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Aviation History
2003
2003 - 0858.PDF
Cover story designs using traditional metal airframes, is under administration; and France's Apex Aircraft, manufacturer of the Alpha, Bui Aero, Cap and Robin ranges of light air craft, entered voluntary receivership follow ing a downturn in orders. Even the steadi est of bases can be chipped away by cheap, attractive new market entrants, and France's EADS Socata is considering launch ing two new piston aircraft to fill its market gaps, and these would also use a significant share of composites in their final designs. Diesel development Materials are not the only key to success, however. Other factors in making GA more affordable and easier are also receiving enor mous interest. One of the most significant innovations in the European automotive industry in recent years has been the devel opment of turbocharged direct injection (TDi) diesel-cycle engines. In Europe, diesel is big business, chiefly because of fuel taxes roughly double that of the USA, and TDis from BMW, Mercedes and Volkswagen have transformed the fuel's cheap agricultural image to a super-efficient sports car fuel. Unsurprisingly, therefore, the develop ment of diesel-cycle engines for piston air craft has been greeted with enthusiasm by the European GA community. New com posite aircraft designs can shave around one-third off running costs through aero dynamic refinements while the lower price of diesel can cut an additional third. TAE points to its own study, which shows a 600km (400nm) journey in a lOOkW (135hp) Centurion 1.7-powered DA40-TDi Diamond single to cost around €14 ($15) in Jet A believes the fuel compared with €50 in aviation gaso- lowerfuel line required to propel a Lycoming-pow- costs of ered Cessna 172 single. DA40 will Diamond believes that US customers, less give it a concerned by fuel costs, will still be inter cutting edge ested in diesel-cycle engines, since TAE's Centurion 1.7 includes full authority digital engine control (FADEC), which replaces twin magnetos and other pre-flight checks with a one-button automatic starting proce dure. The FADEC, based on an automobile control unit developed for Lotus, also per mits the pilot to accelerate without worry ing about fuel pump mixtures. TAE has around 1,000 orders today, with 90% coming from Europe, and is leading the pack of manufacturers developing diesel-cycle engines, pushing ahead of established players such as France's SMA Engines with its 170kW Jet A-fuelled SR305. Yet TAE did not exist until 1999, when Thielert Group realised the enor mous potential market in retrofits alone. Thielert had already invested in the latest computer-aided superalloy milling and casting machines for its Thielert Motoren division, which produces precision compo nents for Formula 1 and Indy Car proto type engines, and had the design for its TAE-110 (later Centurion 1.7) modified automotive engine certificated within three years. TAE says superalloys have made the diesel light enough to replace avgas engines and direct fuel injection means that performance now more than rivals traditional powerplants. TAE predicts annual sales of around 1,500 Centurion 1.7s, plus 600 of its 230kW Centurion 4s, by the time its facilities are at full capacity in 2006, mainly consisting of retrofits. When Thielert Group decided to found an aero-engines division, rather than try ing to source land and engineers in its home base of Hamburg, where both are scarce, it looked east, to the former com munist-controlled states, to the town of Lichstenstein, close to Chemnitz (formerly Karl-Marxstadt). "Chemnitz was home to the Trabant automotive facility as well as AutoUnion DKW [forerunner to Audi] so there was already a skilled workforce in place," says TAE. Metalwork craft Similarly OMF, which in using facilities in Neubrandenburg, 200km north of Berlin, uses personnel from companies in the area's metalwork industry "that didn't manage to make the transition to a market economy" to produce the steel cages for the Symphony, a certificated development of the GlaStar kitplane, says Stinnes. Such was the intricacy of the welding work needed to modify the structure from the original design, that OMF originally sub contracted the work to two western German firms, both of which failed toler ance tests and the firm found local staff able to complete the task in-house. OMF and TAE will have benefited, how ever, from German government aid given to companies that establish technological facilities in the eastern states. Aquila, for example, was founded by western German www.flightinternational.com FLIGHT INTERNATIONAL 22-28 APRIL 2003 31
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