CKD Aerospace hit innovation preview with a couple goodies right off the bat, updating fans on their line of kit aircraft, Fisher Flying Products.
Of note Richard Kaczmarek, director of CKD, said that further sales of spruce would be hard to expand since the global supply of quality wood is all spoken for. "Mike Fisher designed some beautiful aircraft, all made of Sitka Spruce, nature's composite. Unfortunately nature's composite has been used up, we cannot buy the quality Spruce that we used to be able to purchase. Fisher's goal is now to bring the Fisher product line into the modern age, so that it is still affordable for the builder to build, easy for us to manufacture and move it forward." That echoes the findings of some high-end, historically accurate restoration specialists. Sadly, those who want their own will have to hunt some down themselves.
Now, Fisher Flying Products are looking to the same evolutionary process that the wider aero industry discovered decades prior, moving from spruce into rag & tube. Thankfully Dacron, steel, composites, and aluminum are quite plentiful today, so they'll do just fine at underpinning the E-Hawk, Dakota Hawk, Archon, and more. The E-Hawk will be Fisher's first foray into pure battery-powered flight, promising 2 hours of flight time using a motor from Kite Magnetics.
The Archon, Fisher's eye-catching little stealth fighter LSA wannabe, has been given an additional model in the SF2, a tandem seat version of the single seat SF1. That larger model eschews the original's Rotax 503 for a larger 100-hp engine provided by white label Chinese manufacturer Zonsen.
Kaczmarek says that there will be a Rotax option for the SF2 "for those who aren't ready to try the Zonsen," though he notes that 'millions of Zonsen pieces are imported every year under a range of other names, makes, and models.' In the end, the brand will have to build a reputation for itself over here before it can really start moving some metal.
FMI: www.ckd.aero
