ARV Super2
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The ARV Super2 (''Air Recreational Vehicle'') is a British two-seat
light aircraft A light aircraft is an aircraft that has a Maximum Takeoff Weight, maximum gross takeoff weight of or less.Crane, Dale: ''Dictionary of Aeronautical Terms, third edition'', page 308. Aviation Supplies & Academics, 1997. Light aircraft are use ...
with
strut-braced In aeronautics, bracing comprises additional structural members which stiffen the functional airframe to give it rigidity and strength under load. Bracing may be applied both internally and externally, and may take the form of struts, which act in ...
shoulder wings and
tricycle landing gear Tricycle gear is a type of aircraft undercarriage, or ''landing gear'', that is arranged in a tricycle fashion. The tricycle arrangement has one or more nose wheels in a single front undercarriage and two or more main wheels slightly aft of th ...
. Designed by Bruce Giddings, the Super2 was available either factory-built or as a kit. It was intended to be both a cost-effective trainerGreen 1987, pp 26–27 and an affordable aircraft for private owners. Later called the "Opus", it gained US FAA
Light-Sport Aircraft A light-sport aircraft (LSA), or light sport aircraft, is a category of small, lightweight aircraft that are simple to fly. LSAs tend to be heavier and more sophisticated than ultralight (aka "microlight") aircraft, but LSA restrictions on weigh ...
approval in February 2008.Bayerl, Robby; Martin Berkemeier; et al: ''World Directory of Leisure Aviation 2011–12'', page 67. WDLA UK, Lancaster UK, 2011. ISSN 1368-485X About 35 aircraft were produced in the 1980s before the
Isle of Wight The Isle of Wight (Help:IPA/English, /waɪt/ Help:Pronunciation respelling key, ''WYTE'') is an island off the south coast of England which, together with its surrounding uninhabited islets and Skerry, skerries, is also a ceremonial county. T ...
-based company went into liquidation.OPUS ARV Super 2 (United States), Aircraft - Fixed-wing - Civil
''Jane's.com''. Jane's Information Group. 19 February 2010. Retrieved 9 September 2010.
Subsequently, there have been a number of attempts to restart production, all unsuccessful, of which the most recent was by Opus Aircraft. In November 2013, Opus Aircraft announced that its assets had been auctioned off successfully, adding: "We hope to see our plans continued and to see the all-aluminum plane flying by 2015." Since 2015, little has been heard of the ARV and no resumption of production has occurred.


