Brainthee

To me it depends on the cost both literally - what it would cost to modify existing engines and what performance loss against noise reduction gain. Silent Paramotors are obviously the snake oil as like you said, the prop will make noise but if there is a quieter engine that doesn’t sound like, as someone put it - a dirt bike in the sky for a performance loss I can deal with. I’d be happy. Would love to jump onboard with electric Paramotors but I feel it’s the same lifecycle as electric cars - early gen will be/are low distance and high recharge time which will both improve with tech.

Really really interesting. I wouldn’t be surprised if there was a trade off between performance/efficiency and additional noise reduction (isn’t there always?!). That said, I think one of the biggest issues our sport has in terms of engagement with local communities is noise pollution. The way I see it is if we can significantly reduce that (perhaps at a small cost to performance or efficiency) then there could certainly be a big benefit in being responsible pilots. Will take a better read of it later so my hobby mechanic skills can be overwhelmed :P

Curious... what kind of forces does each one take on? It wouldn't be too difficult to model and 3D print these but the question would be if the 3D printed part would be strong enough. Good post though! I've seen these dotted around on different sites/videos and wondered what they were for!