Anyone know what a "EMB 202 Ipanema" is like? (Brazil has them burning Ethanol now.)

[FrogNog 1]

clicky http://www.thestar.co.za/index.php?fSectionId=132&fArticleId=2449210.

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A Brazilian firm yesterday delivered the world's first ethanol-burning production aircraft to a crop-spraying company.

Neiva Aeronautic Industry says it sees a booming market for alcohol-powered planes.

The single-seat EMB 202 Ipanema is the first production-series model approved by aviation authorities to run on ethanol produced from sugar cane.

I didn't find any pictures of this thing so I wondered if someone else had any info.

I'm an alternative fuels fan, and of course an aviation fan, so the idea of them going together is pretty exciting to me, even if the Alaskan interior will be collapsed ten feet below sea level and Luigi Canni will be landing a 5 square foot canopy by the time one of these is certified in the U.S..

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Pull.

[wmw999 2,587]

Here's a picture. The Ipanema has actually been around for over 30 years; the alcohol version was announced in 2002. The press release when it was announced said that they like alcohol for agricultural applications, in part because it might increase the cycle time between maintenance.

The Ipanema is actually produced by Neiva, rather than Embraer (which developed it). If you can read portuguese, there's a lot of information on their website. If you can't (the article I pointed to is in English), you can probably write them and get information. They're an excellent company (one of my brothers used to work as an engineer onsite, for a company building them engines).

Wendy W.

There is nothing more dangerous than breaking a basic safety rule and getting away with it. It removes fear of the consequences and builds false confidence. (tbrown)

[Scrumpot 1]

Wendy, you're just SOOOooo Smart! ...Seriously
I've marvelled at both the depth and bredth of your knowledge in here for some time now, and I just could not resist finally just coming right on out and saying that!
Thank you, for all your CONTRIBUTIONS you have ALWAYS put into these forums with your ALWAYS on point, and salient posts! You ARE what I want to be when I grow up!

Blues,
-Grant

coitus non circum - Moab Stone

[wmw999 2,587]

Um, thanks. But please -- don't grow up.

Wendy W.

There is nothing more dangerous than breaking a basic safety rule and getting away with it. It removes fear of the consequences and builds false confidence. (tbrown)

[Groundbound 0]

If you will let a new guy make a comment:

I think the point of this being a spray plane is important.
We pilots often talk of alcohol based or alcohol-mixed fuels in our carbureted piston engines (many are stc'd to run on auto fuel but try to avoid those with alcohol in them).

So it may be that this alcohol fuel will run fine in an engine at low level (spray planes) but not at altitude for the same reason... vapor lock. Alcohol is too volatile at low ambient pressures so it may not be suitable for airplanes flying at altitude (or those carrying skydivers for example).

Just a guess as to why they are talking about spray planes and cars only.

[FrogNog 1]

You may be right, but my thinking is that volatility does not necessarily make for a poor motor fuel - it may make for a better one because it can be boiled and mixed with air more easily. (I understand part of the problems with gasoline car engine efficiency are because it contains so many different types of molecules with different boiling points that it takes a long time, relatively speaking, to get it to become gaseous and mix with the air prior to burning.)

The people who really have to make that sort of decision are the aviation engineers, not us.
I was just interested to see another, significantly different fuel being used in an aircraft someone's government decided to certify. Realistically I don't expect the FAA and the U.S. fuel architecture accomodating anything like this as a certified plane anytime soon.

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Pull.

[FrogNog 1]

Thanks for the picture. When I searched I kept getting risqué beach pictures. (That's good and that's bad.)

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Pull.

[wmw999 2,587]

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So it may be that this alcohol fuel will run fine in an engine at low level (spray planes) but not at altitude for the same reason... vapor lock. Alcohol is too volatile at low ambient pressures so it may not be suitable for airplanes flying at altitude (or those carrying skydivers for example).

I asked my brother that question; here's his reply:

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Right on all counts - the Ipanema has a normal aero engine, it's a large Continental or Lycoming (not sure which), it is susceptible to vapor lock. Interestingly the Ipanema has been approved locally to use alcohol since it used as a crop duster on (guess what?) sugar cane, so hence an abundance of alcohol... I wouldn't use alcohol in a jump plane if my life depended on it, imagine flying heavy to 12500 feet... Don't forget there's a couple of differences beyond what is mentioned - it takes more alcohol for complete combustion so that hits the per mile/cost, you should have a higher compression ratio (on the order of 10 or 11 to 1) for the engine to handle normally especially during starts, and alcohol holds a lot of water, so this has advantages/disadvantages - no water at the bottom of tanks, but nasty oxydation if you're not careful, not sure how you cure this without coatings, etc.

So maybe this is a piece of a puzzle, leaving more avgas for the rest of us...

Wendy W.

There is nothing more dangerous than breaking a basic safety rule and getting away with it. It removes fear of the consequences and builds false confidence. (tbrown)

[FrogNog 1]

Is the Ipanema carbureted or injected?

The energy density of alcohol is concerning; alcohol is significantly "puffier" than gasoline or kerosene. But I think that's only a volume issue, not a weight issue[1]. If someone wants to show I'm wrong on that, too, I'm listening.
Footnote 1: more volume translates to more weight in that larger tanks are needed to hold it and larger tanks tend to weigh more and can require a fatter airframe, which is also heavier. But that's secondary to whether the fuel contains less energy per weight. And jump planes often take off only half-full of gasoline or kerosene anyway, so it's not an immediate killer.

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Pull.

[pilotdave 0]

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And jump planes often take off only half-full of gasoline or kerosene anyway, so it's not an immediate killer.

But all that volatile fuel vapor in the half-full (or is it half empty?) gas tank might very well be an immediate killer!

Dave