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“In a nutshell, we removed all of the conventional mechanical anti-torque components — which is gearboxes, driveshafts and tail rotor hub and blades — and replaced it with four electric motors and fans,” Eric Sinusas, program director of light aircraft at Bell, told Vertical. “They are fixed-pitch blades and they’re changing rpm constantly.”
The system has been installed on a Bell 429 demonstrator aircraft at Bell’s facility in Mirabel, Quebec, and began flight testing on May 23, 2019. Since then, the program has completed about 25 flight hours, with the aircraft gradually expanding its flight envelope.
originally posted by: ignorant_ape
i have a question - :
if both engines failed on this - would the main rotor rotation still drive teh alternator as the pilot attempts to do an autorotation emergency landing ?
As soon as you pull up on the collective to land, you want that tail rotor working
The electrically distributed anti-torque (EDAT) system is composed of four small fans within a tail rotor shroud in an offset two-by-two pattern. Each of the rotors contains four blades, and they are powered by four separate motors, with the electrical energy provided through generators driven by the turbine engines.
But fitment of the EDAT has required significant modifications from nose to tail. Rather than mechanically actuated anti-torque controls, the pedals now provide commands to a fly-by-wire system that controls the output of the four fans. The air-cooled fan motors are powered by a liquid-cooled generator running off the aircraft’s two Pratt & Whitney Canada PW207 turbines. Wires connecting the generator with the motors run down the tail boom, where the tail rotor shaft once sat.