This Genius Propeller Will Change Transport Forever

Sharrow and MIT have both been working on toroidal propellers which have shown incredible results.

In this video we look at a new design of propellers known as toroidal propellers. These have been shown to increase efficiency, thrust, and reduce the noise of both boats and drones. There could be many applications for this, such as cargo ships, electric flying taxies, and even computer fans.

Sources:

#breakthrough #drones #boats

[ZirothTech]

Thank you all for watching and the interesting comments, here are some points to address the main ones I have seen:
- Great points about how this may be manufactured in the future, part of the economies of scale I mentioned could definitely include injection moulding or similar.
- Durability is an interesting point and I would love to see how the blades fair in a 'crash test', they may also be harder to repair? Let me know your thoughts.
- The gain in efficiency is 105% when compared to the original values (38% to 78%), it is true that absolute efficiency cannot be over 100%, but increases can be. Such as a company seeing a 200% increase in profits, for example.
- Many saying that reduced cavitation may also reduce wear on the blades, making them last longer in boats. Great point that I didn't think of!

[alistaircruickshank]

This propeller design originates in Tasmania in 1971. It was developed by D B Sugden, an engineer consulting to The Robbins Company (a US company out of Seattle, specialists in hard rock tunnelling machines). The Robbins Company financed an R and D project lasting 2 years in collaboration with David Sugden. I joined the company in that year, thus I speak with some authority. We built and trialled a series of propellers from about 10 inch to 30 inches swept diameter. At that time the difficulty was reproduction of form, a problem which, as you point out, is overcome by CNC capabilities and 3D printing. Trials and wind tunnel testing demonstrated significant performance gains. I recall that a large prop was provided to a fishing vessel owner on the understanding he would trial it for a few months. He refused to give it up because it was so good when the trial concluded. The manufacturing difficulties of that time precluded further development.

[EnragedSephiroth]

I love seeing engineering breakthroughs like this. Amazing stuff.

[DudesIn]

This is huge!hey hats off to you for being on top of this type of video, it's seriously a major saving of fuel and makes the boat for efficient through the water.thsnks for the vid.

[livefire]

Im a CNC programmer who worked for a top tier marine propulsion company for years. Our company has been in the R&D phase of producing a prop similar to this for years to no avail. We produce the Volvo-Penta dual out drive props and Volvo is/was very interested in this design.

The main hurdle we couldn't clear on this design was cavitation and vibration during high RPM, which absolutely destroys lower ends. We even consulted top level fluid dynamic phd's from University of Michigan and still haven't cracked the code (pun intended), as of 2019 anyways.

I had to work hand-in-hand with our engineers on this project and I can say with 100% certainty, these style prop's are a bear to machine, even using state of the art 5-axis mills, the tolerances are crazy and the balance has to be absolutely perfect to mitigate the issues I mentioned above. I've produced some highly technical stuff in my career, including Govt. projects like the Navy's SWS submersible troop transport vessel to high end Hatteras, Bertram and Bollinger Shipyard 5, 7 and 8 blade NiBrAl, Bronze and Stainless steel props for luxury yachts and cargo vessels alike. All that being said those projects were a cake walk in comparison to this design. I don't miss the stress, twisted steel & broken tools. I was on a 1st name basis with our Dapra tool rep after trying to machine these.

[badkittymama]

So exciting! My dad was a metallurgist and cast many large propellers for military, cargo, and passenger vessels. I wish he was still around so I could share this with him. Thank you!

[jpsalis]

I could see this being interesting for FPV, quieter at the same performance and potentially greater crash resistance with the right materials. Not to mention it would probably hurt a lot less to get hit by one of these props compared to an open blade

[motorvN]

Fascinating topic and well presented - as a lifelong power boater I certainly love the idea of this so far untapped potential efficiency gain. And as someone involved in the emerging advanced/urban air mobility industry I’m interested in mitigating what will almost certainly be the impacts of community annoyance to noise. Subbed!

[WALBK]

As a drone pilot, I love the idea of quieter flight & improved rfficiency! Hope these make it to the marketplace soon! 🙂

[les_crow]

It's crazy how much improvement can be made to everything we already have.

[eamonshields]

More Efficient and quieter is amazing, great video!! Thanks

[JLchevz]

Fantastic video, I think you covered A LOT of different areas relevant to this. Good good.

[russellzauner]

Cavitation also is responsible for a great deal of wear and tear, shortening the service life of a propeller. Given that even smaller propellers aren't inexpensive, consider replacement costs on a cargo or military vessel.

[loiskimberleyplayer]

Such a cool innovation with a surprising amount of applications! Hopefully they become more cost effective in the future!

[IanValentine]

Wow what a great set of info and a great breakthrough

[WaterspoutsOfTheDeep]

Being able to travel 20% farther with the same amount of fuel the boat can holy and doing it faster is quite an improvement.

[jacoblajeunesse]

Love to see the effects on massive ships like cargo and cruises

[turtleturds]

My brain just blew up watching this. Fluid dynamics are rad!

[douglasgault]

Back in the 70s I ran into this toroidal propeller design in patent reseach. While attempting to design a constant torque variable pitch propeller myself. Must say I was very impressed at the time. In my own study of the toroidal design I drew the same conclusion of machine shop limitations of this design in manufacturing on a commercial level. But an extremely viable concept since the invention of 3 axis cnc machinery on an industrial scale. The shape does redefine the term of warp speed, , due to the warping of edge chines in this design.

[Denmon]

I imagine that toroidal blades could be amazing on fans, both for noise and static pressure