Design and development

Richard Noble, the world 1983 land speed record holder and UK entrepreneur, identified a gap in the market for a low-cost lightweight two-seat trainer, after expensive product-liability lawsuits in the USA had driven the major American
general aviation General aviation (GA) is defined by the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) as all civil aviation aircraft operations except for commercial air transport or aerial work, which is defined as specialized aviation services for other ...
manufacturers temporarily to abandon production of such aircraft. Noble established a factory at
Sandown Sandown is a seaside resort and civil parishes in England, civil parish on the south-east coast of the Isle of Wight, England. The neighbouring resort of Shanklin and the settlement of Lake, Isle of Wight, Lake are sited just to the south of t ...
on the
Isle of Wight The Isle of Wight (Help:IPA/English, /waɪt/ Help:Pronunciation respelling key, ''WYTE'') is an island off the south coast of England which, together with its surrounding uninhabited islets and Skerry, skerries, is also a ceremonial county. T ...
to build the ARV Super2 aircraft, with the first prototype flying on 11 March 1985. The factory used some novel manufacturing techniques, including British ALCAN's "Supral" (a superplastic aluminium alloy), adhesives (to reduce the number of rivets and thereby save weight), and a
bespoke ''Bespoke'' () describes anything commissioned to a particular specification, altered or tailored to the customs, tastes, or usage of an individual purchaser. In contemporary usage, ''bespoke'' has become a general marketing and branding concep ...
new British engine, the Hewland AE75. These innovations gave the ARV an empty weight 40% lower than the
Cessna 152 The Cessna 152 is an American two-seat, fixed- tricycle-gear, general aviation airplane, used primarily for flight training and personal use. It was based on the earlier Cessna 150 incorporating a number of minor design changes and a slightl ...
,Blech 1986, p.47. making the Super2 both cheaper to buy and to operate. The manufacturer claimed it could reduce pilot training costs by 25% The ARV Super2 is a
side-by-side configuration Tandem, or in tandem, is an arrangement in which two or more animals, machines, or people are lined up one behind another, all facing in the same direction. ''Tandem'' can also be used more generally to refer to any group of persons or objects w ...
two-seater with a shoulder wing for improved visibility."Pilot" magazine February 1986 pages 32–33 The wing is swept forward 5° to maintain correct
centre of gravity In physics, the center of mass of a distribution of mass in space (sometimes referred to as the barycenter or balance point) is the unique point at any given time where the weighted relative position of the distributed mass sums to zero. For a ...
balance. The wing area is a small , giving a wing loading of 11.9 lb/ft2 (58.1 kg/m2). The forward sweep may also promote a spanwise airflow inwards towards the root, thereby reducing the likelihood of a wingtip stall. The ARV's tapered
fibreglass Fiberglass (American English) or fibreglass ( Commonwealth English) is a common type of fiber-reinforced plastic using glass fiber. The fibers may be randomly arranged, flattened into a sheet called a chopped strand mat, or woven into glass c ...
wingtips help to reduce drag from
wingtip vortices Wingtip vortices are circular patterns of rotating air left behind a wing as it generates Lift (force), lift. The name is a misnomer because the cores of the vortex, vortices are slightly inboard of the wing tips. Wingtip vortices are sometimes ...
. The ARV is constructed mainly of
aluminium Aluminium (or aluminum in North American English) is a chemical element; it has chemical symbol, symbol Al and atomic number 13. It has a density lower than that of other common metals, about one-third that of steel. Aluminium has ...
alloy, with fibreglass wingtips, cowlings and canopy frame."Pilot" magazine, June 1985 pages 5–6 The cockpit is a stiff
monocoque Monocoque ( ), also called structural skin, is a structural system in which loads are supported by an object's external skin, in a manner similar to an egg shell. The word ''monocoque'' is a French term for "single shell". First used for boats, ...
of "Supral" alloy for lightness and improved crash protection. Aft of the cockpit bulkhead, the ARV is conventionally built, with frames, longerons and a
stressed skin In mechanical engineering, stressed skin is a rigid construction in which the skin or covering takes a portion of the structural load, intermediate between monocoque, in which the skin assumes all or most of the load, and a rigid frame, which has ...
forming a
semi-monocoque The term semi-monocoque or semimonocoque refers to a stressed shell structure that is similar to a true monocoque, but which derives at least some of its strength from conventional reinforcement. Semi-monocoque construction is used for, among o ...
. Skin sections are both glued and riveted. The aircraft has twin control sticks. Ailerons, elevators and flaps are pushrod-controlled, but the rudder and trim are cable-linked. Both rudder and elevator are horn-balanced. The rudder pedals also control a steerable nosewheel, but the hand-operated
disc brake A disc brake is a type of brake that uses the #Calipers, calipers to squeeze pairs of #Brake pads, pads against a disc (sometimes called a
