The Raven Explorer II is an American

autogyro An autogyro (from Greek and , "self-turning"), also known as a ''gyroplane'', is a type of rotorcraft that uses an unpowered rotor in free autorotation to develop lift. Forward thrust is provided independently, by an engine-driven propeller. Whi ...

Raven Rotorcraft Raven Rotorcraft (also called Raven Redrives and Raven Rotorcraft & Redrives, Inc.) is an American aircraft manufacturer based in El Prado, New Mexico and formerly of Boulder Colorado. The company specializes in the design and manufacture of au ...

Boulder Colorado Boulder is a home rule city that is the county seat and most populous municipality of Boulder County, Colorado, United States. The city population was 108,250 at the 2020 United States census, making it the 12th most populous city in Colorad ...

and later

El Prado, New Mexico El Prado is an unincorporated suburb on the north side of Taos, in Taos County, New Mexico, United States. It is generally bounded on the south by the town of Taos, to the east by Taos Pueblo lands, to the north by Arroyo Seco and Arroyo Hondo, ...

, introduced in the 1990s. No longer in production, when it was available the aircraft was supplied as a kit for amateur construction.Purdy, Don: ''AeroCrafter - Homebuilt Aircraft Sourcebook, Fifth Edition'', page 328. BAI Communications, 15 July 1998. Introduced in the mid-1990s the Explorer II design is now out of production as the company is developing into the

Raven Rotor-Plane A raven is any of several larger-bodied bird species of the genus ''Corvus''. These species do not form a single taxonomic group within the genus. There is no consistent distinction between "crows" and "ravens", common names which are assigned t ...

for the

light-sport aircraft A light-sport aircraft (LSA), or light sport aircraft, is a fairly new category of small, lightweight aircraft that are simple to fly. LSAs tend to be heavier and more sophisticated than ultralight (aka "microlight") aircraft, but LSA restrictio ...

category.

Design and development

The aircraft was designed to comply with the US ''Experimental - Amateur-built'' aircraft rules. It features a single main 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 ...

open cockpit without a windshield and

conventional landing gear 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 ...

. The acceptable power range was and the standard engine used is a three cylinder in-line, liquid-cooled,

four-stroke A four-stroke (also four-cycle) engine is an internal combustion (IC) engine in which the piston completes four separate strokes while turning the crankshaft. A stroke refers to the full travel of the piston along the cylinder, in either directio ...

Geo Metro The Geo Metro is a marketing and manufacturing variation of the Suzuki Cultus available in North America from 1989 through 2001 as a joint effort of General Motors (GM) and Suzuki. In the US, the Metro carried a Geo nameplate from 1989 through ...

automotive conversion powerplant in

tractor configuration In aviation, the term tractor configuration refers to an aircraft constructed in the standard configuration with its engine mounted with the propeller in front of it so that the aircraft is "pulled" through the air. Oppositely, the pusher c ...

. 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 welded

4130 steel 41xx steel is a family of SAE steel grades, as specified by the Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE). Alloying elements include chromium and molybdenum, and as a result these materials are often informally referred to as chromoly steel (common ...

and bolted-together

aluminum Aluminium (aluminum in American and Canadian English) is a chemical element with the symbol Al and atomic number 13. Aluminium has a density lower than those of other common metals, at approximately one third that of steel. It has ...

tubing. Its two-bladed rotor has a diameter of . The aircraft's specifications include a typical empty weight of and a gross weight of , giving a useful load of . With full fuel of the payload for the pilot, passengers and baggage is . The standard day, sea level, no wind, take off with a engine is and the landing roll is . The manufacturer estimated the construction time from the supplied kit as 100 hours.

Operational history

In April 2015 no examples were registered in the United States with the

Federal Aviation Administration The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) is the largest transportation agency of the U.S. government and regulates all aspects of civil aviation in the country as well as over surrounding international waters. Its powers include air traffic m ...

and it is not clear if any were produced at all.

Specifications (Explorer II)

References

External links

* {{Raven Rotorcraft aircraft

Explorer II ''Explorer II'' was a manned U.S. high-altitude balloon that was launched on November 11, 1935, and reached a record altitude of . Launched at 8:00 am from the Stratobowl in South Dakota, the helium balloon carried a two-man crew consisting of ...

1990s United States sport aircraft 1990s United States ultralight aircraft 1990s United States civil utility aircraft Homebuilt aircraft Single-engined tractor autogyros

Design and development

Operational history

Specifications (Explorer II)

See also

References

External links