Viking Dragonfly MK3
A SPORTSCAR FOR THE SKIES
The Viking Dragonfly is a homebuilt, 2-place tandem wing canard aircraft. With the planned Corvair power it should cruise at around 150mph and give good climb performance. It seats two in a snug- in the 60's British Sports Car sense- cockpit. In fact the Dragonfly really does remind me a lot of the early British sports cars along the lines of MG and especially Lotus. From the snug cockpit to the small light engines and "different" styling it is not a plane for "everyone".
Mine came from a very nice fellow who had it sitting in his hangar for a long time and decided he needed the space and the plane needed a home. He had gotten it from somewhere in Southern California- he told me but I have forgotten- and had really done little more than unload it into his hangar and cover it up.
The airframe came to me in more or less "kit form", meaning the big pieces- fuselage and wings- had been constructed but were unfinished, on landing gear, with no control surfaces- ailerons, elevators, or rudder- no wiring or plumbing, and really just sort of thrown together to make it easy-ish to move around.
Since receiving the airframe I have cleaned up some of it, and started the process of turning it from a pile of composite parts into a functional aircraft.
I will be using Corvair 6cyl aircooled 3.4liter power for this aircraft. The original aircraft specified a 40hp 1600CC VW engine, which most builder opted for and installed 60hp1835cc or even 75-80hp 2300CC VW motors. The Corvair motor will make around 110, or as high as 130hp and not weight very much more.
It is worth noting the original aircraft called for minimal instruments, hand start, and no alternator. Once builders started adding starters and alternators and bigger batteries and more electronics the engine needed to make more power to keep performance in range with the added weight, which is why the engines continuously have grown in size and output.
Pictures will be posted in a gallery with descriptions and a blog format will be used to allow me to easily update the page and status of the build.
Photo Gallery
Here is the Dragonfly in its former home, prior to pickup.
Looking forward from the pilot seat. A bulkhead will need to be built and glassed in for the header tank and the hinges for the canopy to bolt to. A horizontal panel will be made from the bottom of that bulkhead back to the instrument panel which will serve as the radio and electronics tray and to help strengthen the header tank mount.
Here is a good shot of the cockpit area from the right side looking across the panel. Snug isn't it? The seats are molded in and the area under your hips form the top of the main fuel tank.
The center console at some point was widened from the plans specification of 4" to the current 5". This is probably going to have to be cut out and re-done to gain back the 1" of space lost to make the cockpit