rake Rake may refer to: Common meanings * Rake (tool), a horticultural implement, a long-handled tool with tines * Rake (stock character), a man habituated to immoral conduct * Rake (poker), the commission taken by the house when hosting a poker game ...
rotor) to create friction. There are two basic types of brake pad friction mechanisms: abrasive f ...
s are not differential and do not contribute to steering. The AE75 engine, a inverted three-cylinder water-cooled two-stroke unit with
dual ignition Dual Ignition is a system for spark-ignition engines, whereby critical ignition components, such as spark plugs and magnetos, are duplicated. Dual ignition is most commonly employed on aero engines,Crane, Dale: ''Dictionary of Aeronautical Terms, ...
and a 2.7:1 reduction gearbox, was specially developed for the ARV by
Hewland Hewland is a British engineering company, founded in 1957 by Mike Hewland, which specialises in racing-car gearboxes. Hewland currently employ 130 people at their Maidenhead facility and have diversified into a variety of markets being particul ...
from their existing two-cylinder
microlight Ultralight aviation (called microlight aviation in some countries) is the flying of lightweight, 1- or 2-seat fixed-wing aircraft. Some countries differentiate between weight-shift control and conventional three-axis control aircraft with ailer ...
engine. The AE75 engine has a TBO of only 800 hours, and, in the absence of continuing factory support, many ARVs have had their AE75s replaced with engines such as the
Rotax 912 The Rotax 912 is a horizontally-opposed four-cylinder, naturally-aspirated, four-stroke aircraft engine with a reduction gearbox. It features liquid-cooled cylinder heads and air-cooled cylinders. Originally equipped with carburetors, la ...
, the
Rotax 914 The Rotax 914 is a turbo-charged, four-stroke, four-cylinder, horizontally opposed aircraft engine with air-cooled cylinders and water-cooled cylinder heads. It is designed and built by the Austrian company BRP-Powertrain, owned by Bombardier ...
, or the
Jabiru 2200 The Jabiru 2200 is a lightweight naturally aspirated, pushrod four-stroke, flat four, air-cooled aircraft engine produced by Jabiru Aircraft. Design and development The conventional direct-drive engine is fitted with an alternator, silencers, ...
. Three ARVs were fitted with a
MidWest The Midwestern United States (also referred to as the Midwest, the Heartland or the American Midwest) is one of the four census regions defined by the United States Census Bureau. It occupies the northern central part of the United States. It ...
twin-rotor wankel as their original engine. The Super2 gained airworthiness certification in July 1986, and soon after entered production. In November 1985, Noble had reached an agreement to supply ARV parts to Canada's Instar Aviation, where the aircraft was intended to be assembled for the North American market.
Transport Canada Transport Canada () is the Ministry (government department), department within the Government of Canada responsible for developing regulations, Policy, policies and Public services, services of road, rail, marine and air Transport in Canada, tra ...
had agreed to certify the aircraft based on it "meeting UK criteria", but in the end these Canadian production plans came to nothing. Originally, ARVs were available either as kit-built aircraft (subject to PFA Permit), or factory built (and subject to the CAA
Certificate of Airworthiness A standard certificate of airworthiness is a permit for commercial passenger or cargo operation, issued for an aircraft by the civil aviation authority in the state/nation in which the aircraft is registered. For other aircraft such as crop-spray ...
). In the spring of 1990 Aviation Scotland Limited was to restart production and in 1993 that company intended to set up another facility in
Sweden Sweden, formally the Kingdom of Sweden, is a Nordic countries, Nordic country located on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. It borders Norway to the west and north, and Finland to the east. At , Sweden is the largest Nordic count ...
to build ARVs.Purdy, Don: ''AeroCrafter – Homebuilt Aircraft Sourcebook, Fifth Edition'', page 174. BAI Communications, 15 July 1998. In the late 1990s the aircraft was sold in kit form in the US as the Highlander by Highlander Aircraft Corporation of
Golden Valley, Minnesota Golden Valley is a western and first-ring suburb of Minneapolis in Hennepin County, Minnesota, Hennepin County, Minnesota, United States. The population was 22,552 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census. The city is mostly residential an ...
. In 2004, the CAA reclassified all ARVs as PFA (now LAA) Permit aircraft. The ARV Super2 was originally intended to be aerobatic, but the Isle of Wight factory closed before CAA clearance was obtained, so aerobatics remain prohibited. Also, the factory had planned to develop a four-seater version, wing-tip tanks and floats. Opus Aircraft upgraded some specifications for the aircraft, increasing the
Vne In aviation, V-speeds are standard terms used to define airspeeds important or useful to the operation of all aircraft. These speeds are derived from data obtained by aircraft designers and manufacturers during flight testing for aircraft Type ...
to and increasing the gross weight to . The company intended to equip the aircraft with the
Rotax 912UL The Rotax 912 is a flat-four engine, horizontally-opposed four-cylinder, naturally-aspirated, four-stroke engine, four-stroke aircraft engine with a Propeller speed reduction unit, reduction gearbox. It features Radiator (engine cooling), l ...
or 912A of .


