The MFI BA-12 Sländan is a single seat

ultralight 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 aile ...

of pod and high boom configuration and with a butterfly tail. It was designed and built in Sweden in the 1980s and led to a two-seat, slightly larger, development called the BA-14.

Design and development

The Sländan ( en, Dragonfly) was the first Swedish microlight apart from glider based types. It is built from

composite material A composite material (also called a composition material or shortened to composite, which is the common name) is a material which is produced from two or more constituent materials. These constituent materials have notably dissimilar chemical or ...

s, with a square section beam formed in two halves supporting the engine well ahead of the wing

leading edge The leading edge of an airfoil surface such as a wing is its foremost edge and is therefore the part which first meets the oncoming air.Crane, Dale: ''Dictionary of Aeronautical Terms, third edition'', page 305. Aviation Supplies & Academics, ...

and extending aft continuously to the tail. The wings, rectangular in plan and with a high aspect ratio (10:1), are attached to the beam with dihedral of 1.5°. Ailerons cover 30% of the

trailing edge The trailing edge of an aerodynamic surface such as a wing is its rear edge, where the airflow separated by the leading edge meets.Crane, Dale: ''Dictionary of Aeronautical Terms, third edition'', page 521. Aviation Supplies & Academics, 199 ...

. The wing has two pressed

spar SPAR, originally DESPAR, styled as DE SPAR, is a Dutch multinational that provides branding, supplies and support services for independently owned and operated food retail stores. It was founded in the Netherlands in 1932, by Adriaan van Well, ...

foam Foams are materials formed by trapping pockets of gas in a liquid or solid. A bath sponge and the head on a glass of beer are examples of foams. In most foams, the volume of gas is large, with thin films of liquid or solid separating the ...

filled glass fibre ribs and

Kevlar Kevlar (para-aramid) is a strong, heat-resistant synthetic fiber, related to other aramids such as Nomex and Technora. Developed by Stephanie Kwolek at DuPont in 1965, the high-strength material was first used commercially in the early 1970s a ...

filled glass fibre

sandwich A sandwich is a food typically consisting of vegetables, sliced cheese or meat, placed on or between slices of bread, or more generally any dish wherein bread serves as a container or wrapper for another food type. The sandwich began as a po ...

skins. The butterfly tail surfaces are also rectangular and assisted by a short ventral fin with the same chord as the

tailplane A tailplane, also known as a horizontal stabiliser, is a small lifting surface located on the tail (empennage) behind the main lifting surfaces of a fixed-wing aircraft as well as other non-fixed-wing aircraft such as helicopters and gyropla ...

. The round nosed, single seat cabin is formed from six bonded pieces and mounted on the boom with its windscreen at the wing

, placing the pilot below the wing at about one quarter chord. The sides are normally open though complete enclosure is an option. On each side a forward leaning bracing

strut A strut is a structural component commonly found in engineering, aeronautics, architecture and anatomy. Struts generally work by resisting longitudinal compression, but they may also serve in tension. Human anatomy Part of the functionality o ...

runs from the lower rear cabin to the front wing spar. The Sländan has a short, fixed,

tricycle undercarriage Tricycle gear is a type of aircraft undercarriage, or ''landing gear'', arranged in a tricycle fashion. The tricycle arrangement has a single nose wheel in the front, and two or more main wheels slightly aft of the center of gravity. Tricycle g ...

with a steerable nosewheel; the mainwheels, fitted with brakes, are mounted on straight steel

cantilever A cantilever is a rigid structural element that extends horizontally and is supported at only one end. Typically it extends from a flat vertical surface such as a wall, to which it must be firmly attached. Like other structural elements, a cant ...

legs from the lower fuselage. There is a protective

tailskid Conventional landing gear, or tailwheel-type landing gear, is an aircraft undercarriage consisting of two main wheels forward of the center of gravity and a small wheel or skid to support the tail.Crane, Dale: ''Dictionary of Aeronautical Term ...

on the tip of the underfin. The prototype Sländan was initially powered by a (21 kW) (28 hp) König SD 570 4-cylinder

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

engine though there were plans to replace this with a Lotus Magnum 2.25 when this type became available. At least three examples have been fitted with

Rotax Rotax is the brand name for a range of internal combustion engines developed and manufactured by the Austrian company BRP-Rotax GmbH & Co KG (until 2016 BRP-Powertrain GmbH & Co. KG), in turn owned by the Canadian Bombardier Recreational Produc ...

engines. The Sländan first flew in 1984 and by February 1985 MFI were assembling five more. It was agreed that later aircraft should be produced by the Royal Swedish Aero Club using MFI's moulds and tools. It was intended to market the Sländan in both flyaway and kit form. At about the same time, in a collaboration between MFI and FFK Aerotech, Andreasson was developing a slightly larger, two seat version called the FFV Aerotech BA-14 Starling.

Operational history

Three Rotax powered, Swedish registered Sländans appear on the mid-2010 civil aircraft registers of Europe excluding Russia.

Aircraft on display

Sländan ''SE-YKA'' is on display at the ''Aeroseum'' at

Gothenburg City Airport Gothenburg (; abbreviated Gbg; sv, Göteborg ) is the second-largest city in Sweden, fifth-largest in the Nordic countries, and capital of the Västra Götaland County. It is situated by the Kattegat, on the west coast of Sweden, and has a p ...

Variants

;BA-12 Sländan: Single seat version. ;FFV Aerotech BA-14 Starling: Side-by-side version with 48 kW (65 hp)

Rotax 532 The Rotax 532 is a two-stroke, two-cylinder, rotary valve engine, liquid-cooled, gear reduction-drive engine that was formerly manufactured by BRP-Rotax GmbH & Co. KG. It was designed for use on ultralight aircraft.Raisner, William: ''LEAF cat ...

engine. Wing span increased by 1.0 m. (3 ft 3 in) with more rounded tips. Flaps added. Tailplane span also increased and tips rounded, with horn balanced elevators.

Specifications (BA-12 Sländan)

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:MFI BA-12 Slandan 1980s Swedish civil aircraft Ultralight aircraft Single-engined tractor aircraft High-wing aircraft V-tail aircraft Aircraft first flown in 1984