The Very Best (And Worst) of Oshkosh 2005! (Part One)

Compiled By The Staff and Readership of the Aero-News Network

For quite a while, we have recognized the highs and lows inherent in the general and sport aviation community. There are but a few places where that is more a propos than at a major event like the Oshkosh Fly-In.

It's hard to know what really is going to make a difference and what really qualifies as exceptional unless you've been watching this industry carefully for several years... as we have.

Unlike past years, ANN readers remarks were heavily incorporated into ALL aspects of this report, and not just the Aircraft awards and such. Their contributions are specifically noted when a particular attribute is based primarily on an individual's report.

Our Annual Best Plane of the Year Selections (tentatively announced after Oshkosh and finalized at year's end) will await the end of the year but we will announce the nominees at this point, with the proviso that our opinions may change as the year develops. 

So; here are our picks for the Best and Worst of this year's Oshkosh... and why we think so...

Best Aircraft of Show (Overall)

SpaceShipOne/White Knight: No contest... not even by any scale imaginable. No other birds got the attention, no other birds attracted the crowds and it is possible that much of this year's amazing Oshkosh attendance can be tracked directly to the sight of these amazing constructs. (Jim Campbell, ANN E-I-C; Staff)
Runner(s)-Up: The VLJ Wars: With Eclipses, a Mustang, and even an A700 running through the skies of Oshkosh, the advancements in GA have never been more apparent... or more exciting.

Best Ultralight/Ultralight Trainer

No Award: Nothing really stands out at this point as the Ultralight community searches for meaning in a post-LSA world.

Best "Affordable Flyer"

Flight Design CT: NICE flyer, great looks, excellent company support here in the USA and a good value make this a bird that deserves SERIOUS consideration for your flying dollar. (Jim Campbell, ANN E-I-C; Staff)

Best "LSA"

CubCrafter SportCub. Yup... it's a Cub, alright... but with some excellent 2000 era twists that bring this delightful design fully into the 21st Century.
Runner(s)-Up: Indus Aviation's Thorpedo: Now coupled with innovative financing, we gotta wonder why you're sitting there reading this... Put down the computer and go buy one. (Kevin O'Brien)

Best High Performance Kit Aircraft

Velocity XL Series: A well-proven design from a well-proven company continues to gain adherents in an industry that is enjoying new popularity with the advent of new engines and avionics to further increase the already impressive utility of a number of exciting aerial hot-rods.

Best Rotorcraft

Hard call. It was a thin year for rotors at Oshkosh. Next year, we'll try to get to Homer Bell's and Mentone, two events before Oshkosh where helicopter and gyro innovation (respectively) are still happening. The most interesting new developments were Tim Blackwell's ultralight tractor Jyro Deer, which we shall cover in depth shortly, and Larry Neal's Super Sky Cycle, which we have covered before but we'll update you on when we can get to it. Canadian Home Rotors' Safari now has a stablemate in the Interceptor, but it's really just a new skin on the old Safari -- me, I like the visibility of the bubble better than the Darth Vader look of the new version. (Kevin O'Brien)

Best Certified Aircraft (At Oshkosh)

No Award... Yet: ANN has decided to reserve our selection for the year's best aircraft until we complete the year. Look for our final selection as part of our Annual End-Of-Year Coverage. (Jim Campbell, ANN E-I-C; Staff)

Nominee: Cirrus SR-22 GTS. A flight last June from the Cirrus factory in MN to the Diamond Factory in Ontario was an eye opener. 540 NM, 2:40 enroute (takeoff to landing), climbs to 14.5K, autopilot off (simply because the hand-flying was SO sweet), was an eye-opener... if there is a more mature and accomplished S/E GA Piston transport, we have yet to fly it. 

Nominee: Columbia Aircraft Columbia 400. T'aint nothing faster. T'aint much that can even compare and the increasing maturity of both the aircraft and the company is impressive. If they ever pressurize this airplane (for a reasonable price), this company may be unbeatable.

Nominee: Diamond DA42. Finally... a light twin that meets the potential that this industry desperately needs... and with strong technological improvements in the three critical categories intrinsic to our birds... Airframe, Avionics and Powerplant. No aircraft boasts as much technological sophistication and for a first outing, the bird is strikingly complete. We are very impressed.

Nominee: Piper Aircraft Meridian. Wow... Piper's hot-rod is a real workhorse. The new Three-screen Avidyne panel is beautifully designed, the bird handles beautifully and squirts along REALLY fast... but darned if it doesn't slow down REALLY well, to boot. In the midst of a swarm of birds (we were behind a Pacer for quite the while, fer God's sake...) trying to crowd into Oshkosh one evening after the airshow, our respect for the Meridian was drastically upgraded... what a great flying airplane.

I Gotta Get Me One Of These

Columbia Aircraft Climate Control System: Remember when you had to sweat through those first 10-20 minutes of a summer start-up, run-up and taxi before takeoff... remember when a "Hold Short" command was pure torture on a hot August day? Well, Columbia's exquisitely engineered CCS is rocking new owners' worlds ... in a VERY cool way. Reports are ecstatic. Flight test upcoming.

