James Labouchere, Managing Director, Warrior Aero-Marine

James Labouchere has a dream. His company, Warrior Aero-Marine, hopes to revolutionize marine aviation with its Centaur seaplane. That's more than some PR drivel. The aircraft, with folding wings and a multi-hull design, could well be an everyman's aircraft. It will operate from sea bases as well as land-based facilities.

ANN asked 20 questions of Mr. Labouchere. Without editing (well, we did spell-check), here are the answers:

1. Aero-News: The Centaur is a unique, multi-hulled seaplane. What advantages does that afford a pilot?

James Labouchere (right): The hull form is derived from slender-hulled yachts and cuts waves and rides rough water with low shock-loading. This improves the whole deal for a pilot - better ride quality and a wider range of wave conditions in which a pilot can operate both safely and reliably.

2. Aero-News: Do you foresee the Centaur as being at the forefront of a revolution in marine aviation?

James Labouchere: Yes. In making aviation entirely compatible with the marine sector, a major expansion in the application for aviation is inevitable.

3. Aero-News: What price points do you hope to hit with the Centaur?

James Labouchere: Current purchase contracts tie us to $550k for a basic amphibious aircraft. This prices capacity competitively, but for it you get lower operating cost and many new types of destination to access.

4. Aero-News: What options will be available and at what cost?

James Labouchere: Options include 350hp (turbo), hydraulic wing-fold, electric or combustion-engine for auxiliary drive (used for low-speed maneuvering in marinas etc), and the usual options on navigation, communication and interior. Options and their prices are not all defined yet but we are making commitments in relation to their costs.

5. Aero-News: What sort of design challenges do you face on this project?

James Labouchere: I think there are twice as many design considerations in an amphibious aircraft than a land plane, which makes it four times as difficult to design. Challenging us still further, we have set high target specifications in terms of function, accommodation and practical operating needs. The configuration now melds very nicely, but we are still up against detail. The undercarriage and doors have taken at least four times as long to define than we expected, there being many failure modes and cases driving the design of a fail-safe concept that can be driven up beaches, bumped into floating debris, pressed down into the water even when taxiing on water at moderate speed. . . . this is difficult iterative design.

6. Aero-News: How did you hit upon your ideas for the aircraft?

James Labouchere: They come from engineering and sailing racing yachts. I have been out in rough water in fast multi hulls yacht, 'flying' hulls and touching on speeds that an aircraft needs to take-off. These circumstances are much the same as a seaplane at the point of take-off, but yachts do it in a far wider range of conditions and usually with very docile handling. Hence, in ignorance of conventional texts on seaplane hull design, we found ourselves taking an original approach. The first round of comparative tests showed up the potential of major advantages, and development began.

7. Aero-News: Does the multi-hull concept detract in any way from the Centaur’s performance in the air?

James Labouchere: The stub-wings and sponsons pay a slight penalty in terms of cruise speed, but these serve a multitude of other purposes in housing fuel and landing gear, lifting hard in ground-effect and providing an on-water platform. These advantages allow a tidier fuselage which in turn tends to recover any penalty. Greater than this, the main hull is aerodynamically cleaner and lighter to engineer, which reflect on cruise and payload.

8. Aero-News: What sort of performance will pilots derive from the Centaur?

James Labouchere: We could have competed for top speed if we wanted and may some day, but as long as the Centaur can compete reasonably amongst existing land planes, speed is secondary to essential functions. We have an airplane that will reliably deliver greater load, further, safer and at lower cost to more types of destination than any equivalent aircraft. With maximum load, the acceleration, take-off distance and climb will be conventional. Loaded with the maximum that a conventional 300hp amphib can take (light in respect of the Centaur's capacity), it should out-perform everything equivalent in terms of take-off performance.

9. Aero-News: How cost-effective do you believe this aircraft will be to operate?

James Labouchere: The short airframe lives and intensive maintenance schedules of metal seaplanes in salt water generally prevent their application - especially in the tropics. With the use of composite structure identical to high-specification yachts and with wing-fold enabling the Centaur to use ordinary boat docks and marinas (as opposed to high-cost specialist facilities), fundamental cost advantages are achieved. These accumulate with greater capacity per horse-power to suggest that 20% to 40% reductions in cost of ownership and life-cycled cost-per-seat-mile may be typical.

10. Aero-News: As with most aviation projects – especially those that involve revolutionary concepts, such as the Centaur – you have to convince people that the idea is sound. How has that process gone for Warrior?

