It was great seeing you at Oshkosh 2026

Thank you to the (over) 400 folks that stopped by to chat with us.

About the program

Although most of the work highlighted on our site is about the plane, our program is really about our genset and electrical system.

To be sure, the plane is cool, but its primary purpose is as a test bed and showcase for the genny and various downstream components, such as the AC/DC rectifier and our motor controllers.

The plane itself is very likely to be 1 of 1 ever built. Thus the PRODUCTS for sale will be the generator and electrical components.

 Program Goals

• Light weight, high power electric generator capable of powering full time electric flight

• Good cross-country range & useful load

• Distributed electric thrust to yield a blown wing

• Outstanding field of view

About the plane

• The plane will gross around 1,900 pounds (861kg), with an empty weight of approximately 1,100 pounds (499kg).

• It is powered by a gasoline-fueled genset located aft of the cockpit.

• We are designing for a range of 500+ nautical miles (926km). We got into aviation to go places, not fly around the pattern. We are quite confident we can hit the 500nm goal, it’s more a question of how far we can go beyond that.

• The plane does have an onboard battery capable of providing power for flight. This is a purely backup power source and is not charged or used in normal flight. Other folks in the industry have referred to this approach as an “electric parachute” and it’s a good description. If the genset fails the plane will have enough battery for full power climb for 6 minutes, or to sustain level flight for ≈17 minutes, or extend a glide until touchdown.

• The plane has a circular frontal cross section. We did this for several reasons. Firstly it allows us to keep the molds very simple—there are only two large molds, one for the fuselage and one for the nose bowl. Secondly the circular cross section gives us a very large internal volume while still having an extremely efficient shape.

• By using distributed electric thrust (which is the engineering term for “lots of smaller props all over the place”) we get to use a blown wing. A blown wing is an approach wherein the air flowing over the wing is powered rather than varying with the forward motion of the plane. This allows the designer to use a wing that is smaller than typically seen and therefore greatly reduce drag. A little more about this here.

Images

Frequently Asked Question

Q: Developing an electric aircraft of this size, complexity, and performance, is a challenging proposition. Do you, SkyLab, know what you’re doing?

A: Righty tighty, lefty loosey.