Oshkosh 2010

The newest airframes to debut aren’t flying yet, but models and mockups were enough to lure onlookers to the Cobalt Co50, Terrafugia’s redesigned flying car and a diesel version of KAI’s KC-100 four-seater.

Record rainfall plagued preparations and helped attendance land seven per cent lower than at AirVenture 2009. Still, 535,000 people flooded this city of 65,000.

Clouds parted, but 50 Piper Cherokee pilots who trained three days for formation flying and a mass arrival on the type’s 50th birthday flew home in frustration over a muddy cancellation.

That mass arrival would have provided a nice contrast to the new GA activity highlight at Oshkosh, showing the sector, despite its recent struggles, is attracting innovators and new designs.

One of those innovators is the new CEO of the newly formed Kestrel Aircraft, who broke a year of silence after leaving the 2009 show feeling rejected. Alan Klapmeir’s failed bid to buy the SF50 singleengine jet program from Cirrus Aircraft ended his term as Cirrus chairman and his relationship with his brother Dale, who became chairman of the world’s leading four-seat piston single manufacturer, which the brothers cofounded.

“There isn’t another person like him,” Dale said, expecting big things for his brother and the seven-seat turboprop Kestrel. “As a turboprop, it’s going to have pretty decent operating costs, probably not much more than where we’re at in operating costs,” he said, referring to Cirrus’s SR22 four-seat piston single.

Each Klapmeir brother tells a different version of why the attempted jet buyout fell apart, with Dale saying the price wasn’t met and Alan suggesting the sale could have pulled Cirrus through the tight recession.

As the hunt for capital continues, development and certification of the SF50 progresses, but only barely, and top engineers have left Cirrus to join Kestrel.

Rumours of impending bankruptcy are overstated, insists Cirrus CEO Brent Wouters. “At half the volume that we had in 2008, our business is (US)$80 million more profitable at the bottom line. At the same volume that we had in 2009, our business is more than (US)$50 million more profitable than we had in 2009,” he says, “The bottom line is, our strategy is working today. ” Wouters touted Cirrus sponsorship of the Red Bull Air Race as a certain way to promote aviation in the minds of potential new pilots, though Red Bull put clouds over that horizon by announcing a one year hiatus days later.

Cirrus became the industry leader with breakthroughs in composites and avionics, and its pioneering use of airframe parachutes is now matched, Wouters says, with the new Perspective ESP, a safety and flight stability augmentation system by Garmin that will be available on Cirrus SR series aircraft for new orders scheduled for (northern) autumn 2010 delivery. If thepilot becomes disabled the ESP takes over, potentially correcting the most common causes of accidents.

The Kestrel is just the beginning, Alan notes. “There certainly will be other designs we’ll be looking at. Some of them could be turbofan airplanes, or a variety of other possibilities. We’re not at a helicopter yet, but you never know!” The Kestrel, which was developed by the UK’s Farnborough Aircraft, cruises at 350kt.

Also in the high performance realm, Oshkosh saw the world debut for the Cobalt Co50 mockup, even if it was missing its canard and pusher propeller. This five-seater piston single is far from its first flight, with founder and owner John Loury leaving his role at EADS and his home in France to plant roots in California. Loury expects his design to attain 245kt in cruise over a 600nm range. It’s beautiful, too, he adds. “When you spend (US)$500-600,000 on an aircraft, you want it to be just gorgeous,” he says, and there’s a lot to learn from car designers.

“I feel in the automotive sector you have 10-20 years of advancement in pretty much everything – mechanics, materials and ways of designing that are not used in aeronautical engineering – so we tried to blend the different methodologies. ” Senior French military officers are among his major investors.

At the other end of the spectrum, Sonex Aircraft, based in Oshkosh, revealed its tiny Onex during its annual open house.

The all-metal, 5. 00m long, 5. 72m span single-seat aircraft is designed to meet light sport aircraft regulations when powered by an 80hp (60kW) AeroVee engine.

Folding wings for easy storage are one feature. Range of 430nm and fuel burn of 13 litres/hr are others.

Flight Design brought two new ideas to Oshkosh from Germany. The serene seabase south of Oshkosh on Lake Winnebago hosted Flight Design’s CTLS-Lite model on amphibious floats. The latest version of the Icon A5 was there, too, next to the Cubs and Caravans and their pilots’ secluded campground.

Terrafugia attracted much attention with its ‘roadable aircraft’ in the revised, better, heavier Transition flying car (Terrafugia is Latin for ‘escaping the Earth’). COO Anne Dietrich says the 28 test flights of its proofof- concept led to a new configuration that is a better aircraft as well as a better car. The extra 90kg weight increase recently approved by the FAA especially helps with strength and stability on the road when the folded wings can get pushed around by wind.

