looks cool:


hmm... maybe they bring it down to fit in the sport category?

I dont know about the plane but the engine sounds pretty dang good to me. 2400 hour TBO and a easy on the wallet cruise fuel burn. 85hp is enough for me at cruise and having 180hp for takeoff would be sweet. Wonder if I can get one for my Luscombe

www.cubcrafters.com/news_item.aspx?id=200

for the Cub Crafters news release on this airplane. Only $163,280 -- better gimme two!

Hmmm...this is from the press release they sent me "and a continuous 80 HP at altitudes up to 12,000 feet!" Now, without a turbo, power output drops off as altitude increases. Does this mean the power is "aritficially" limited to 80 hp at all altitudes up to 12.000 (either mechanically or by placard), and if so is it an engine limitation or something to keep it within the LSA rules? Or, do they mean 120hp and 4,000, 100hp and 7,000, ending with 80hp and 12,000? The wording seemed a little cagy to me.

I'm betting that the 80 "meto" (maximum except take off) horsepower rating has something to do with the amount of gas that has to be figured into the weight and balance when they are calculating the 1320 gross weight to meet LSA restrictions. There is a meto/fuel minimum spelled out in AC43.13 for use when calculating maximum fore and aft loadings for W&B sheet purposes. (I just did new W&B sheets for my airplane so am pretty familiar with this stuff) For extreme fore and aft & sample loadings purposes, minimum fuel is 1/12 gallon per meto horsepower, or meto horsepower x 1/2 = pounds. (aka 75 pounds fuel for 150 meto-hp). For LSA I believe the empty weight plus this minimum fuel weight plus 340 pounds of human beans must add up to 1320 or less. For example:
aircraft empty weight ............................940#
minimum fuel: 80hp x 1/12 x 6#/gal..... 40#
pilot/copilot @ 170# each..........................340#
total................................................1,320#
I don't recall exactly what the LSA weight reg's say, but it is something along this line. BTW, I just googled up a pretty good article about doing a W&B which was published in the May 2007 EAA SportPilot magazine.
www.sportaviationspecialties.com/May_07 ... _E-LSA.pdf

Eric

LSA rules and weight formulas all center around maximum continuous hp. As altitude increases, you decrease HP unless you are turbo normalized or turbo charged. I don’t have a power chart handy, but say your 100 hp Cub only produces 40 hp at altitude. We set that as the bar instead of sea level hp as the bar. Then you reduce RPM for the lower altitudes to maintain that value all the way down to sea level. What was done with this engine was to flat-rate the engine at about 12000’ and 80 hp. The RPM settings are then decreased for the lower altitudes to maintain 80 hp. Then the icing on the cake is that you have 180 hp available for a short time to get off the ground quick and climb hard. There is no mechanical or electrical restriction to this limit, it will be published info in the POH, tachometer, or possibly a horsepower meter. In having a lower rated “maximum continuous hp” engine, the empty weight is obtainable. Running the aircraft at lower RPM settings during normal operation will get you very nice fuel economy and longer TBO. It is essentially an “RPM Normalized” engine. The engine is based on an O-340, electronic ignition (not FADEC), and other special lightweight/Cub Crafters specific design changes. Innovative variations on a proven theme.