update

*We don't update the web site very often. We get complaints about this. We know it is frustrating. Here's why we don't do it: the guy who updates the web page is also working on the prototype. He is working on the proto 7 days a week. At the end of any given day he has a choice of sleeping or updating the web site. Sleeping wins.

Current Update

Roll out, June 2006

The morning of the first day of the show--before the crowd swarmed us

These guys kept coming back so often we eventually gave them t-shirts

Steve & Jack . . . plotting

Gary . . . plotting

Steve & Grant . . . plotting lunch

Just do whatever these guys say

This is Lars when he is awake

This Ed when HE is awake

This is Lars & Ed--sleeping through an airshow

Bill figures out that we weren't kidding about the aluminum wings

After the show . . . see you all next year!

April 2, 2007

The weather finally gave us a short window and we took the opportunity . . . at 10:00 am this morning, we taxi tested the prototype for the first time. The engine caught on the first try, the Dynon D-180 talked to the engine sensors perfectly, the oil temps and oil pressure came up and stabilized right in the green arcs. We ran it for a while to watch the numbers, shut it down to look for leaks or drips. After a few minutes to psych up, we started it up again and taxied up and down the taxi way for a while. For our own peace of mind we did not taxi with the wings on--you can't hit something with your wings if they aren't there.

The weather is turning bad again for the next few days, so the proto is back in the hangar with all of the cowls and access doors back off for a little post-taxi inspection. We've got good data from the first run and now we set the stage for more ambitious testing.

We only took a few photos because A) our minds were on the run, not the camera and B) it was very cold. A few shots are below. Note: until you properly break in your brake pads, they don't grab as well as you are used to. Scared the beans out of us at the end of the first run.

Oshkosh 2006

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June 12, 2007

Today was a big day for us. We didn't fly but we did something that is perhaps an even bigger trick for a project such as ours--we cooled.

Folks who have watched our program know that it was cold out when we began taxi testing and ground runs. Even with the cold weather the engine cooling was not perfect and we worked on it as the spring rolled into summer. Each time we ran the engine the cooling was a little better but the weather on test day always seemed a bit cool, so there was the concern in our minds that the test data was not valid because we weren't seeing summer-type OAT's.

Ah, but today it was 90 F on our little patch of taxiway. We ran up the engine, got the CHT's nice and high and then pulled the engine back to idle to see if our cooling scheme would do it's thing on a hot day. Sure enough, as soon as the throttle came back the CHT's started to come down nicely. This is a big, big, big deal for us, and a huge relief. If we can get it to cool properly on a hot day, we're looking good.

Speaking of looking good, here are some recent shots of the plane. The canopy plastic is still on (and will probably stay on until the day we fly) and the body work on the cowl looks like a tropical rash but overall the lines of the plane are looking nice.

July 18, 2007

Yesterday evening the Ion prototype flew for the first time. This is normally the point where a company launches into a lengthy monologue about what a huge achievement this is and how great everything was and how deliriously happy we all are, etc.

The truth of the matter is that we are more relieved than anything. Not relief that the plane flew (we knew it would fly) but that it flew before Oshkosh and we don’t have to go to the big show with a non-flying prototype again. “When will you fly” is about the least popular question to ask a manufacturer. Now that we have flown it takes a lot of the edge off for us.

Looking to the future, we go to Oshkosh in 3 days. After Oshkosh we will be taking a vacation . . . perhaps a long one. Folks can anticipate a short post-Oshkosh update with some photos. After that we will probably be off the air for a while as we decompress from what we call the Oshkosh Apocalypse.

NOTE: Some folks have reported that they can’t find us at the show. This is probably because they are looking in the wrong place. We are located in booth 406 in the North Display Area. This is NOT the northern part of Aeroshell Square or the north hangars, and is definitely not the North 40 parking area--it is a distinct area of the grounds.

