Taking Personal Aircraft To A New Level

Safety and performance. Lancair has been doing it for 23 years, delivering high performance piston and turbine powered aircraft kits.

Surrounded by press and fans, Lancair unveiled Evolution at AirVenture. Engineering on Evolution began three and a half years ago. Lancair President Joe Bartels (above) makes no apologies for the length of time spent on the design. "We did not take the fast track approach with this design as many manufacturers have done so in the past."

The Evolution is a product of technology, it was developed entirely through Computer Aided Design created by Computer Numeric Code machining and evaluated by Finite Element Analyses.

Some of the self imposed goals to meet; more space, meet FAR Part 23 standards, including a 61kt stall speed while upholding the Lancair reputation. Lancair's goal according to Bartels is to "maximize uniformity and safety while still providing a kit that our customers enjoy building."

Some of the safety features include BRS parachute system, energy absorbing seats and AmSafe Aviation airbag seatbelts. "We took the time necessary to come up with the best and safest four-place turbine aircraft today," says Bartels.

Under the cowling lies a Pratt and Whitney PT6A-135A allowing speeds in excess of 385 mph true using the four bladed Hartzell prop. All this while sipping only about 35 gallons of Jet A per hour. The range of Evolution with 45 minute reserve at max cruise is 860nm and 1290 at economy cruise. Evolution will be ready to take you places after about 1,000 hours of build time.

The Evolution is a true four seater. Four occupants, 140 gallons of Jet A, 150 lbs of bags and still be below 4,300 lbs. Lancair engineer Tony Ong comments on the 39 cubic feet of baggage space and even more with the rear seats removed "if you wanted to camp back there you could." The pressurized baggage door allows for the addition of the family pooch and no mess from the packed toothpaste tube. The instrument panel can be a Chelton EFIS or Garmin G-900X.

The first five kits were ready for sale here at AirVenture and by the end of the Evolution's debut only one was left. Construction has started on the initial five and are scheduled to be delivered before year end. After that the tooling and fixtures will be sent off to the Philippines for full production run.

FMI: www.lancairevolution.com