James Labouchere: Good question and yes, it has been a struggle. We have used every analytical method available, copied the development procedures used by the big seaplane developers of past (Saunders-Roe and Lockheed Martin particularly), used the best qualifications and obtained the most professional market assessment. Thus our level of technical and commercial confidence could not be higher. This is not enough for most financiers or customers. Fortunately, the few that put aside time to read our information, that ask questions and that do not draw judgments from negative experience in the over saturated land plane arena, become converts and invest. We owe these few investors everything, and I believe that we are going to please them well.

11. Aero-News: Saltwater is, of course, terribly corrosive. How will the Centaur grapple with that?

James Labouchere: Both becoming more favorable in respect of cost, we have the use of titanium and fiber-reinforced plastics to remove the problems with short lives and intensive maintenance schedules associated with aluminum in saltwater. These will leave the powerplant and some systems as the maintenance issues. Much can be done with conventional marine engineering principles and the powerplant can easily be maintained within other inspection/maintenance cycles. We are helped by the fact that the Centaur generates much less spray than conventional hulls and this passes below the propeller arc when tracking straight.

12. Aero-News: Another unique concept in the Centaur is the hydraulically powered folding wings. What advantage does this feature offer to pilots/owners?

James Labouchere: Seaplanes can generally not access coastal marinas and boat docks. They thus can not be protected from waves or weather, and only in exceptional circumstance can they be re-fuelled and loaded in populated waterside areas. The Centaur can approach any marina and any dockside just as any other boat, with wings folded and using a small auxiliary thruster engineered into the stern and controlled from the cockpit. This gives it easy access to at least five times as many coastal facilities than any equivalent seaplane.

13. Aero-News: What is your timetable for bringing the Centaur to market?

James Labouchere: We can not fix a schedule yet as it is sensitive to funding and partnering. We expect to have the Centaur Certified and in rate production within two years from being fully resourced.

14. Aero-News: What segment of aviation do you plan to address with this revolutionary aircraft?

James Labouchere: The Centaur's content is similar to the most popular categories of privately operated land plane. However, it has the capacity and economics to work hard for a living amongst much bigger machines. Hence, we have a wide range of markets, from personal/family transport to Part 135 taxi operators and other service providers. Much purchase interest has come from Bonanza and Bell 206 owners in addition to frustrated seaplane owners.

15. Aero-News: What do you see as your biggest challenge in bringing the Centaur to market?

James Labouchere: The one that we most want done and dusted is the financing and partnering. Provided you do not hang your hat on an unproven engineering technology, Certification once reasonably resourced can be achieved quite reliably, as others will support.

16. Aero-News: The aviation industry is largely depressed right now, yet you continue moving toward bringing the Centaur to market. Why now?

James Labouchere: The industry is depressed because new land planes achieve less practical purpose than most 1950's aircraft, being more constrained than ever to prepared runways and thus a diminishing 'box'. Speed is not important, because the average private pilot in the US flies less than 40 hours a year!The market needs a product that is compatible with spouse, family, other outdoor activities, summer holidays and both urban and remote destinations. Water is the biggest common factor amongst these, whether boating, fishing, lounging on a beach or making a business meeting or shopping trip to town-center. We have a product which will do this in addition to everything a land plane does. Our reason for existing is the very same reason that mainstream aviation is depressed.

17. Aero-News: How do you plan to manufacture and support the market?

James Labouchere: We intend to supply the Americas from the USA and both Europe and Asia from the UK, using supply chains as sought by partner companies for original components. Manufacture will be carried out in subassemblies for a low-time final assembly and for ease of repair/replacement. We fully appreciate the importance of market support and we are thus engineering with standard systems to make it easier. We expect to have a go-anywhere 'ambulance' team to fix any other problem in a hurry until we have built up regional expertise.

18. Aero-News: Do you foresee a difference in the needs of marine aviation markets in the US and Europe?

James Labouchere: No. Identical boats and aircraft succeed well both sides of the pond and we are all up against exactly the same kind of waves and practical issues.

19. Aero-News: Which domestic or international market do you expect will become the focus of your business?

James Labouchere: North America is the immediate focus as it is most accountable and has a large practiced and educated aircraft-operating population. We have also been well supported in Maine, where the company is registered. Global markets are potentially just as great, but these must follow as business expansion allows.

20. Aero-News: What is the regulatory atmosphere surrounding the Centaur?

James Labouchere: All design work has been carried out with FAR part 23 in the right hand of all our engineers, many of whom have lived a life Certifying more demanding aircraft than the Centaur. There will be some negotiation on details, particularly the automation of the wing-fold and lock.

FMI: www.centaurseaplane.com