Dark Aero 1

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Jon Stains

Filing Flight Plan
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Oct 12, 2018
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Jon Stains
Ive been following them slowly on Instagram. Whats your guys thoughts on this. I think it will be incredible competitor for lancair and glasair if it does what it says it will.
 
Very tiny wing. And relatively high stall speed. This company at least claims to be making aerospace parts currently.
 
Kenny Phillips said:
Very tiny wing. And relatively high stall speed. This company at least claims to be making aerospace parts currently.
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Where did you find the proposed speeds or are you making speculation?
 
High stall speed, based on everything being listed in miles and MPH, looks like they are marketing it to new pilots, where have I seen that model before.....
 
Ah yes, another engineering major undergraduate capstone project yai. Looks like they might make some of your money back retailing homemade honeycomb panels. Who knows, maybe they'll end up with a parts and materials business with enough profit to net them the discretionary life to buy an A36 Bo and be done with it :rofl:.
 
SkyDog58 said:
NTSB reports?
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Well the bede is one example, there was the guy who lawn darted a PC12 with his family, the icon acidents, early circus stuff etc

Just marketing high performance planes to low performance pilots, or worse non pilots.
 
I like the concept, just a little hot rod built for speed and not much else.
 
James331 said:
Well the bede is one example, there was the guy who lawn darted a PC12 with his family, the icon acidents, early circus stuff etc

Just marketing high performance planes to low performance pilots, or worse non pilots.
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Well if pro pilots weren't such Taco Cabana tortilla flippers, Pilatus would be able to market these damned things to them, instead of your computer sophistry neighbors with all the spending cash...:stirpot:
 
James331 said:
High stall speed, based on everything being listed in miles and MPH, looks like they are marketing it to new pilots, where have I seen that model before.....
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Van's Aircraft? The largest GA manufacturer by volume.

Tim
 
hindsight2020 said:
Well if pro pilots weren't such Taco Cabana tortilla flippers, Pilatus would be able to market these damned things to them, instead of your computer sophistry neighbors with all the spending cash...:stirpot:
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Lol, as much as I like the PC-12, it’s not what I’d fly for my me time.

Only upgrade I’d debate would be a turbine beaver amphib or a PC6 amphib, and for me that really would just be spending money to spend money compared to my current ride.
 
I predict with a 200 hp naturally aspirated engine, 215 kt cruise. All up completed IFR will be $180K. Basically a carbon Lancair360. Personally, I’d go with a Barracuda and a well backed company.
 
None, none...none.
 
So is this like a Lancair, but you run the risk of the company going T.U. and not being able to finish your kit?
 
jssaylor2007 said:
So is this like a Lancair, but you run the risk of the company going T.U. and not being able to finish your kit?
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16qw39.jpg
 
Gotta start somewhere. Better a new kit maker than no new kit maker, so long as the airplane work.
 
Jon Stains said:
Ive been following them slowly on Instagram. Whats your guys thoughts on this. I think it will be incredible competitor for lancair and glasair if it does what it says it will.
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One problem for startups like this in GA is that other companies have been promising fantastic performance (Synergy,Raptor, Delthahawk) and have never delivered. Some - like Deltahawk - have even drained taxpayer funding for the perpetual magic beans show.
 
Thing is I don’t see many original designs, like I said make a solar turbine powered one and I’d probably cave in and pull the trigger, or a cool fast flying boat, or if you’re going to copy stuff copy the white lighting where there is nothing on the market to compete.

Why would I pay the same to get your knock off of a glasair or rv or whatever when I can just get the real thing?

Just a bunch of rotax / little conti/lyc clones, blah
 
all carbon fiber has been done before?

some pretty big claims on their website. useful and speed namely. also think i'd rather some cargo room vs 77 gallons of fuel
 
These guys did a 45 min presentation on their build for an EAA chapter meeting.




Interesting design aspect with the rudder(s). As some have said it looks like a smaller, tighter version of a Lancair Legacy.
 
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Wait until the prototype is actually completed and tested with a few flying examples of customer built planes out there before getting too excited about this design. Kit companies with big promises come and go very quickly and the smart money will go with the established kit producers. As I see it, there isn't much difference between the DarkAero and what is already out there except promises of increased range on less fuel burn with the DarkAero. To attain the same cruise speeds as the competition with 1/3 less fuel burn would be quite a feat, indeed. The DarkAero would have to be a lot cleaner to produce those promises and still have a reasonably comfortable cockpit for 2 people. There is no "free lunch" in aviation as every knot has to be earned.
 
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I completely agree with you, not buying into any hype about the aircraft or it's performance specs. I just find some of the design features such as a complete wet wing or those dual rudder bits interesting.
 
It will be interesting to see the performance once it flys. And more interesting to see the weight growth after the first build and after they do some aeroelastic flight testing.
 
Test flights are supposed to be happening this summer.
 
Man, four years in the making and no flight yet. What is it with EAB these days?
 
Salty said:
It's hard to build a better mousetrap.
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I suppose. When I think about how fast Glasair, Vans, Lancair, Velocity etc., had prototypes flying and kits shipping soon after, just gotta wonder what the hold up is these days.
 
Velocity173 said:
I suppose. When I think about how fast Glasair, Vans, Lancair, Velocity etc., had prototypes flying and kits shipping soon after, just gotta wonder what the hold up is these days.
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Other than vans, have any of them come up with a new design in the last decade? I think even the twin velocity is older than that now and It’s not exactly a new design.
 
One reason for the time is they are trying to design for production as well as for flight. They went through several landing gear iterations for example, tossing some because they were functional, but not suited to mass production. I give them credit for being methodical and I hope they come up with something interesting.
 
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