http://lmgtfy.com/?q=how+fast+is+the+fastest+non-jet+aircraft

Well I did try google, just not in English :-)

@ steephie22

Try looking into American X-planes from the mid-20th Century. We came out with a lot of really, really fast rocket-propelled aircraft.

I'm basically looking for something fast that doesn't need traditional fuels. So electric, pretty much.

Well not neccessarily, but green anyway.

Have you considered the potential of a plane powered by a really really big elastic band?

You should make a blimp.

There's got to be something faster than a blimp out there :-)

220mph, is that the record?

http://www.wired.com/2014/07/chip-yates-electric-plane-records/

What about a heavily armoured sphere that is propelled at speed via the repeated detonations of fusion bomb explosions? That's uber green as the main byproduct is helium, and pretty quick. Hard to think of a downside at all, to be honest

I'm afraid that doesn't suit my needs, sorry..

Steephie,

Why don't you ever tell us what you're actually trying to do so we can offer real advice? No one is going to steal your ridiculous ideas.

Some propeller military aircraft went as much as 330mph

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Republic_XF-84H

Well, because I'm still forming the fundamentals of the idea, and formulating them isn't my strongsuit either.

The general thought process evolves around a plane or similar with solar energy, wind energy (since that's gonna mess with aerodynamics obviously, maybe two 'modes'. Think 'landing gear up, wind turbines down') and energy storage. The perfect, obviously not very realistic situation in my mind would be a plane that has all of that and is pretty much an efficient mobile generator, while also being fast enough to keep up with the sun. It can be quite a bit less than that since it wouldn't practically stay in the air forever anyway.

I am not arguing that isn't absolutely ridiculous. It's part of the process for me, now comes the part where I try to make it less ridiculous. Just speed and solar, solar and wind or wind and speed will probably do, for example, since that would still be a first as far as I know. Any of the three on their own is nothing new so not interesting for me.

Well, just keep in mind that any energy you get from wind will be offset by the added drag the plane now needs to overcome. Solar has a lot of potential, though.

It's too bad diplomat isn't here any more. He could have helped you out with his PhD in aerodynamic and aeroplanes.

Indeed, utilizing wind energy would be in'generating mode', essentially. So when there are no passengers etc., rather than letting it rust on the ground, let it generate energy, or generate wind energy while doing recreational flights.

With solar, I figured it would be ideal for tailored flight routes around the globe, westward of course. Because moving east across an ocean for example seems particularly impossible, but west might work. So it's not meant to be a catch-all-flights solution, but it could be beneficial for particular flights.
With short flights within, say, 6 hours, east is still possible I suppose.

Am I sensing correctly that you don't consider it too insane, abge?

In other news, I'm now at a university on a regular basis, so don't worry, I should have new soundboards for my crazy ideas soon :-)

Steephie, I recently read about a company in Oregon that is creating solar/wind powered glider/generators. Might find that interesting. But the point wasn't human flight, just capturing energy high up in the air.

Yeah I googled and, for example, solar planes already exist, blimps with wind turbines are being developed too.

There are already designs for solar powered drones which can sustain themselves for up to five years.
http://www.popsci.com/article/technology/solar-powered-drone-designed-fly-five-years-nonstop

When you say 'non-jet engine' people offer you propellor (also run on internal combustion engines) and rocket (run on rocket fuel) instead - these are both not what you wanted but you weren't very clear...

I've seen some cool stuff about compressed air, though mostly for ground vechiles.... Blimps overcome the lift issue with a downside of extra drag, they're great when the wind is in their favour, and you could probably control altitude to escape the worst wind conditions, but being forca le grounded (even with an anchor) would suck big time...

Best option for high speed transport is sub orbital flights, which take ~4 hours to get anywhere. But current designs require jet/rocket engines and really good oxygen supply/air tightedness.

@ steephie22

Is your goal a 100% renewable-energy-driven airplane? Because there's been a lot of recent developments into aviation biofuel. Aviation biofuel performs just as well as conventional fuel, but it's WAY more expensive at present. I don't see aviation biofuel going into widespread service unless oil prices get out of hand.

The premise is pretty much that the most ideal realistic place for generating solar energy would be on a plane moving along with the sun.

I suppose the same is true for conventional airplanes if they can store/use the energy and their flight paths and times are optimized to catch lots of sun.. It would just sound less perfect I suppose, but still generate green energy in a way that could perhaps be more beneficial/relatively economical than solar energy generated on the ground.
I wonder whether the combination of jets and wind works..

