The great show of Europe called Aero Friedrichshafen is about to begin. It starts officially tomorrow and runs through Saturday (April 20-23, 2016). I’ve lost count, but believe this is my 20th year of attending, far more than any other European show. As he worked to help exhibitors and manage the million details of his event, boss Roland Bosch said the event started in 1977, meaning next year would be its 40th, but… Aero alternated years from 1977 through 1991 (as do many European airshows). With the 1993 event it went annual, meaning this is the 31st Aero.
On Monday, the vast 11 halls of the Messe (the facility name) were largely empty but slowly becoming populated with airplanes. In all of the gymnasium-sized halls with their elegant curved wood roofs, workers assembled displays. In Halls B1, B2, and B3 — where the light aircraft I follow are concentrated — displays are more elaborate than anything we typically see at U.S.
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Flying Sling 4 … Airman’s Medical Update
As I’ve indicated many times in the last couple years, this website seeks to deliver news and video about Light-Sport Aircraft, light kit aircraft, ultralights, and light GA aircraft. The latter refers to four seat (and larger) aircraft created by the same companies that make LSA or kits. Specifically, I do not plan much on Cessna, Piper, Cirrus, Diamond, and other legacy brands as every magazine already examines these every month. Instead, I plan to cover emerging models from companies that established their brand in the LSA space: Tecnam, Flight Design, Pipistrel, Evektor, Van’s and The Airplane Factory. These six manufacturers are presently in the four seat game either with ready-to-fly aircraft or four seat kits. More are expected to follow.
At Copperstate 2015, I finally got a chance to fly the Sling 4 from The Airplane Factory, which I had been anticipating since enjoying the Sling LSA.
Two LSA Manufacturers Score Overseas
American readers of ByDanJohnson.com may be surprised to hear that more than a third of all visitors are from outside the United States. In a related fact, America has more pilots than any other country (very roughly half of the world aviator population) but more light aircraft are sold in other country by a ratio of around 10:1. These figures are fuzzy for a number of reasons but the point is that for LSA, the world is their market.
That statement is further proven by two recent successes.
Evektor reported it successfully passed the audit of the Civil Aviation Administration of China (CAAC) for production at the company’s Kunovice, Czech Republic plant. “CAAC’s audit team inspected the production facilities of Evektor-Aerotechnik focused on quality assurance, engineering and manufacturing, and quality inspections of fixed wing light sport aircraft,” said Evektor.
This Czech company — the first to obtain FAA acceptance back in 2005 — was able to prove compliance with CAAC requirements for Light-Sport Aircraft, meaning Evektor is fully authorized by the CAAC for deliveries of SportStar SL aircraft to the Chinese market.
Racing Down Electric Avenue … Here Comes Airbus
At the recently concluded Palm Springs Expo, a keynote address was provided by George Bye, the man behind the Sun Flyer project that aims to put electric two seaters into flight schools. Pipistrel is already selling into this market with its Electro (video) and while only a small number of aircraft are in use, the race is on for more … much more.
Airbus made big news back in July when a race developed to see who would cross the English Channel first in an electric powered airplane. Of course, the whole thing was a bit moot because it had been done years before. Longtime electric pioneer Eric Raymond of Sunseeker Duo noted, “It was already done in 1981 by the Solar Challenger, which flew from Paris to London at 14,000 feet. [Famous hang glider pilot and manufacturer Gerard] Thevenot even flew an electric trike across.
SLSA N-Number Registrations in First Half 2015
The U.S. market for Special Light-Sport Aircraft continues to grow at steady pace, modestly better than the trend for single engine piston certified aircraft as reported by the General Aviation Manufacturers Association for the first half of 2015.
SLSA deliveries in the half-year period totaled 97 units, with 91 of those coming from 15 manufacturers, showing that the famous 80/20 rule still generally applies … more than 80% of the market is supplied by less than 20% of the builders. It also implies the majority of those companies who previously earned FAA acceptance for their LSA models are either quite slow or inactive in the U.S. market.
We’d prefer to describe vigorous growth but the so-named Great Recession seems to be lingering on; at least it appears the much-talked-about recovery has left most of aviation still looking for improved business. Evidence of a still-troubled global economy is even clearer when you consider the wild stock market gyrations of recent weeks.
