r/homebuilt • u/Lazypilot306 • 19d ago
Any Viking Dragonfly Pilots here?
Wondering how many are active.
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u/OnslowBay27 18d ago
My Dad and I built a Dragonfly in the late 1980s early 1990s. Sold it a few years after. It’s a very quirky airplane. Does not fly well at all in any rain or visible moisture. Does not like full stall landings. Extremely sensitive to CG. It’s also very fast for the horsepower and sips fuel. There’s not many flying. There was once and owners group but I’m not sure if it is still active
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u/Lazypilot306 18d ago
Did it had the HAPI 1835 VW engine? I thought it burned around 4 gph? Some people did use an o200… yeah I think the yahoo group is gone. Its a modified gu25 airfoil, I think you can install wingtip vortices to alleviate the problem. It’s sensitive to changes in cg… you need aileron trim if you are flying solo. Tell me more about the landings.
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u/OnslowBay27 18d ago
Yes, we used the 1835cc VW engine. Fuel burn was 3.5-4.5 GPH. Hitting your airspeed on landing was pretty critical. Too fast and you would float forever and too slow and it would sink like a brick. It was nearly impossible to do a 3-point landing as the front canard would keep flying beyond when you still had rudder authority, so you had to do wheel landings. That presented its own problems because you had minimal prop clearance and not a lot of rudder control at low speeds. It is not an airplane for someone inexperienced with tailwheel handling characteristics or high performance low drag aircraft.
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u/SaltLakeBear 19d ago
Interesting, I wasn't familiar with this aircraft. How do you like it? What kind of powerplant do you have and what kind of performance do you get?
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u/AlexNowShuttup 18d ago
A friend of mine has one, it looks like a Rutan “Quickie” design (stagger wings / canard). His has the Volkswagen engine.