When you are at the show facing the runway, you are looking east. Turn left (north) and begin walking. Go past the outdoor classrooms, past the Federal Pavilion and past the NASA hangar. A good landmark is the Homebuilt Café. The Homebuilt Café is at the southern extremis of the North Display area. The northern extremis is Warbirds, the west is the pavilion area and the east is the runway. We are in the southwestern corner of the area, next to Jabiru on one side, Zenith across the street and the craft tent / hospitality tent on the other side. Rotec Radial Engines is behind us.

See you soon, and be safe.

August 20, 2007

Back from a post-Oshkosh vacation with a quick update about the show, a few photos and an outline of what the future holds.

First off, the show went very well. As always, folks were happy to see us and to see, touch and feel the airplane. This was the first year that we let some people sit in the airplane and folks had a good time with it.

As we spin back up from vacation, the focus is split between flight testing and preparing for the second airplane. We are using Len Fox as our chief test pilot and Steve M. will do the duty when Len is not required. Serial 002 will incorporate all of the lessons we learned building 001 and several ideas we have had along the way.

First thing first--the airplane cover got almost as much attention as the airplane. It fits extremely well, covers just enough of the airplane to get the job done, and was made by Steve S's mom.

Rodger and Ed try out the cockpit. It is worth noting that Ed is right around 6'4" (193 cm). Since the highlight of the airplane is the canopy, we were pleased that everyone was impressed with the head room and visibility. Thanks again to CU for the mold & Jeff and Becky at Airplane Plastics for the great bubble.

Either these guys really liked sitting in the cockpit or the nitrous oxide we pumped in had an effect.

Ion also hosted a group that is working to create a museum to the Flying Tigers. Visit their site:

The Flying Tigers Heritage Park

December 10, 2007

Ok, ok . . . stop yelling at us. We don’t update as often as we should and we’re terrible human beings because of it.

Here’s an update.

There are a lot of balls in the air right now, each of which would take an entire essay to explain in any detail. Part of the juggling act is the process of moving ahead with pre-production stuff while still working on the existing prototype. Technically you aren’t supposed to do the one until you are done with the other, but we’ve already been in development hell for a long time and we’re trying pretty hard to actually sell some airplanes.

Rather than write a novel, here is a little bullet point list of what we’re doing at the moment:

Finishing the process of moving the landing gear. This is a very embarrassing issue that cropped up while the test pilot was here. Early in the design stage the landing gear mounts were moved from location A to location B, and in the process the axle station also moved. This screwed up the rotation moment. As we said, it’s very embarrassing and not something we like to dwell on. The fix is fairly easy but time consuming and has kept the plane in dry dock for a few weeks.

Preliminary work for a second airplane. Now that we’ve built the prototype we have a number of ideas we need to implement on future planes. Some of these ideas are to make the plane lighter or simpler, some are to fix hassles, some are to reduce build time. The upshot of this is that we need to build a second proto to dial in these ideas. Traditionally this is called a pre-production prototype; we just call it “number 2.”

A little from column A, a little from column B. One of the chief things that needs to change from proto 1 to proto 2 is (as you may have guessed from the earlier paragraph) the landing gear. The gear on the plane at the moment is Van’s RV-6 gear, right off the shelf with almost zero modification. We liked this because it’s readily available,* fairly cost effective and strong as Holy Hannah. Which all went right out the window when we realized we had to move the gear back where it was originally supposed to be. If anyone might be wondering, designing landing gear is much harder than you would think.

Moving into our new hangar. We worked hard to avoid having to buy a hangar, but in the event we had one essentially donated to us. It’s insulated and heated which makes all the world of difference in Minnesota (current OAT is 6.5 F). Aside from the heat, the new hangar also has some perfectly ratty old couches that make the flight test process much more comfortable.

And of course the Ion Weight Witch Hunt continues. Every part of the plane gets analyzed from scratch with the goal of pulling weight out. It is quite normal for a proto to be overweight but we are working within the LSA envelope, which makes weight challenging for an airplane of our size (this airplane is physically much larger than any of the other LSA airplanes hitting the market). We are confident that we will end up with a decent number but of course we have to work to get there.

