The Gun Counter

It won a Popular Science invention award in aviation.
Synergy Aircraft
If this thing pans out, it's going to start a major revolution in general aviation.

200mph cruise @ 5 GPH? Carrying 4-5 people? Just WOW.....

And with the pusher prop, it simplifies taking out the back seats, and mounting the machineguns on the ventral centerline behind the pilot, which'll increase first-run strafing hits and improve air-to-air victory rates commensurately.

Those wings almost look like they were drawn by M.C. Escher...

Yup, to truly be family friendly, though, it would need at least as much cargo space as a large sedan trunk. From this mockup, I'm not seeing it.

Langenator wrote:Those wings almost look like they were drawn by M.C. Escher...

Yeah, the first thing I said when I was it was "Dafuq?"

Yay, another vapor plane. Let me know when they have something that will actually fly.

I didn't want to harsh the mellow, but it's par for PopSci.

The way I see it, they still owe me a jetpack, a personal airship, and a flying car.

I just got my hands on a book about aeroplane design published in the early 80's and it's got concept designs of aircraft which look very similar to that ( or equally whacky )
However the writer isn't a 'popular science' type guy, he's an expert in the field who wrote books which were set texts at the UK Boscombe Down test pilot's school and covers these unconventional aircraft shapes in a lot of mathematical detail. Much of which I can't follow...
It got me to thinking that if these shapes were being proposed 30 years ago and offer such advantages then why don't we see them all the time now ?
My guess is :-

1) GA manufacturers are very cautious for reasons of product liability, customer acceptance and economics
2) Most of these airframes would have been very difficult to manufacture on a production level until recently ( advances in composites )

Highspeed wrote:It got me to thinking that if these shapes were being proposed 30 years ago and offer such advantages then why don't we see them all the time now ?
My guess is :-

1) GA manufacturers are very cautious for reasons of product liability, customer acceptance and economics
2) Most of these airframes would have been very difficult to manufacture on a production level until recently ( advances in composites )

Give that man a cigar.
(1)Product liability/tort for GA factory built aircraft is.....INSANE.
(2) If it proves good in testing, it will likely be a kit plane for the experimental crowd.

Netpackrat wrote:Yay, another vapor plane. Let me know when they have something that will actually fly.

Well, there's a 1/4 scale model flying. The first prototype is under construction, should be ready for testing in the next few months, reportedly.
This is coming from John McGinnis himself, who I spoke with.

CByrneIV wrote: Also, they're looking at using the 180hp or 200hp deltahawk diesel... good choice.

Might as well pick a vapor engine to go with a vapor airplane.