The LAE Ultrasport 496T is a

Cypriot Cypriot (in older sources often "Cypriote") refers to someone or something of, from, or related to the country of Cyprus. * Cypriot people, or of Cypriot descent; this includes: **Armenian Cypriots **Greek Cypriots **Maronite Cypriots **Turkish C ...

helicopter A helicopter is a type of rotorcraft in which lift and thrust are supplied by horizontally spinning rotors. This allows the helicopter to take off and land vertically, to hover, and to fly forward, backward and laterally. These attributes ...

that was produced by LAE Helicopters Cyprus of

Larnaca Larnaca ( el, Λάρνακα ; tr, Larnaka) is a city on the south east coast of Cyprus and the capital of the district of the same name. It is the third-largest city in the country, after Nicosia and Limassol, with a metro population of 144 ...

. Now out of production, when it was available the aircraft was supplied complete and ready-to-fly.Tacke, Willi; Marino Boric; et al: ''World Directory of Light Aviation 2015-16'', page 209. Flying Pages Europe SARL, 2015. The aircraft was reportedly in production in 2015, but by the end of 2017 production had ended in favour of the new LAE Piranha.

Design and development

The Ultrasport 496T is derived from the

American Sportscopter Ultrasport 496 The American Sportscopter Ultrasport 496 is an American helicopter that was designed and produced by American Sportscopter of Newport News, Virginia. Now out of production, when it was available the aircraft was supplied as a kit for amateur ...

, replacing the

two-stroke A two-stroke (or two-stroke cycle) engine is a type of internal combustion engine that completes a Thermodynamic power cycle, power cycle with two strokes (up and down movements) of the piston during one power cycle, this power cycle being comple ...

powerplant with a

turboshaft engine A turboshaft engine is a form of gas turbine that is optimized to produce shaftpower rather than jet thrust. In concept, turboshaft engines are very similar to turbojets, with additional turbine expansion to extract heat energy from the exhaust ...

. The 496T was designed to comply with the European Class 6 microlight helicopter rules. It features a single main rotor and tail rotor, a two-seats-in

side-by-side configuration Tandem, or in tandem, is an arrangement in which a team of machines, animals or people are lined up one behind another, all facing in the same direction. The original use of the term in English was in ''tandem harness'', which is used for two ...

enclosed cockpit with a windshield,

skid landing gear Landing gear is the undercarriage of an aircraft or spacecraft that is used for takeoff or landing. For aircraft it is generally needed for both. It was also formerly called ''alighting gear'' by some manufacturers, such as the Glenn L. Martin ...

and a

Solar T62 The Solar T62 Titan is an American gas turbine engine used mainly as a helicopter auxiliary power unit (APU), ground power generator, turboprop engine or helicopter turboshaft engine. A free power turbine version was developed as the Solar T66. ...

turbine engine. The aircraft

fuselage The fuselage (; from the French ''fuselé'' "spindle-shaped") is an aircraft's main body section. It holds crew, passengers, or cargo. In single-engine aircraft, it will usually contain an engine as well, although in some amphibious aircraft t ...

is made from composites. It has a two-bladed main and a ring-mounted tailrotor. The aircraft has a typical empty weight of and a gross weight of , giving a useful load of . Reviewer Werner Pfaendler, noted that it has "an exceptional power to weight ratio".

Specifications (Ultrasport 496T)

References

{{reflist

Ultrasport ''Ultrasport'' was a Norwegian extreme sports magazine. The magazine was started in 1991. In 2001 the magazine published nude photos of Kari Traa Kari Traa (born 28 January 1974) is a Norwegian former Olympic freestyle skier. She won the Olympi ...

2010s Cypriot sport aircraft 2010s Cypriot ultralight aircraft 2010s Cypriot civil utility aircraft 2010s Cypriot helicopters

Design and development

Specifications (Ultrasport 496T)

See also

References