulsion system applied on a light aircraft

Aircraft industry is still in the early stages of pure electric propulsion systems development, the main concern is the significant mass of batteries. As such, hybrid electric systems have gained much stake-holder attention in the recent years. At the same time, interest in distributed propulsion systems is also increasing, due to the improvement in aerodynamic efficiency compared to conventional configurations. This paper investigates these two fields, presenting the results of two correlated studies. The first study deals with: i. The relevance of the purely electric propulsion systems and their comparison to conventional ones and ii. Hybrid propulsion systems and the suitable hybrid configuration for light aircraft using the normalized range factor and range analysis. The outcome of the first investigation has been used in the second study to build a distributed propulsion architecture and complete a comparative CFD analysis to demonstrate the advantages of the new concept compared to the baseline configuration. (C) 2020 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier Ltd.