I too am extremely interested in the D-motor but have also been waiting to see it develope. I also know this engine was first represented in the US by Renegade Light Sport IE Doc Bailey... who is a known to be full of hot air. I think it appears that D-motor has overcome many obstacles and are moving forward with the current design. Here are some update which may explain in more detail what has been going on at D-Motor...
Posted Oct 9th 2017
It is some time since our last news bulletin, so we thought it was time to update existing and potential customers about our future plans for D-Motor.
We will be continuing with production of the existing engine model and the launch of a proposed new version will be delayed by at least 2 years. This is to allow in-house development and testing to continue to ensure the engine will be fully reliable before any serial production starts.
As reported on 23 May 2017, one of the partners has left the company, which has obviously meant some re-organisation was necessary, but it has given us the opportunity to improve our systems and efficiency. The design has been frozen and the CAD and CNC libraries updated for all components.
We were manufacturing most components on CNC machines in our own factory although some parts were outsourced, such as camshaft manufacture, cylinder boring and Nikasil treatment / honing and valve seat installation. We have now decided to outsource the crankshaft and connecting rods to specialist companies in the UK. Line boring of the crankcase for crank and camshaft will also be outsourced.
Problems have been experienced during QC with a high rejection rate of the cast components caused by failures of the sand moulds. Working with our foundry company we have been running mould simulations to solve this problem and by the end of October we are confident that this issue will be eliminated.
In early 2017 we decided to stop serial production due to the casting problem, although sufficient parts were always held in stock to support any in-service engines. After customer feedback and comments at recent trade shows about the proposed new version we later decided to restart production of the existing model engine once the casting issue had been solved, but due to the re-organisation mentioned above this has taken much longer than we hoped.
Shortly we will be launching the first serial production batch of the 6 cylinderLF39 and a new serial production batch of the existing 4 cylinder LF26. As soon as these are available from stock we will re-start promotion and sales.
As you can see from this update they have been dealing with and over-coming a lot of obstacles encountered along the way as any small firm would! I agree that D-motor could be a lot more pro-active on the marketing of their engine line, however I think they are waiting until all ducks their were in a row and they could start a solid serial production of the engines. It appears as though Fisher Flying Products out of Canada will be the new Canadian distributor. Fisher has been in the business for many years and I doubt they would risk their reputation on a bogus design or poorly crafted engine. I do also wish their engines would be priced closer to the Jabiru 2200 and not the 3300 as it is. That being said I think this would be an amazing little engine for the SportCopter Vortex I am looking into purchasing. I also think it would make for an excellent choice on the Sonex Waiex I plan to build in the future, although I also like the UL260isA for this application. The D-motor engine may be a bit light for the heavier tail of the Waiex though... either way I see this motor finding market share in the years to come! I wish D-motor the success they deserve and feel every true aviator should feel the same way! Without new companies out there risking it all like D-motor we would all be selling our first born for a Rotax!
