This Genius Propeller Will Change Transport Forever

this is a toroidal propeller it gets its name from the blades which are in the shape of a Taurus which is often described as resembling a donut however these special donut inspired blades are much more impressive than they first appear in fact they have proven their ability to more than double the propeller efficiency when used on a boat which greatly increases speed and fuel economy not only that but these propellers can massively reduce the noise of both drones and boats in this video we'll see how it does this and some examples of it in use the physical difference between the toroidal prop and a standard prop is obvious when you look at them but it is not immediately obvious why this has such huge benefits however if we look at these two operating next to each other things start to become a bit clearer firstly this is a comparison between a toroidal prop and a standard prop you can see far less bubbles known as cavitation coming off of the blade tips even though the blades are the same size and rotating at the same speed this is because the toroidal prop generates less tip vortices which can cause noise vibration and reduce efficiency It is believed to do this because the vortices that would develop at the tips are instead spread across the whole blade in this second comparison we can see that the toroidal prop also brings in more surrounding fluid as it spins than the standard prop as the die from further away is pulled into the blade this gives a further increase in both efficiency and thrust the two main toroidal propellers I've seen is the one from sharrow who have been focused on Marine applications and one from a research group at the Lincoln Laboratories within MIT who have been focused on extremely quiet drones we came up with this this initial concept of using uh this toroidal shape this annular Wing shape to make but hopefully a quieter propeller so I had an intern of mine run with the idea where he took the concept and created a bunch of iterations to try out basically different shapes and see you know what works what doesn't the main difference between the two propellers from MIT and sharo is that the sharo blades have a more aggressive pitch and the holes in the blades are smaller and less noticeable this makes them more suited to their respective uses and either air or water to demonstrate the noise reduction between these propellers let's listen to a boat using a standard and toroidal one this is a pretty insane difference and can be seen on drones too where these graphs show that a standard prop generates much more noise in the important frequency zones than a toroidal prop on top of that if we consider a boat with a motor running at 4000 RPM the toroidal propeller efficiency is 205 percent that of a standard one the toroidal prop also approaches maximum efficiency much sooner than the standard one which is highly beneficial as boats spend a lot of time cruising at the mid-range these combined mean the toroidal prop gives incredible average fuel Savings of around 20 percent the benefits of faster quieter and more efficient ships can't be overstated as it could decrease sailing time reduce fuel consumption and emissions and reduce noise pollution to marine life which is an increasing threat in our oceans as it affects their communication and navigation these benefits are especially important if the props could be used on large cargo ships which are the backbone of global trade traveling thousands of miles across the world's oceans to transport everything from Electronics to food to raw materials in terms of the boat's operation it is said to increase handling from those that have tried it and it increases thrust in the reverse direction for drones on the other hand more efficient flight may enable new possibilities for air travel and reduce disturbances to people and animals nearby clearly this propeller has many benefits but what are the drawbacks the main one is that the complexity of the prop makes it more expensive to manufacture as they are currently made using CNC machines or by being 3D printed this makes the shower prop cost around five thousand dollars compared to five hundred dollars for a standard one however as the boat would be cheaper to run due to its increased efficiency it could earn this back over time and if these become more popular the cost will come down due to the economies of scale from Mass manufacturing it is also not fully clear how these will scale up to the larger ships or aircrafts just yet as these generally use slower motor speeds however it is likely some benefits could come from this this is also just the tip of the iceberg there could be many more applications to come that we don't even know about yet from highly efficient Hydro generators to quiet computer fans as you're still watching please subscribe to the channel as I think you'll enjoy some of the other videos that I make like this one on a hydroelectric generator that can deliver cheap constant electricity thanks to their new breakthrough

Channel: Ziroth

Views: 5,806,423

Keywords: Science, Engineering, STEM, Electric, Zero, Tesla, News, Research, EV, Battery, ship, mit, boat, propeller, toroidal, learning, educational, footage, test

Id: MGy8jvf-DZ0

Length: 5min 18sec (318 seconds)

Published: Mon Feb 06 2023

Reddit Comments

[u/OleksiiUA]

All of a sudden I'm seeing this propeller everywhere. Was it just invented?

[u/DazedWithCoffee]

So, just to head off other comments, yes I understand that this is to be interpreted as “more than twice as efficient as x” but that’s some clickbait nonsense on the thumbnail and title

[u/bacon205]

Seen these maybe a year ago, thought they looked super interesting and just screwing around started looking into them for my fish & ski boat. Noped that idea right outta my head when I seen the price vs the standard stainless prop on there now.

[u/fishfetcher_anaconda]

Badass dynamics. Thank you.

[u/Proper-Nectarine-69]

The benefits don’t justify the cost

[u/classical_saxical]

Have a 100hp engine? Add this to make it 105hp! /s