Light Aircraft Design for Swift Aircraft

Swift Aircraft was founded in 2007 with bold ideas to revitalise the British Aviation industry and a promise to design and manufacture, wholly in the UK, a brand new certified aircraft – the first to be certified in Great Britain for over two decades.

The company is now in the late stages of designing a series of CS-VLA and CS-23 composite aircraft, with a unique modern design and admirable preliminary specifications.

The Swift Range, developed on a single platform, will initially include the Swift VLA which will be available as a Kit Plane, certified to CS-VLA and also be LSA Compliant. The Swift II, which will be certified to CS-23 will follow these. The aircraft has been designed for private pilots and for flight training, including Military Elementary Flight training and Private Pilot Licence (PPL) training.

Optima’s services were sought by Swift Aircraft in order to help in the design of a proposed aircraft, the Swift CS-VLA. Due to the demanding nature of the development of highly advanced control surfaces and airframe structures, Optima were engaged to partake in specialised A-surface and mechanical system development.

Utilising Creo 3D and its powerful integrated analysis tools for subsequent computational modelling, Optima assisted in perfecting the efficient surface forms and allowed prototyping to advance to a late stage development phase. The Swift’s Elliptical carbon fibre wing construction and glass fibre fuselage uses compound curves that are beneficial to both aerodynamics and aesthetics. The result is a unique, striking and highly proficient flight-trainer for both Military and Private Licence Certification.