If you were a dedicated Cub aficionado and wanted to build yourself the ultra version of the essential Cub idea, what would you do? Youd start with the basic planform, update it with edge-of-tech materials and build methods-carbon fiber, CNC-cut parts, modern avionics-all buttressed with an aerodynamic makeover to tweak performance. Then youd send the airplane to the place that designs and builds seats for Bentleys and Ferraris and tell them to go wild.
For a few years now, Insight Avionics has been selling its G-series line of color engine analyzers. The company is hardly a stranger to the engine display market. Its first-generation GEM series (graphic engine monitor) sold we’ll and delivered on quality, but these instruments fell short on advanced diagnostic utility for lack of modern software.
A decade ago, when the FAA and ASTM were dickering over what became the light sport aircraft rule, limitations on weight and performance-but not power-bubbled to the top of the discussion. The airplanes were supposed to be less expensive, light and simple, but the rule didnt say they couldnt have neck-snapping power-to-weight ratios and thus the era of the 180-HP LSA is upon us.
Electric aircraft will get bigger in 2016, but probably no more accessible. Its not for lack of trying. Above and below the surface, there’s semi-furious developmental work to bring electric airplanes to market, driven by a mix of a parallel market push in the automotive world, a war on noise and emissions, demand for drones and the faint outlines of an energy transition away from oil and toward electricity for everything.
Even with fuel prices at historic lows in the aviation world, pilots are constantly looking to save when they top off. Various apps keep us apprised of current pump prices, so we can plan our stops. But, what if there were a way to get a discount from the retail price when we taxi up to an FBO?
Modifying airplanes that the original manufacturer got almost right has been a constant in general aviation. But lately, we call it something different: remanufacturing. And if any company is the Alpha dog of this process, its Cleveland-based Nextant Aerospace, which has had impressive success remanufacturing Beechjet 400As. Now its poised to repeat the trick with the popular King Air C90 series.
If Pratt & Whitney doesnt quite own the low- and mid-power turboprop market, it at least has a long-term lease at rent-controlled prices. GE Aviation plans to challenge that primacy and the instrument of their run at PW will be the H-series engines of the sort Nextant is using. GE is the giant in transport-category turbofan engines and in a tiny little Czech Republic company, Walter Aircraft Engines, it found a contender. Walter began life in…
In the November 2015 issue of Aviation Consumer, we reported on Continental Motors acquisition of competitor and aftermarket supplier ECi, a buy which eliminated the aftermarket Titan cylinder line.While Continental admitted that it wouldnt retain many of ECis products, it also said it was considering a corrosion treatment for its existing line of factory cylinders, and now follows through with the NiC3 line.
For most owners, the exhaust system is an out-of-sight, out-of-mind portion of the airplane. Its certainly not a sexy part of any aircraft-even the FAAs description of the exhaust system in its Airframe and Powerplant Mechanics Powerplant Handbook is a little off-putting: …a scavenging system that collects and disposes of the high-temperature, noxious gases as they are discharged by the engine. Nevertheless, all exhaust systems deserve a great deal of respect and your attention and consideration because they live in a horrible environment of intense heat, flame, corrosive gases and vibration. Plus, if any component fails, the risks are nothing short of serious: carbon monoxide poisoning of the aircraft occupants, partial or total engine power loss and fire.
After years of developing and manufacturing speed mods for Piper aircraft, Robin Thomas started Power Flow Systems (www.powerflowsystems.com) with the intent of using automotive technology to design tuned exhaust systems for aircraft. To accomplish this, Power Flow says it customizes the exhaust tube for each cylinder so its length-from cylinder to the collector where the tubes join-causes the low pressure traveling down the tube behind an exhaust puff to reach the collector in time to suck out the exhaust from the next cylinder.
In 1995, following 10 years of running a company that performed aircraft exhaust system repairs, Dane Wagner opened Leading Edge Exhaust Systems (LEES) (www.wemakeyoufly.com), in Anchorage, Alaska. He was determined to build aircraft exhaust systems that were not only of higher quality and more robust than OEM equipment but that would allow the engine to develop more power. Having experience with the needs of the Alaska bush operators, he targeted their airplanes of choice, the…
Our latest cylinder survey yielded similar results as it did when we ran it in 2012. Again, Lycoming factory cylinders rated impressively we’ll with our respondents-60 percent said they were happy, while another 28 percent were satisfied with them.
