RV-11 is

Richard VanGrunsven Richard E. "Dick" VanGrunsven (born 1939) is an American aircraft designer and Homebuilt aircraft, kit plane manufacturer. The number of VanGrunsven-designed homebuilt aircraft produced each year in North America exceeds the production of all com ...

's designation for a proposed single-seat touring motor glider design similar in layout to the AMS Carat. Most touring motor gliders are two-seaters; VanGrunsven felt that the lower drag and weight of a single-seater would allow for superior performance. Although the designation is the 11th in the

Van's Aircraft Van's Aircraft, Inc. is an American Homebuilt aircraft, kit aircraft manufacturer founded by Richard VanGrunsven in 1973. The Van's RV series aircraft are all-aluminum, low-wing monoplanes of monocoque construction. In 2023, over 11,000 Van's a ...

“RV” series, the RV-11 is not a company project. Rather, it is Richard VanGrunsven’s “personal pet project”, being designed and built at his home in his spare time. The prototype RV-11 uses the wings of an

HP-18 The HP-18 is a Richard Schreder-designed metal Racing Class sailplane that was offered as a kit for homebuilding during the 1970s and 1980s. Design and development The HP-18 is a flapped (15-meter) sailplane featuring a V-tail and 90-degre ...

sailplane mated to a specially built fuselage. A

Jabiru 2200 The Jabiru 2200 is a lightweight naturally aspirated, pushrod four-stroke, flat four, air-cooled aircraft engine produced by Jabiru Aircraft. Design and development The conventional direct-drive engine is fitted with an alternator, silencers, ...

was installed in the nose. The panel features an I-K Technologies AIM-1 display and a MicroAir radio. The canopy is the aft half of an RV-4 canopy, rotated 180 degrees so as to face forward. Construction is all-metal, except for the PVC ribs in the HP-18 wings and - as is typical in RVs - some small fiberglass components such as the engine cowl and prop spinner. The RV-11’s single main landing gear is similar to those of a

DC-3 The Douglas DC-3 is a propeller-driven airliner manufactured by the Douglas Aircraft Company, which had a lasting effect on the airline industry in the 1930s to 1940s and World War II. It was developed as a larger, improved 14-bed sleeper ...

, retracting up and forward, “half way” into a pod-like fairing on the underside of the belly. VanGrunsven first announced the RV-11 in an issue of the RVator newsletter published in 2000. In a 2002 issue, VanGrunsven reported that the prototype was “perhaps 80% complete”. Later issues included photos of the build. In 2022, at an EAA event to celebrate the 50 years of

, VanGrunsven showed recent photos and reported that, although the airplane has not yet been completed, further progress has been made.

References

Van's Aircraft
{{VansAircraft Homebuilt aircraft Proposed aircraft of the United States Motor gliders Low-wing aircraft Single-engined tractor aircraft Aircraft with retractable bicycle landing gear RV-11 Single-engined piston aircraft

See also

References