Midwest Hornet


The Midwest Hornet is an American autogyro that was designed by Don Shoebridge and made available by Midwest Engineering & Design in the form of free plans for amateur construction.
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Design and development

The Hornet is a development of the Taggart GyroBee and was introduced in 1997. The Hornet was designed to comply with the US FAR 103 Ultralight Vehicles rules, including the category's maximum empty weight of. The aircraft has a standard empty weight of. It features a single main rotor, a single-seat, open cockpit without a windshield, tricycle landing gear and a twin cylinder, air-cooled, two-stroke, single-ignition Rotax 447 engine in pusher configuration. The Rotax 503 engine can also be fitted.
The aircraft fuselage is made from bolted-together aluminum tubing, while the landing gear and flight controls are fabricated from 4130 steel. The rotor has a diameter of, while the propeller recommended is a Powerfin composite model with a diameter of. With an empty weight of and a gross weight of the design offers a useful load of. Without a pre-rotator fitted the Hornet requires to become airborne.