2 seat Vampire

[Deskpilot]

I can't find the thread but someone wanted a 2 seat Vampire, well it exists, see

 

Sadler Vampire, Sadler Vampire II, Sadler Vampire lightsport aircraft, Bill Sadler designer of the Sadler Vampire and Sadler Vampire II, Lightsport Aircraft video magazine.

 

Wouldn't mind the Piranha myself.

 

 

[Hercules]

Gday Doug,

 

That would be me and it was posted in the "Just Landed" under 'Newbie in Canberra' forum.

 

Thanks for the link. Just have to wait for it to be built and brought to Aus I guess.

 

It does appear to be a little more expensive than I had hoped for but I guess you get what you pay for in the end.

 

Cheers

 

Grant

 

 

[Guest Michael Coates]

Its been doing the rounds of the US airshows for a while, BUT i havent seen it fly yet. (its hand made and ROUGH) as you would probably expect from a prototype. Last time it arrived with a rotary engine.

 

 

[pylon500]

There is a small range of aircraft in this 'class' and they all suffer from the same problem, they are difficult to balance easily.

 

While working at the Vampire factory in the late 80's, we had the first side by side pod from Sadler, and began building an airframe around it.

 

I was continually reminding the design team tat there would be problems trying to balance the aircraft, and eventually the original layout was scrapped.

 

The mark II version tried an interesting tack by having a fairly swept wing, hoping that the centre of pressure would be wide enough to handle the CofG shift between solo and two up.

 

Naturally on a lightweight aircraft, this doesn't work either.

 

This machine went through a few engine changes and I don't know if it ever got airborne, but was down in Victoria somewhere.

 

Larger machines like the original DH Vampire two seater, the problem is lessened by the fact that each 90kg pilot is a fairly low percentage of the aircraft's all up weight.

 

Another aircraft in this layout is the Edgley Optica, which keeps balance by moving weights between the nose and the tail, depending on crew.

 

Arthur.