Sleeker Is Better In Electric-Propelled Aircraft
If you’ve been following exciting developments like the Airbus/Pipistrel/Cri-Cri English Channel crossing, or for that matter any of the electric airplane developments, you should know that the ideal electric-powered aircraft today are the very lightest weight machines.
However, another quality is just as important while we wait for scientists to significantly amp up the energy density of batteries. That quality is sleekness and I’ve been watching a Norwegian project from Equator Aircraft. Airplanes don’t get much sleeker than this.
If it needed to be even more intriguing, consider that this project comes from a team that has also been involved with seaplanes, so how about a two-seat electric seaplane? OK, it isn’t ready yet but this is one I will continue to follow closely. Following is some detail on this fascinating entry that again suggests the tip of the spear in LSA design seems intently focused on seaplanes.
Equator’ Aircraft P2 Excursion (abbreviated EQP2) is envisioned as a performance hybrid amphibian aircraft.
David Versus Goliath … ePlane Channel Crossing
When discussing big versus small, you cannot go much further than comparing a Light-Sport Aircraft company to Airbus. This story speaks to LSA builder Pipistrel, the goal of their French dealer, and nearly identical plans of the giant corporation. In a fascinating development, it turns out that an even smaller entity, a single individual in a miniature flying machine, managed to best the jet airliner producer at its own game. Here’s the story as I understand it although I readily admit I am relying solely on second-hand information.
Pipistrel makes the Alpha Electro (formerly known as WattsUp as our video at the end notes). They’ve already seen some success with this aircraft the factory model of which has been powered by a Siemens motor supplied by the huge Germany company.
As everyone who follows reporting of electric propulsion of either airplanes or electric cars surely knows, “range anxiety” is a consumer problem to be overcome and taking flights demanding courage is one way to assuage those concerns.
Exciting Development Projects at Aero 2015
Aero is such an interesting event for many reasons. Among the most significant of these are the large number of aircraft introductions or the newest development projects one discovers in the vast gymnasium-sized halls … eleven of them in total. It can be hard to cover all the square meters, which although not as enormous as giant outdoor American shows, are nonetheless so packed with aircraft that one gets sensory overload before you’ve seen them all.
The world premiere of BlackWing was such a project. Here is the first light aircraft I’ve seen from Sweden; others may exist but I’m not aware of them. This sleek speedster uses the ubiquitous Rotax 912 to achieve what they state as stunning speeds up to 400 kilometers per hour (250 mph or 217 knots) and this from only 100 horsepower! Of course, this won’t work as a Light-Sport Aircraft but BlackWing is LSA in size and concept other than its blazing speed.
eAirplanes at Aero 2015 Plus Major Motor News
With Aero mere days away now, excitement is growing for the electric aircraft event-within-the-event. Visitors can tour around the entry foyer hall where the e-flight-expo will be located. This year offers a few highlights, provided to me from my publisher friend Willi Tacke in Germany.
One aircraft not many Europeans and even fewer Americans have seen is the Chinese RX1E made by the Liaoning Ruixiang General Aircraft Manufacturing Company. An electric motorglider, RX1E earned its CAAC Type Design Approval (TDA) earlier this year using ASTM standards (article). Willi reported, “The Chinese team lead by chief developer Professor Dr. Yang Fengtian is now seeking certification in other countries such as Germany or France.
Some companies will not be attending not because their projects have stopped but because they are at critical junctions. Among those missing will be the Volocopter from e-Volo nor any man-carrying aircraft display by Yuneec — which last year showed their eSpyder that had just won German approval.
Electric Flight Events to Advance State-of-the-Art
A new season of airshows is about to erupt now that April has arrived. Among all the gasoline-powered aircraft that show visitors can see will be a growing collection of electric aircraft. As I often repeat, the pioneering development of electric propulsion will come first in light aircraft … at least until batteries go through a major breakthrough in energy density, as today’s best cells still weigh far too much for larger aircraft to use them effectively.
First up, in mere days, is the e-flight-expo, organized in cooperation with Flying Pages, the company operated by European publisher Willi Tacke who is well known for his Directory of Leisure Aviation.
Aero officials said “e-flight-expo will again be a major section at Aero Friedrichshafen 2015.” They note that as in other industries such as automobiles and drones, electric power continues to gain in importance in the man-carrying aviation sector.
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