History of aviation in short:
1903 Wrights fly first time ( Whitehead flew little earlier 1901 )
1909 Bleriot crosses the channel
1910 Coanda flies the first jet.
1912 Gallaudet flies first time MAX III kinda aeroplane at 2x the speed of anything before.
Here is the E. Gallaudet's Bullet:
Based on this brilliant principle placing the prop aft like a ship Edson Fessenden Gallaudet was able to reach the speed of 130 mph in 1912 using 100 hp engine.
Later in USA base company Acme-Sierra produced a plane that was able to a lot faster with 80 hp engine.
It was designed by Northorp:
So all in all as weird as it may seem to many the pusher prop planes have been around nearly 100 years.
One of the historys most expensive pusher project was Bill Lear's Lear Fan 2100. It came to publicity around December 1981 after the first so called oil crisis in the seventies. There is plenty of information of it in the net and magazines. It was able to fly at 42 000 ft and cruise at 350 kts. It's main feature was economy since it went fast as the business jets, but was using less fuel. Despite of three protoypes and 260 orders FAA never approved it and project was cancelled...also Bill Lear passed away and oil crisis seemed to vanish too. But the idea was brought to the media and great potential was seen and admired by the aviation community all around the world.
Very little is known about another great pusher called XB-42 Mixmaster, but it also was able to cruise 100 mph faster with ½ the power of contemporaries carrying the same load.
XB-42 Mixmaster:
Recently also a private person Lars Giertz made an attempt to break the FAI 300 and 500 kilo classes world speed records. His plane was officially the AC with smallest drag factor ever produced, albeit it had a fixed landing gear. It was very small and powered with 100 hp engine. His blog ( which still exists ) he explains his plane was calculated to go 250 mph with 50 hp power and faster than 300 mph at full throttle. Unfortunately we will never know, if it was really so since he suffered severe head injuries when his plane stalled at 5 feet altitude over the airfield. He had radioed of rising temperature of the powerplant. He did not wear helmet nor did his AC have a safety arch in the cockpit. He died 6 hours after the accident in the local hospital.
More about his plane VMaxProbe here: http://www.webcamsue.nl/vmax.html
The safety record of another pusher is not the best either, but it is the current world speed record holder in FAI under 300 kg class. It is the famous BEDE-5B. Its jet version BD-5J is well known of the scene in James Bond movie OCTOPUSSY. Bede-5J is also the world's smallest jet with retracting undergear ( Cri-Cri being the smallest jet and smallest twin engine AC ).
More about the FAI record: http://records.fai.org/general_aviation/history.asp?id1=16&id2=27&id3=1
Bede - 5B:
Max is only foot shorter than an average BD-5B ( and 8 cm shorter than the shortest ), it has to be since all or most Bedes are equipped with 60-100 hp engines and MAX III is intented to be fitted with a 50 hp air cooled 2-stroke Limbach L550 engine. Max is not the world's smallest AC since Bumble Bee and Bumble Bee II are about a meter shorter and officially the world's smallest aircraft. Bumble Bee is in a museum in Tucson Arizona, but Bumble Bee II suffered an engine failure in tailwind section of the finale and crashed ( pilot Robert Starr now 86 is still going strong and made a full recovery after the crash that took place ).
History shows that there are advantages in pushers like this..almost forgot...the most successfull pusher prop AC designer of all times Molton Taylor..he made the famous Aerocar and Mini-Imp.
Molton's Micro-Imp was never realized, but it was intented to be propelled with a 40 hp engine ( as was BD-5B originally ).
Back to MAX III.
MAX III dimensions:
Span 5.0 m
Length 3.8 m
Weight 120 kg
Mtow 260 kg
AR 1:8
Wingarea 3.4 m2
fueltank 35 l
MAX III estimated performance.
Top Speed 230 mph
Cruise 210 mph
Stall 50 mph
Fuel consumption of MAX III:
full burn 14.5 l/h
cruise 11.0 l/h
Several aspects of MAX III are still trade secrets, but it will have very well cooled engine and fowler flaps and retracting undercarriage.
Most of all it will be excellent flier and very economical ( about 3.2-3.5 liters per 100 km ) and relatively fast. How fast will it be...if goals are met..possibly the fastest in 300 kg class. MAX III will have 10 hp less than most contenders in the category, but it is lighter and cleaner so it is interesting to see how will it perform.
Biggest obstacle at the moment is money. We have engineering + design help and test pilot, but so far no funding. Don't worry I am working on it.
If you want to know about this aircraft contact me at: ToimintaA4@gmail.com
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