Aircraft distributor SportairUSA is bringing a new LSA option to the American market, and an aerobatic one at that. On Tuesday at EAA AirVenture the company unveiled a prototype of the aircraft, which is a single-seat, 130 horsepower aerobatic LSA known as the Snap.
The Snap is a low-wing taildragger manufactured in Italy by Dallair Aeronautica. The aircraft runs on an electronic fuel injection engine based on the Rotax 900 series and built by EPApower, a company, also based in Italy, known for its production of Audi racing engines.
With a steel-tubed airframe and carbon-fiber fuselage, the Snap has a basic empty weight of 628 pounds. The aircraft tops out at a Vne speed of 180 knots and rolls at a rate greater than 300 degrees per second.
The Snap prototype unveiled on Tuesday has logged approximately 30 flight hours and will be taken to a variety of aerobatic events throughout the remainder of the year.
According to Sportair, the American marketer and seller of the Snap, the airplane could be available in the United States as early as the beginning of next year. Company officials said the Snap will be certifiable as an experimental-exhibition aircraft or a special or experimental light sport aircraft.
The estimated cost of the airplane is currently set at $150,000.
