The St-Just Cyclone, also called the St-Just Cyclone 180, is a Canadian

homebuilt aircraft Homebuilt aircraft, also known as amateur-built aircraft or kit planes, are constructed by persons for whom this is not a professional activity. These aircraft may be constructed from "scratch", from plans, or from assembly kits.Armstrong, Kenn ...

that was designed and produced by St-Just Aviation of

Mirabel, Quebec Mirabel () is a suburb of Montreal, located on the North Shore (Montreal), North Shore in southern Quebec. Mirabel is also the name of a Equivalent territory, territory equivalent to a regional county municipality (TE) and Census geographic unit ...

. The company has since moved to

Boucherville, Quebec Boucherville () is a city in the Montérégie region in Quebec, Canada. It is a suburb of Montreal on the south shore of the Saint Lawrence River. Boucherville is part of both the urban agglomeration of Longueuil and the Montreal Metropoli ...

. While it was available the aircraft was supplied as a kit and in the form of plans for amateur construction.Purdy, Don: ''AeroCrafter - Homebuilt Aircraft Sourcebook, Fifth Edition'', page 126. BAI Communications, 15 July 1998. The Cyclone was later developed into the higher gross weight () St-Just Super-Cyclone, which superseded it in production. In 2021, the rights to the Cyclone aircraft were acquired by Bushliner Aircraft LLC of Granite Falls, WA.

Design and development

The Cyclone is a replica of the

Cessna 180 The Cessna 180 Skywagon is a four- or six-seat, fixed conventional gear general aviation airplane which was produced between 1953 and 1981. Though the design is no longer in production, many of these aircraft are still in use as personal airc ...

that incorporates modifications and improvements, such as an extended wing span, greater wing area and vertically hinged doors. It features a

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 ...

high-wing A monoplane is a fixed-wing aircraft configuration with a single mainplane, in contrast to a biplane or other types of multiplanes, which have multiple wings. A monoplane has inherently the highest efficiency and lowest drag of any wing config ...

, a four-seat enclosed cabin accessed via doors, fixed

conventional landing gear Conventional landing gear, or tailwheel-type landing gear, is an aircraft Landing gear, undercarriage consisting of two main wheels forward of the Center of gravity of an aircraft, center of gravity and a small wheel or skid to support the tail ...

and a single engine in

tractor configuration In aviation, a tractor configuration is a propeller-driven fixed-wing aircraft with its engine mounted with the propeller in front, so that the aircraft is "pulled" through the air. This is the usual configuration; the pusher configuration ...

. The aircraft is made from sheet

aluminum 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 ...

, with the kit

airframe The mechanical structure of an aircraft is known as the airframe. This structure is typically considered to include the fuselage, undercarriage, empennage and wings, and excludes the propulsion system. Airframe design is a field of aeros ...

parts preformed with pilot holes to allow construction without the use of

jigs The jig (, ) is a form of lively folk dance in compound metre, as well as the accompanying dance tune. It first gained popularity in 16th-century England, Ireland, Scotland, and other parts of the British Isles, and was adopted on mainland Eu ...

. Its span wing employs a

NACA 2412 The National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA) was a United States federal agency that was founded on March 3, 1915, to undertake, promote, and institutionalize aeronautical research. On October 1, 1958, the agency was dissolved and its ...

airfoil An airfoil (American English) or aerofoil (British English) is a streamlined body that is capable of generating significantly more Lift (force), lift than Drag (physics), drag. Wings, sails and propeller blades are examples of airfoils. Foil (fl ...

, mounts flaps and has a wing area of . The acceptable power range is and the standard engine used is the

Continental O-470 The Continental O-470 engine is a family of carburetor, carbureted and fuel-injected flat six engine, six-cylinder, horizontally opposed, air-cooled aircraft engines that were developed especially for use in light aircraft by Teledyne Continen ...

. The Cyclone has a typical empty weight of and a gross weight of , giving a useful load of . The manufacturer estimated the construction time from the supplied kit as 2000 hours.

Operational history

In December 2013, 23 examples were

registered Registered may refer to: * Registered mail, letters, packets or other postal documents considered valuable and in need of a chain of custody * Registered trademark symbol, symbol ® that provides notice that the preceding is a trademark or service ...

in Canada with

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 ...

and three in the United States with the

Federal Aviation Administration The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) is a Federal government of the United States, U.S. federal government agency within the United States Department of Transportation, U.S. Department of Transportation that regulates civil aviation in t ...

Specifications (Cyclone)

References

{{St-Just Aviation aircraft

Cyclone In meteorology, a cyclone () is a large air mass that rotates around a strong center of low atmospheric pressure, counterclockwise in the Northern Hemisphere and clockwise in the Southern Hemisphere as viewed from above (opposite to an ant ...

1990s Canadian civil utility aircraft Single-engined tractor aircraft High-wing aircraft Homebuilt aircraft Aircraft first flown in 1992