The Brändli BX-2 Cherry is two-seat sport homebuilt aircraft, designed by Max Brändli. More than one hundred had been constructed by 2010. Cherry BX-2

Design and development

Max Brändli designed the Cherry in 1979 when he was 55 years old and started its construction in his cellar. He carried out all the structural and aerodynamic calculations and supervised the building, which took 3½ years and 5,500 hours of work. He also flew it on its first flight on 24 April 1982. The Cherry is a low wing monoplane. It has a wood-framed fuselage and wings with wooden spars, styrofoam cores and

glass fibre Glass fiber ( or glass fibre) is a material consisting of numerous extremely fine fibers of glass. Glassmakers throughout history have experimented with glass fibers, but mass manufacture of glass fiber was only made possible with the inventio ...

covering. The inner sections of the wings have constant chord and carry flaps; the outer sections are straight tapered with ailerons. The wings can be removed rapidly for transport. The tail surfaces are straight tapered and the

stabilator A stabilator is a fully movable aircraft horizontal stabilizer. It serves the usual functions of longitudinal stability, control and stick force requirements otherwise performed by the separate parts of a conventional horizontal stabilizer and el ...

is fitted with a full-span anti-servo tab. The Cherry seats two, in side-by-side configuration under a large, almost fully transparent, forward sliding canopy. It has a retractable tricycle undercarriage, with simple, outward folding main gear. A non-retractable undercarriage is an option. The prototype was powered by a 65 hp (49 kW) Continental A65 flat four engine; since then, Cherrys have used flat fours with power of up to 100 hp (75 kW), including some from the Continental range, the Volkswagen-derived Limbach L.2400 and 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, late ...

. Also the flat 2-cylinder motorcycle derived BMW R1200GS has been used.

Operational history

The Cherry is kit-built from plans, with some components provided. By 2010, more than 240 sets of plans had been sold and over 100 aircraft completed. In mid-2010, 76 were registered in Europe west of Russia, flying in Austria, the Czech Republic, France, Germany, the Netherlands,

Switzerland ). Swiss law does not designate a ''capital'' as such, but the federal parliament and government are installed in Bern, while other federal institutions, such as the federal courts, are in other cities (Bellinzona, Lausanne, Luzern, Neuchâtel ...

, Slovenia and the UK. The prototype Cherry, ''HB-YBX'' flew around Europe for 25 years; in 2009, it crashed after take-off from Sundsvall-Härnösand Airport in

Sweden Sweden, formally the Kingdom of Sweden,The United Nations Group of Experts on Geographical Names states that the country's formal name is the Kingdom of SwedenUNGEGN World Geographical Names, Sweden./ref> is a Nordic country located on ...

, killing both Dani Gerwer and its designer, Max Brändli.

Specifications

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Brandli Bx-2 Cherry 1980s Swiss civil aircraft Single-engined tractor aircraft Low-wing aircraft Homebuilt aircraft