A
year ago I did a blog piece here as well as a piece in
the magazine about the resurrected “Lazarus Machine”,
Renegade Light Sport’s super sexy low wing, about-to-be
Lycoming IO-233-LSA-powered, all composite S-LSA.
I found Renegade’s prime
mover Christopher “Doc” Bailey
at the flashy Lycoming display at
this year's Oshkosh Airventure and
before I could say “Lightning
round!” he was regaling me,
as only Doc can do, with the leaps
and bounds the company has made in
the last year.
I’m going to
serve up the rapid-fire infostream
in his own words, but before I do,
here’s the short tell: the
Falcon is done with testing, is in
production, comes in two configurations,
tricycle and taildragger, sells for
$125,000 with a bunch of nice features
(including 10" Dynon SkyView,
full Garmin stack and dual electronic
ignition) and if your mouth isn’t
watering yet, I’m stepping
to the side and take it away Doc!
“The
first production model Renegade Falcon
with the Lycoming IO-233-LSA is owned
by our dealer on Long Island, NY
- Steve Norman. It’s the airplane
you see right here (and in the photos).”
“The engine is FAA Part 33
certified. The airframe is ASTM certified.
We’re done with R&D, we’ve
been through a year of testing with
the 233. We’ve tested six fuel
injection systems, five electronic
ignition systems (and settled on
the Lightspeed dual ignition system),
four different exhaust systems (and
settled on the Vetterman exhaust),
and three or four panel mounts. We
just brought on the Catto 3-blade,
nickel-edge composite prop, we also
tested Sensenich and others.”
“And we’re getting 1500 fpm climb solo, 4.6
gph cruise at 2400 rpm, and we’re just where we said
we would be in a year.”
“We’ve put in 100
hours of test flying so far.”
“This airplane,
Steve Norman’s, has everything you can get, the stuff
I mentioned and dual Grand Rapids Synthetic Vision with built-in
highway in the sky and autopilot; a ballistic chute, ostrich
skin seats...”
Real ostrich skins? I asked.
“You
bet, I’m the one who paid for them, they were real
alright!”
“So many guys came up and said they’d
flown Cubs and other taildraggers all their lives, and when
500 people tell you they want that, you better take notice!
So we now have a taildragger version too, with beefy, durable
7071-T6 gear for flight schools and a Matco 42-degree breakaway
tailwheel.”
“We’ve got five engines coming from Lycoming
this month, we’ve sold six airplanes since we’ve
been here at the show, we’re in full production here,
everything is built in the U.S., we have a new autoclave
system set up by former Boeing engineers, and like I said
we’ve come a long way in a year.”
“Before
the prop has turned 45 degrees, the ignition system is producing
a 120,000 volt spark and the engine starts right up like
a car. We call this engine the Rotax Slayer! We’re
getting 305 degrees on the CHT, 1000 degrees on the EGT,
so it’s burning efficiently and burning cool. We’re
placarding max level rpm at 2400 to maintain the 120-knot
LSA restriction.”
“Future enhancements will include
room for golf clubs, wing locker baggage, winglets for more
stability, things like that.”
I asked how fast it was
now at full power.
“You don’t want me to tell
you that,” he said with a laugh. “It’s
fast. We’ll placard it at 2400 rpm for 120 knots. We
had a CFII bring it out here from Kansas City. He was doing
140 knots at 2700 rpm.”
“People ask me, ‘Why
not restrict the engine?’ That’s a huge safety
issue for me. If you’re downwind to land and the wind
falls out, you may need all the power you can get. Why restrict
that? If you go over that 2400 rpm setting, it’s on
you legally but I’m not going to take it away. It’s
like CubCrafters did with their 180 hp engine, placarding
it to a max of five minutes full power.”
“The
first production taildragger Falcon is going to Switzerland,
to the guy who started the Swatch company. We’ve got
orders for five, with seven airframes done, we can make five
a month and all of it is out of our Lees Summit, MO plant.”
“Weight for the taildragger is 795 lbs. For the tricycle
gear it’s 814, with everything installed. It gets off
in 200-300 feet easily. Before you get the throttle all the
way up, it’s already rotated.”
“It will
throw you back into the seat; with the Catto prop you really
feel the thrust. It really takes off. We figure we’re
getting 123-125 hp with the fuel injection. With the traditional
carbureted version, we were getting 120 knots at 2750 rpm.
With the fuel injection, we dropped 300 rpm to get the same
speed, at the same altitude and in the same weather. It just
feels smoother. We think it’s that 120,000 volt spark.
It was burning 5.5 gph with the carburetion: with electronic
ignition, it’s 4.6.”
All that’s left now
is for me to fly it for a pirep which I hope to do here at
the show and let you know how much of this is real, and how
much is “Doc”-ese!
One last word: the airplane,
already a winner in the looks department, has a beautiful
engine installation. It’s clean, it’s elegant,
it’s beautiful. And, for those “graying” types
Doc talks about who still don’t trust the well-proven
Rotax, the Lycoming is the deal-maker. It'll be interesting
to see how much support this all-American, $125K looker garners
in the market place.
For more information visit Renegade
light Sport LLC or contact Christopher “Doc” Bailey
at doc@renegadelightsport.com or call 816-282-8635.
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