Ultralights don't demand a lot of energy to run, and a propeller engine can be electric and run on solar power. The problem is that solar panels aren't super effective and not super light so in order to compensate for the weight and drag of the solar panels you need more power, meaning you need more panels and hence more power...

If you find light and effective solar panels enough to get enough electrical power from the surface of your plane, then there you have it. Like the drones mentioned above the plane could stay up for years.

What about a huge light plane filled with helium or something alike, except for where passengers etc. are?
So, say, 80% of the plane would be dedicated to solar panels and helium or alike..

Another idea entirely would be to get a plane to mid-air with loads of balloons, after which it continues on its own, to save energy getting off the runway.

Undersea tunnel, made airtight so a vacuum can be maintained, containing a maglev train. The limited energy required maintained by geothermal sources or turbines powered by ocean currents.

Sorted.

Initial investment would be much larger and harder to pull off.

Also less flexible.

I genuinely think it has more potential than a balloon/ solar plane hybrid. Hell, even the fusion bomb powered giant golf ball is more likely :p.

The trouble is that for slow moving cost effective transport the boat is pretty damned awesome. For rapid transport beating a modern jet is damned tricky.

A boat isn't too useful when you're transporting from, say, Switzerland to Moscow though, is it?

@Octavious, have you seen Elon Musks Hyperloop idea? http://www.bloomberg.com/news/videos/b/03176067-a55c-418 -a89a-fec2c87b26f5

Not a perfect vacuum, but still pretty good.

I think that until we get a space elevator, rocket powered sub-orbital flight (possibly from a floating ballon/zepplin launch pad) will be the fastest way to travel long distance - while the hyperloop (or just better trains) might become the best way to travel inter-city distances.

@Steephie, of course! Until you build a series of canals!

let me see... the Danube from Switzerland to the black sea, then the Volga all the way to Novgorod, then it is a quick tributary along hte Oka to Moscow!

Indeed not... If only we had some kind of boat on wheels and smooth tracks connecting places to increase speed and reduce friction...

Remind me again, what problem are you trying to solve exactly?

The high-pitched idea would be a green passenger plane, essentially, but other than CO2-emission from planes not really a problem to solve.

Rather a possible improvement. The improvement would be two-fold:
1. By staying above the clouds, you don't have to worry about those, meaning the amount of daylight is more consistent.
2. Solar panels are only useful in daylight which is only there during daytime. If you move the panels in the same direction as the direction the daylight is moving in, so west, you can catch more daylight per day. If you also move the solar panels east at night, you'll have less 'downtime'.
So it's a possible improvement for planes that get much more daylight than usual, because they have a standard traject in which they fly west during the day and east during the night for instance.

And in general I'd like to explore possibilities with generating wind energy on fast-moving objects, but I'm aware of the fact that catching wind slows down, generally wasting energy. Any object would be slowed down by the air though, maybe the slowdown that occurs naturally can be turned into electricity.

@steephie, em physics 101.

if a wind turbine is (say) 90% efficient, then you can get a lot of energy from wind. If you generate teh wind in the first palce (by, say moving very fast) You have to put in 100% energy and will only get 90% back out. That is always a losing proposition.

Someone above explain how drag works better than i can, but if you start harvesting energy you increase the drag - that means you need more energy to go at the same speed; in effect you are adding energy harvesting at less than 100% and being forced to apply 100% energy.

The only case where this would be helpful, is when you are slowing down (think landing an aircraft) you could concievably harvest energy from the motion at that point and not have to add anything - because you don't care that you are slowing down here.

This is done in some hybrid cars with magnetic-disc brakes - they generate electricity from the motion of the wheels and store it up in a battery for later use accelerating. But it adds weight to the car and is expensive...

Jet engines might be able to run in reverse, but you can't make them turn exhaust back into jet fuel... electric motors running a propellor plane would be able to turn this motion back into electricity - and likely wouldn't add signifigant weight to the plane.

What I meant is that you're going to have drag anyway and maybe you can design the plane in such a way that the drag from the plane (which is, in a sense, unintentionally harvested anyway, with a normal plane as well) is turned into energy.

So I'm not talking about adding drag, I'm talking about utilizing the unavoidable drag already there. Still not sure whether that's possible, but an interesting thought to me.

You can attempt to reduce the friction, i guess if it results in an increase in temperature then you can try and harvest that energy, if you have a temperature difference to exploit.

A sterling engine would do it, but that might also be heavy; fine for rail or sea travel, but weight is a major concern for air travel.

Harvesting energy from the engine that would otherwise go wasted (read: warmth mostly) was on my list as well.