Victa Aircruiser Four Seat Light Aircraft

The Victa Aircruiser was an 1960s Australian four-seat touring
monoplane designed by Henry Millicer and built by Victa.

History:-

The Victa Aircruiser was designed by Dr Henry Millicer, who had
earlier designed the two seat Victa Airtourer (described separately),
the most popular light aircraft designed and built in Australia. With
Airtourer production in full swing in the early 1960s Victa
commissioned Dr Millicer to develop a four seat light aircraft based
on the Airtourer. This resulted in the Aircruiser 210CS, which flew
for the first time on July 17 1966. The Aircruiser was later awarded
full Australian certification equivalent to US FAR Part 23 standards.
         The Aircruiser showed considerable promise and looked a
worthy competitor to American four seaters, however Victa withdrew
from light aircraft production in January 1967 due to the Airtourer's
inability to compete on price against alleged dumped imports to
Australia, and the design and production rights to the Airtourer and
Aircruiser were sold to AESL of New Zealand in 1970. AESL continued to
build the Airtourer and used the Aircruiser as the basis for its CT-4
Airtrainer (described separately) but did not put the Aircruiser into
production.
In 1994 Tony Peters, a flying school proprietor in Mount Gambier in
South Australia, commissioned a market study into two and four seat
light aircraft demand in Australia which found there existed a
significant market for new aircraft. A syndicate was formed to
purchase the Aircruiser design and type certificate, with Millicer
Aircraft Industries established to place an upgraded development of
the Aircruiser into production as the M-9-200 Shrike. The Shrike name
was dropped in 1998 in favour of AirCruiser (with an upper case "C").
Originally plans envisaged the first M-9-200 being delivered in mid
1997 but minor delays and the decision to acquire the Airtourer design
and place it into production as a priority meant that the first
M-9-200 - the rebuilt Aircruiser prototype - was not due to fly until
September 1999 with first customer deliveries planned for 2000.
AirCruisers and AirTourers would be built in a new, purpose designed
factory in Sale in Victoria.
    Compared with the original Victa Aircruiser, the M-9-200
AirCruiser would have featured a fuel injected IO-360 engine, standard
GPS, new wheels, brakes and controls. A retractable undercarriage
variant was also planned. However, in late 2000 Millicer ceased
trading due to financial difficulties, before the M-9-200 had been
flown. present day, only one Aircruiser was built.


Victa Aircruiser:-

Role:-            Four-seat light touring monoplane
National origin:- Australia
Manufacturer:-    Victa
Designer:-        Henry Millicer
First flight:-    18 July 1966
Number built:-    1
Developed from:-  Victa Airtourer
Variants:-        AESL CT/4 Airtrainer


Development:-

Following the success of the earlier Airtourer, Millicer designed a
four-seat version which he called the Aircruiser.The prototype
registered VH-MVR first flew on 18 July 1966. Like the airtourer it
was a low-wing monoplane with a fixed nosewheel landing gear and
powered by a 210 hp (157 kW) Continental IO-360-H piston engine.
Rather than the sliding roof of the Airtourer the four-seat Aircruiser
had a fixed cabin roof.
   Following the sale of the design rights of the Airtourer to Aero
Engine Services Limited (AESL) of New Zealand the rights to the
Aircruiser were also sold to AESL in 1969. AESL re-designed the
aircraft as the AESL CT/4 Airtrainer, a fully aerobatic military
trainer.


Specifications:-

General characteristics

.Crew: 1
.Capacity: 3
.Powerplant: 1 × Continental IO-360-H piston engine, 210 hp (160 kW)

Light aircraft:-

A light aircraft is an aircraft that has a maximum gross take-off
weight of 12,500 lb (5,670 kg) or less. Many light aircraft are used
commercially for passenger and freight transport, sightseeing,
photography and other similar roles as well as personal use.

Examples of light aircraft include:-

1.Cessna, the entire range of propeller driven aircraft from the
Cessna 120 up to the Cessna 208
2.Piper, all models
3.Beechcraft, the non-jet models such as the Bonanza and Baron
4.Others such as Cirrus aircraft; the GippsAero GA8 Airvan; the Aviat
Husky and the Robin DR400.

Examples of aircraft that are at the maximum gross take-off weight for
this category include the de Havilland Canada DHC-6 Twin Otter and
Beechcraft B200 Super King Air.

Uses:-

The many uses of light aircraft include aerial surveying, such as
monitoring pipelines. They are also used for light cargo operations,
such as "feeding" cargo hubs, as well as some passenger operations.
Light aircraft are also used for marketing purposes, such as banner
towing and skywriting. Primary flight instruction is also conducted in
light aircraft. Finally, most personal aircraft are light aircraft,
the most popular being the Cessna 172. The Cessna 172 is not only the
most popular light aircraft, but also the most produced aircraft of
any kind.Larger light aircraft, such as twin turboprops and very light
jets are often used as business aircraft.

Keywords of Victa Aircruiser Four-seat Light  Aircraft