I have to say when I’ve flown Rotaxen, I’ve missed all the extra levers and felt as if I had nothing to do. Whether I’d feel that way if I were starting from scratch, I don’t know.
I’ve missed all the extra levers and felt as if I had nothing to do.
… exactly the feeling I had when driving a car with an automatic transmission …
But surely the Rotax doesn’t compete in the same market as the small Lyco/Contis? Is there a plane on which you have a choice?
Diamond DA20 Eclipse and DV20 Katana.
Tecnam offer the P92 with Rotax or Lycoming.
That’s about it I guess.
Yes, plenty, but not certified of course. The Continental A80, C85, C90 produce 80-85-90 HP – the 912/912S 80 resp. 100.
I can’t see any reason the one couldn’t replace the other, though the reduction gear might necessitate considerable changes to the engine mount – the prop suddenly comes higher than the engine’s centre of gravity, on a Rotax.
The ULBI Wild Thing seems to have flown even with an O-360 as well as with Jabiru and Rotax engines. Another example is the Murphy Rebel, though that one is rather heavy for the Rotaxen.
There is one widespread example I can think of: Kitfoxes are built with both Rotax and O-235 Lycoming. A friend built one with an O-235 but recently sold it and bought a kit built derivative of a PA-12. He and his wife now have that and the RV-7 he built earlier, used for traveling long distances faster.
Another friend who built an award winning cover girl Wittman Tailwind originally considered powering it with a turbocharged Rotax, just because nobody else had done it. He eventually chose to build up an experimental IO-320 instead because it was a lot cheaper and more powerful. The whole plane only cost about $25K USD including the engine and does about 205 mph IAS.
There’s a Luscombe in Brazil with a Rotax installed, replacing the original A65 Continental.
a diesel that is as good as a Lycoming at a reasonable price
That is only a matter of time. The design and engineering will ripen with experience, and the price will come down as the volumes go up. Unfortunately, both processes are slow.
particularly as Lycoming already has a diesel…. only that they have not certified it for civilian use. My bet is that this will change if Continental make any significant sales with their TD300. The Lycoming Diesel is exactly what the 180-200 hp market has been looking for in terms of retrofit and new products, it could go on any PA28 fixed and Arrow, Mooney C/D/E/F/J, Grumman Tiger and all other (I)O360 equipped airplanes.
So all in all, the AE is for sure not the end of the technical development, but it is the fully correct step into the right direction and leaves behind all the other, old fashioned big blocks and AVGAS burners.
100% agreement. I’d say the AE is probably the most advanced design at the moment, primarily because they knew what to avoid as they knew the Thielert model only too well. The only “problem” is that it is not available for retrofit or outside the Diamond range at the moment.
The Lycoming Diesel is exactly what the 180-200 hp market has been looking for in terms of retrofit and new products, it could go on any PA28 fixed and Arrow, Mooney C/D/E/F/J, Grumman Tiger and all other (I)O360 equipped airplanes.
The reason I don’t agree with small engines like that being viable is that, no matter where I look, and with no offence meant to the people who are the exception to this, there is very little money floating around in that market.
A few people have retrofitted diesels into PA28s etc. The result has been more of a curiosity, only borderline cost-effective after the massive retrofit cost has been paid for, with improved long distance capability (which almost nobody in that market makes use of) and a lot of hassle all around. It has just about worked for some very busy syndicates and similar operators. Most syndicates operating these aircraft types are hard up, backs to the wall, struggling to get an agreement to install a Mode S transponder for 2k so that some members can fly IFR, or VFR to airspaces where it is required (but other members never leave UK Class G). Most sole owners don’t have the money for major upgrades.
The reason a lot of the smaller diesels were sold is because Diamond pushed them already installed on their planes. Those engines would have never sold by themselves, as retrofits. Not even if they had a 20 year totally trouble free perfect service record.
Whereas if there was a direct IO540 replacement, with the same overall dimensions so it could use the existing mounting frame and cowling, and the price was at/below a new Lyco engine (c. $70k) they would sell loads. I would buy one. This is after all the market where some sole owners spend tens of thousands on avionics eye candy which does nothing, zero, zilch for one’s mission capability and whose fancy user interface (touch screen of course) saves you at most 100 seconds of finger twiddling during a 10000 second (3hr) flight. With fuel dominating the direct operating cost these days, a 100hr/year owner would recover the cost (the extra cost being the excess over and above an exchange engine, at TBO) over 5-10 years and in the meantime would enjoy Jet-A1 refuelling, FADEC, etc.
Unfortunately I just don’t see any sign that anybody is going to do a reasonably priced drop-in-replacement diesel. And Lyco are not likely to compete with themselves by doing it – even if it is only outside the USA where they would be competing with themselves.
As soon as you start needing different cowlings and such, the market shrinks because straight away it is a load more money and a load more downtime.
I know the history of how and why the Lycoming-owned diesel reemerged from hibernation recently. That’s part of what’s formed my opinion on diesel aircraft engines. That aside, I suppose I could buy any number of costly ‘upgrades’ or even a new aircraft requiring regular costly service as part of its fussy design. But I work for my money, and I don’t waste it. Neither do a lot of other people 
Diseals want take off until either they become financially viable for flying schools or 3rd world operators.
I can’t wait until the 182NXT on stream and I hope it doesn’t have many major bugs to rattle out. It world be ideal for operators suchas the mmission overseas fellow ship guys.
The other box they need to tick is the flying schools and all they care about is it cheaper to run than what we have at present.
From a retrofit prospective I don’t think its quite there yet. Especially when u take into account that most of the flying schools that I know are skint at present. Things might change if the tbr of the centurion hits 1800 hours and the gearbox hits 600 tbr. Even with the high 70 grand retro fit costs