“Originally we were going to be a passenger car. We’ve been reclassified as what’s called a multipurpose passenger vehicle, and that’s the same category as your SUVs and light trucks,” Dietrich says, explaining changes to the streamlined model unveiled by her husband and EAA chairman Tom Poberezny. “We still meet the crash requirements, but we no longer need the full-width bumper, so now the bumper can be more integrated into the fuselage. ” Without that canard/bumper and without protective structures below the pusher propeller, the new Transition has a cleaner look. The roll cage and crash zones on the production prototype will make it especially safe, she adds. “Maybe if things go really, really well, we may even be demonstrating it here next year,” she says.

Electricity continues toward viability as an aircraft power source, though Sikorsky doesn’t yet claim its Firefly demonstrator is ready for the daily commute. Its Innovations team replaced the standard piston Lycoming HIO-360-D1A engine of a Schweizer S-300C helicopter with a high efficiency, electric motor and digital controller from US Hybrid, coupled with a lithium ion energy storage system from Gaia.

“Through the electrical conversion, propulsion efficiency of the aircraft has been increased roughly 300 per cent from baseline. Electric propulsion also inherently simplifies the complexity of the propulsion system by reducing the quantity of moving parts, increasing reliability while reducing direct operating costs,” says Mark Miller, vice president, Sikorsky Research & Engineering.

First flight with a 190hp (142kW) electric motor is anticipated later this year.

And Cessna and Bye Energy Inc announced a collaboration to design and develop an electrical propulsion system for a Cessna 172 Skyhawk as a proof of concept aircraft.

“As we look at the landscape of alternative fuels for general aviation aircraft, the electric powerplant offers significant benefits, but there are significant challenges to get there,” said Cessna CEO and chairman Jack Pelton. “We believe Bye Energy has gotten off to a good start in understanding those challenges and how to overcome them. ” Bye Energy is a specialist integrator of clean energy solutions for general aviation and business aircraft, focusing on electric energy propulsion systems and renewable biofuels. The two companies expect the proof of concept aircraft to make first flight by the end of the year.

As part of the World Electric Aircraft Symposium held during AirVenture, Erik Lindbergh awarded (US)$25,000 as part of the first Lindbergh Electric Airplane Prize (LEAP), which recognises contributions to the development of practical electric flight, to the Yuneec E430 electric powered LSA.

Sonex Aircraft was recognised for the Best Electric Aircraft Sub-System or Component Technology for its eFlight Initiative electric propulsion system. Korean Aerospace industries prefers diesel, and revealed a model of its KC-100 four-seat trainer that will be powered by the Austro Engines AE300.

Power and fuel were recurring themes throughout the show, and CEOs across general aviation expressed concern and determination over the impending disappearance of 100LL in the US. The tetraethyl lead additives that boost octane and manage knocking also cause nerve damage in humans and animals and are the target of an Environmental Protection Agency Notice of Proposed Rule Making that was accepting comments through August.

GAMA, AOPA, the National Air Transportation Association (NATA), the National Business Aviation Association (NBAA) and the EAA, along with the National Petroleum Institute and the National Petrochemical and Refiners Association have joined to form the FAST Coalition, and are supporting the creation of a 100 ULL (Ultra Low Lead) avgas that could cut lead emissions by 90 per cent.

Eventually, this consortium expects the private sector to make breakthroughs for an entirely lead-free piston fuel.

“This end of the market is the most sensitive to price increases,” NATA president James Coyne said. “I estimate that a 25 per cent increase in price would cause fuel sales to fall 33 per cent or more. ” GA groups have been searching for more than 20 years for an unleaded piston fuel, even as they lobby the EPA for leniency regarding the Clean Air Act.

Margo Tsirigotis Oge, director of the EPA’s Office of Transportation and Air Quality, released a statement apparently to ease growing unrest among pilots. She states the “EPA has not established or proposed any date by which lead emissions from aircraft operating on leaded avgas would need to be reduced. In fact, EPA does not have authority to control aviation fuels. ” The EPA does, however, have authority to regulate lead additives, as it is planning to do after being pushed by a lawsuit from Friends of the Earth.

Some industry leaders are busy chasing a solution, some are waiting nervously and others are taking matters on directly.

GAMI and Swiftfuel are on track for approval of drop-in substitutes, notes US Senator James Inhofe. The Oklahoma Republican adds, “It’ll take another 18 months, maybe as much as two years.

They’re going to have that thing certified.

The environmentalists would love to get you out of the air, they’d love to have this rule into effect on no lead gas before it’s available. They won’t get by with it. I give you my promise we’re going to be there to make sure they don’t. With a majority in the house and the senate we can put the skids on these outlandish things. ” Where the US goes on low lead fuels could have a telling impact on the rest of the GA world as far as new aircraft development goes.

That anxiety was right next door to excitement and friendship at AirVenture, where 2167 international visitors arrived from 66 nations. Australia was represented by 350 people, coming in behind Canada’s 586 visitors for the largest international delegation.