*One of our goals has been to invent as little as possible. The plane may look somewhat radical but in reality we’ve been working quite hard to avoid inventing the wheel. Thus we try to use off the shelf components from other airplanes as often as is feasible—their designers are smart folks, and we like to collaborate with other manufacturers or designers when we can.

That’s why the landing gear hassle has been such a pain. Landing gear is an often overlooked and un-sexy part of an airplane, but it’s obviously a critical system and tricky to optimize. Using Van’s gear was going to be an excellent way for us to save time and aggravation. The new gear will be nice and will get the job done, but it means that we had to go back and revisit a system that we were hoping to just source off the shelf.

Click for full size photos.

Len taxiing to the active-- landing gear feels wrong

Result: Landing gear is gone, plane is on AN9000-80 Galvanized Aircraft Support and Stabilization Devices ($9.00 on sale)

January 7, 2008

We will provide a detailed report of flight test results some time when we aren't up to our eyeballs with work. For now we are very pleased to report that preliminary results are excellent.

Test pilot Len getting ready for a flight

The prototype flying overhead

Approach and landing after a good flight

You did what to our airplane?

February 5, 2008

This is a follow up to the short post in January.

The testing breaks down into three categories of results: Things that are just fine, things that need fixing and things that need tweaking. Tweaking is just stuff that needs to be adjusted.

The list of tweaks is mercifully short and includes such items as the need to change a breather tube that got kinked, etc. The list of things that need fixing is even shorter at one item. As is typical in pushers and as most of us predicted we didn't get enough engine cooling in flight. This is backward from what often happens which is that a pusher will cool in flight but gets hot on the ground. We spent quite a while on ground cooling and had that nailed down, but of course our opportunities to test in-flight conditions have been in short supply.

Thankfully many smart people have been down this road before and we are able to phone them up and ask questions. The Jabiru folks have been very helpful and the support from our engineers has been excellent. We threw away everything from the 1st generation cooling setup and we are installing a plenum system. For those you who have seen the cooling on a Velocity, this is quite similar. We will let you know how it goes.

Some folks have asked why we aren't upset about the cooling hassle. The answer is simple: compared to what COULD have been wrong with the plane, a very common and predictable cooling problem barely shows up on our emotional radar. A good friend of ours has spent a couple of years and lots of money trying to chase down an abnormal stall situation on his prototype. He has gone through 50-plus design tweaks and hundreds of hours of analysis. And he's still not sure what the problem is. Compared to that, we'll take the cooling hassle any time.

The absolute black-of-night boogey man nightmare for any small project like ours is to have an OML problem. OML stands for Outer Mold Line and is in essence the outer shape of the fuselage, tail and wings. Once your molds are made OML is carved in stone and the only way to change it is to make new molds from scratch, which would have been the end of our project. This is why we paid to have the aero analysis done by Dave Lednicer at Analytical Methods. If he says the aero is good, it's good.

But just because the computer says it will fly nicely doesn't mean we didn't make a mistake somewhere along the way, so when the big day came all we could think about was how does it feel? And so when Len came back down and told us about the cooling, we didn't care. All we wanted to know was about the feel . . . and it felt good. Len's words were: "Field of view is obviously excellent. Cockpit noise is surprisingly low. No chatter or whistling. Engine noise is low. Stability is very good. The controls felt good, it's a pleasure to fly." Honestly, we almost fell over when he said this. A few of us may have gotten a little choked up.

We should have the new cooling setup ready for a new round of taxi testing in another week or so. Mostly we're just making fiberglass ducting right now, which one can only do so fast. In the mean time folks report that they like the photos so here are a few more just to tide you over.

The take off from a different angle

Orbiting overhead

Taxi back to home, this shot really shows the field of view nicely

Len gets an involuntary hug from Steve