Best Construction

Neal Obert's Griffon Lionheart: This aircraft featured impeccable workmanship and nifty features like aerodynamic upgrades and -- is this the future of all long-nosed taildraggers? -- taxiing cameras. Neal designed his own printed circuit boards for his onboard electronics. Unfortunately, this, and two other Lionhearts nearing completion by their builders are the end of the line (Aero-News will tell you why in an upcoming feature). (Kevin O'Brien)

Best Panel

No contest -- Piper/Avidyne Meridian: Among certified birds, there is no panel with this kind of capability, usability and system maturity... though the coming advent of the VLJs and the attendant trickle-down, will spice things up next year, to be sure. (Jim Campbell, ANN E-I-C; Staff)

Best Upgrade

Cirrus Adoption of TAWS As Standard Equipment: Too many of the Oshkosh press releases are simple opportunities for cheap advertising, with some slight news value, but Cirrus' announcement that they were incorporating TAWS as STANDARD equipment on all their new birds was setting the bar WAY high... from the company that has been setting the bar, pretty much, for the GA biz for several years now. We are impressed. (Jim Campbell, ANN E-I-C; Staff)
Runner(s)-Up: Diamond's receiving FAA TCs for the DA42 Twinstar... a long time coming.

Funkiest Aircraft

The Samara Elitar-Sigma from Russia. It not only has an awkward name, but a very strange look ("if it's weird it's Russian," isn't that how the old saw goes?). But the more you look at it, the better it looks. It's funky in a positive way; a lot of the detail design was really interesting. It has a BRS firing through one of the back windows.
Runner(s)-Up: Barr 6. I was fascinated by the Barr Six, which redefines high performance as carrying a ridiculous amount of stuff or six large people at an impressive speed -- and does it by a combination of aerodynamic ingenuity, and brute force. Unfortunately the prototype experienced a fire enroute home from Oshkosh -- no one was injured, but extent of the damage is unknown at this time.
Runner-up: Larry Neal's Super Sky Cycle. First seen with the new jump-takeoff rotor system at Airventure, it has flown but not in this configuration. I gotta get me one of these, but first I gotta move to a state with some personal freedom -- it would never get past our Registry of Motor Vehicles here in the People's Republic of Massachusetts. (Kevin O'Brien)

Best Warbird

Don Rhynalds’ HU-16 Albatross N226GR. Unusual, historic, amazing work.

Best Display Aircraft

Dornier Do-24 ATT: An imposing presence to say the least, this 1930s vintage amphibian, updated with three PT-6 turboprops centrally mounted on the high wing, manages to look both anachronistic and futuristic at once. Squint at it long enough, and it starts to look a bit like a Klingon "bird-of-prey" from "Star Trek." Way cool.
Seeing (and hearing) the Dornier fly 30 feet overhead while on short final for 27 on that first Sunday - while Mike and I were driving back from the Sonex factory - was a properly awe-inspiring introduction for me to Oshkosh. I only wish my camera would have worked!!! (Rob Finfrock)
Runner(s)-Up: Glacier Girl. What an extraordinary piece of history... with an amazing restoration story to go with it.

Best Restoration

A rare "polished" Comanche 400: Rich Mascari, Iowa City, Iowa's N64400. This bird takes the blue ribbon. Although it isn't exactly "restored" -- nothing ever left Lock Haven looking this good. I wonder if all that polishing makes it go even faster?
Runners-up: Staggerwing Row. There was a whole row of Beech Staggerwings, some of them painted in incredibly attractive colors that I hadn't seen combined on an airplane before. (Kevin O'Brien)

Best Research Aircraft

Hondajet: New engines, new think laminar flow wing section, new engine mount location, and a 3d laminar flow forward fuselage give this plane a claimed 40% increase in efficient and 30% increase in interior volume. (Chris Armstrong)

Hottest Prospect (not yet evaluated)

Innodyn (Formerly ATP) Turbine: Is this thing going to be the revolution it promises to be in the experimental market? Or is it going to suffer from the kind of tough luck that turbine conversions have generally done? It has roots as an APU, and APUs are designed for duty cycles totally unlike aircraft power turbines -- but that's probably why the Innodyn people went back to the drawing board. Is the light-experimental world ready for an engine that burns more of a cheaper fuel (31 cents a gallon cheaper at my FBO as of yesterday, or about eight percent)? And what's it going to FLY like? (Kevin O'Brien)

Best Airshow Performance

No Award Possible: In honor of our dear friend Jimmy Franklin and his able cohort, Bobby Younkin, (both lost in a tragic airshow accident just days earlier) we feel that awarding a "best" performance is a fruitless endeavor... believe us, if they'd been at Oshkosh, they'd have given us a helluva show. Godspeed, guys!
Runner(s)-Up: Aeroshell Aerobatic team. Great noises. Great Flying. Great birds.
Runner(s)-Up: Sean Tucker. Aviation's wildman still wows the crowds wherever he goes... but he's never better than when he's flying over Oshkosh.

To Be Continued...

FMI: Comments? Complaints? Additions? Let us have it!