Production history

The ARV Super2 has had an interrupted production history, with a number of successive companies producing 40 aircraft in total. Shortly after initial aircraft deliveries began, there were a number of forced landings. These were due to gearbox failures induced by propeller vibration, and in November 1987 the CAA grounded the aircraft. Although these problems were quickly resolved, the aircraft's reputation suffered. Buyers and investors lost confidence, leading to the closure of the Isle of Wight factory and the company was forced into
administration Administration may refer to: Management of organizations * Management, the act of directing people towards accomplishing a goal: the process of dealing with or controlling things or people. ** Administrative assistant, traditionally known as a se ...
. This resulted in a
management buyout A management buyout (MBO) is a form of acquisition in which a company's existing managers acquire a large part, or all, of the company, whether from a parent company or individual. Management- and/or leveraged buyouts became noted phenomena of 19 ...
and the company being renamed ''Island Aircraft''. Some 30 or so aircraft were completed by ARV and then by Island Aircraft at Sandown. Production was then transferred first to Scotland and then to Sweden, where the ARV was renamed the "Opus 280", However, no aircraft were produced in Sweden before the proprietors went bankrupt in 1995. After yet another unsuccessful attempt to restart production in
Ohio Ohio ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern region of the United States. It borders Lake Erie to the north, Pennsylvania to the east, West Virginia to the southeast, Kentucky to the southwest, Indiana to the ...
, USA, all manufacturing rights (plus a selection of aircraft parts) were sold to a new consortium, "Opus Aircraft". Opus Aircraft established a factory at Rockingham, near Stoneville, North Carolina, and in February 2008, the "Opus Super 2" was granted FAA
Light Sport Aircraft A light-sport aircraft (LSA), or light sport aircraft, is a category of small, lightweight aircraft that are simple to fly. LSAs tend to be heavier and more sophisticated than ultralight (aka "microlight") aircraft, but LSA restrictions on weigh ...
approval. The factory produced an "Opus Super 2" prototype, but the proposed resumption of production never occurred. The company, valued at
US$ The United States dollar (Currency symbol, symbol: Dollar sign, $; ISO 4217, currency code: USD) is the official currency of the United States and International use of the U.S. dollar, several other countries. The Coinage Act of 1792 introdu ...
8 million, was offered for sale for US$2.9 million, and in October 2013 the company was purchased at auction.


Operational history

The ARV Super2 has received favourable reviews which describe it as an aircraft with excellent visibility that is pleasant to fly. The small wing area and the fairly high wing loading produces handling that is responsive but stable."Pilot" magazine April 1994 page 26 A drawback for touring is the shortage of luggage space. The second prototype, G-STWO, has a fuselage luggage compartment aft of the fuel tank which is accessed from the starboard aside, but no other ARVs have this feature. After initial production commenced at least two flying schools adopted the ARV, but today most Super2s in the UK are flown privately. The Hewland AE75 engine, which is no longer available, has a
life Life, also known as biota, refers to matter that has biological processes, such as Cell signaling, signaling and self-sustaining processes. It is defined descriptively by the capacity for homeostasis, Structure#Biological, organisation, met ...
of 800 hours, after which time alternative engines must be installed. Replacement engines have all been heavier than the original, needing a lead counterweight in the tail to maintain balance. The empenage is short-coupled and its area is a little marginal for the landing flare, so flaring with a stopped engine (and thus no propwash) might prove problematic. LAA-approved modifications include ground-adjustable propellers, tundra tyres, additional fuel tanks and fuel-injection. The LAA has approved the fitting and testing of
vortex generator A vortex generator (VG) is an aerodynamic device, consisting of a small wikt:vane, vane usually attached to a lifting surface (or airfoil, such as an aircraft, aircraft wing) or a rotor blade of a wind turbine.WP:AIRCRASH -->


Specifications (ARV Super 2)


See also


References


Notes


Bibliography


Engine troubles grounds ARV Super 2
, ''Flight International'', 14 November 1987. p. 16.

. ''Flight International'', 11–17 August 1993. p. 24. * Blech, Robin.

. ''
Flight International ''Flight International'', formerly ''Flight'', is a monthly magazine focused on aerospace. Published in the United Kingdom and founded in 1909 as "A Journal devoted to the Interests, Practice, and Progress of Aerial Locomotion and Transport", i ...
'', 13 September 1985. pp. 48–52. * Blech, Robin.
Super 2 – back from the brink
. ''Flight International'', 20 May 1989. pp. 92–94. * Daly, Kieran.

. ''Flight International'', 21–27 September 1994. p. 30. * Green, William: ''Observers Aircraft''. Frederick Warne Publishing, 1987. .

''Flight International'', 27 September–3 October 1995, Volume 148, No. 4491, p. 6. .

''Flight International'', 6 April 1985, Vol. 127, No. 3954. pp. 13–14. * Taylor, John W.R., ed. ''Jane's All the World's Aircraft 1988–89''. Coulsden, Surrey, UK: Jane's Information Group, 1988. .


External links


Opus Aircraft archives
on
Archive.org The Internet Archive is an American non-profit organization founded in 1996 by Brewster Kahle that runs a digital library website, archive.org. It provides free access to collections of digitized media including websites, software applic ...
{{DEFAULTSORT:ARV Super2 1980s British civil utility aircraft Light-sport aircraft Shoulder-wing aircraft Forward-swept-wing aircraft Homebuilt aircraft Aircraft first flown in 1985 Single-engined tractor aircraft