SkyCraft Airplanes, a company working to bring an affordable, single-seat light sport aircraft to market, said at EAA AirVenture that it is compliant with ASTM standards and expects certification in September.
The SD-1 Minisport Czech-designed airplane has an empty weight of 270 pounds and a useful load of 310 pounds. It cruises at 118 mph and stalls at 52 mph clean, 40 mph with flaps extended. The aircraft boasts a climb rate of 1,400 feet per minute and a fuel burn of 1.8 gph. The company said the operational cost is only $12 an hour. The purchase price is $54,000.
The SD-1 has a fuel-injected, 50-horsepower Hirth F-23 engine with a time between overhaul of 1,000 hours. SkyCraft said that it will do a free top-end overhaul at 500 hours. The aircraft can be bought in tricycle gear or taildragger versions, and customers can opt to add a ballistic parachute or Mode S transponder.
The company had brought a partially completed fuselage of the SD-1 Minisport to EAA AirVenture in 2012, where it exhibited as a kitplane manufacturer but had not yet completed an airframe. This year, SkyCraft said it has two models flying, one that it brought to the fly-in and another, in a taildragger configuration, that is test flying.
SkyCraft’s Paul Glavin, a 2012 Graduate of the University of Southern California who has tracked his quest to earn a sport pilot certificate affordably online, said the company has 14 preorders and is now accepting $2,000 deposits for delivery in summer 2014.
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