Photograph:
Incomplete WAACO Staggerbipe 10-0062 (c/n 1) at Albion Park, NSW in February 2010 (David C Eyre)
Country of origin:
Australia
Description:
Single-seat light sport biplane
Power Plant:
One 31 kw (42 hp) [1,280 cc] Volkswagen conversion two-cylinder horizontally-opposed air-cooled engine
Specifications:
- Wingspan: 6.10 m (20 ft)
- Length: 4.10 m (13 ft 4½ in)
- Wing area: 10.62 m² (114.31 sq ft)
- Max speed at sea leve:l 144 km/ h (90 mph)
- Cruising speed at 75% power: 126 km/h (78 mph)
- Stalling speed power on: 48 km/h (30 mph)
- Best climb speed: 72 km/h (45 mph)
- Initial rate of climb: 259 m/min (850 ft/min)
- Fuel capacity: 30 litres (6.6 Imp gals)
- Endurance cruising at 75% power: 3 hrs 30 mins
- Empty weight: 147 kg (324 lb)
- Loaded weight: 266 kg (586 lb)
History:
The WAACO Staggerbipe was first produced in the early 1980s by the West Australian Aircraft Company of Box Hill, VIC as a single-seat light sporting biplane and was made available in kit form for the amateur constructor. Designed by Max Kremke, the aircraft was designed to meet ANO 95-22, to use a cut-down two-cylinder Volkswagen engine, and to be built of easily-obtainable, off-the-shelf, materials.
Construction of the machine comprised a fuselage of 6063T5 aluminium square hollow tubing with rivetted and bonded gussets, the former being of timber. The windscreen was polycarbon and the engine and boot cowls were pre-moulded fibreglass, as was the fuel tank and seat. The undercarriage was of chrome moly tube with 13 cm (5 in) wheels. The wing main spar was of Silver Quandong and the ribs of klegacell foam capped in a profiled plywood, the leading-edge and tips being of fibreglass.
A couple were built and operated under RAA regulations, including 10-0062 (c/n 1) fitted with a Continental engine and registered on 3 April 1988 and 10-0384 (c/n 001) registered on 7 July 1988.