Classic Italian styling and Swiss engineering produces beautiful tandem 2-seater

By ANN Correspondent Juan Jimenez

At first glance, there is only one thought that comes to mind: "Honey, I shrunk the Avanti." AceAir SA, based out of Manno, on the Italian side of Switzerland, has brought their first creation to Oshkosh, the Aeriks 200, a very stylish composite canard kit airplane with interior features reminiscent of high-end automotive designs than the typical canard homebuilt.

Fresh off its first flight on May 29, 2002 at the hands of test pilot Walter Spychiger, this aircraft is equipped with 105 horsepower Diamond Engines rotary engine (previously known as Midwest Rotary Engines), driving a three-blade MT Propellers composite three-blade prop with a 2024-T3 driveshaft. The engine is fully embedded in the rear section of the aircraft, and is cooled by three NACA scoops, two on the sides below the wing roots and one in front of the vertical stabilizer.

The aircraft is designed for a 200 kt VNE, 155 kts maximum speed at Sea Level, and a maximum cruising speed of 140 kts at 8,000 MSL. Clean stall is 65 kts and full flaps drops that number to 54 kts. With a fuel tank capacity of 29 gals, endurance is estimated at 5 hours, for a zero-wind range of approximately 700 nm.

According to AceAir, the design process of the aircraft was as high tech as its looks - CAD/CAM tools were employed to lay out the design, and computational fluid dynamics (CFD) and finite-element structural analysis (FEM/FEA) studies were performed to work out as many of the issues that could be identified with CATIA computer workstations. All the molds for the aircraft components were produced with CNC hardware.

During OSH, the company is offering the first three airframe kits for $50,000. This does not include an engine, propeller, avionics or paint.

FMI: www.aeriks.com