Windecker Industries

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Windecker Industries was a USA aircraft manufacturer originally founded in 1962 as Windecker Research in Midland, Texas. It was the first company to produce and market powered aircraft built predominantly of composite materials (in this case, foam and fiberglass). The company was founded by Leo Windecker, a dentist from Lake Jackson, Texas.

[edit] History

Initial tests of composite wings on conventional airplane bodies proved promising, so the company built an experimental prototype of all-composite aircraft, the Windecker ACX-7 Eagle. Designed by Dr. Leo Windecker and his wife, Dr. Fairfax Windecker (also a dentist), the aircraft was molded from a unidirectional fiberglass called Fibaloy. The fuselage was made in two halves in full-size female molds and joined like a model kit; the wings were full core foam around a tubular spar fuel tank, with wing skins formed in full-size female molds. The first prototype, constructed in the Midland factory, flew in October 1967.

The certification Eagle prototype, incorporating retractable landing gear, crashed during spin testing for certification by the US Federal Aviation Administration. After a redesign of the empennage, the Eagle AC-7 became the first composite aircraft to receive FAA certification, in December of 1969. (A number of composite sailplane designs had been certified by foreign authorities, however.) Windecker went on to produce six civilian Eagles in the early 1970s.

Composite aircraft construction had a ready military application, because composites are nearly invisible to conventional radar systems. A test of a Windecker Eagle against an Air Force radar system, for instance, registered only the engine and the landing gear, not the composite body. Windecker built Eagle 9 under contract to DARPA, incorporating numerous modifications to reduce its radar detectability, and delivered it, as the YE-5, to the Air Force who tested secretly for five years at Eglin AFB, Florida.

Windecker Industries continued with military contracts, designing and building the US Air Force Aequare remotely-piloted vehicle (now called UAVs) for Lockheed Missiles and Space Company.

Due to slow sales and daunting prospects for future sales, the owners of Windecker Industries closed the company in 1975. The future Windecker Eagle had been touted as coming out faster and lighter than existing high-performance general-aviation aircraft such as the Beech Bonanza and Cessna 210, but the actual aircraft was heavier than either competitor, and was no faster than the 210, and a full 10 mph slower (top speed at altitude) than the Beechcraft product. These disappointing performance results, along with a premium sales price, made it impossible to sustain the desired business model. Windecker engineers blamed the overweight result on the FAA's reluctance to accept the new construction method without high safety factors, citing the possibility of imperfections and bonding gaps within the composite materials. The disappointing speed result was due to high expectations for the smooth-surfaced composite construction. The Eagle's exterior surfaces were smooth, but the overall shape had not been comprehensively analyzed in wind-tunnel or computer analyses before being committed to production, so it was no improvement over existing shapes. In addition, the wing aspect ratio was no better than the competitors' wings, and its upper wing surfaces were prone to wrinkling under loads, which negated the desired smoothness increases.

A company restart attempt was made in 1977 by Jerry Dietrick, who bought the rights and tooling, but no more aircraft were constructed.

Leo Windecker received twenty-two patents for all aspects of composite aircraft construction, all of which were assigned to the Dow Chemical Company, which funded the research. This technology was licensed to other firms such as Lockheed Martin, Northrop and the De Lorean Motor Company. In 2003, Leo Windecker was inducted into the Texas Aviation Hall of Fame, and he has been nominated for the National Aviation Hall of Fame. Windecker Eagle 7 was donated to the National Air and Space Museum in 1985; it waits in storage, although it is planned to be put on display in the museum's new facility at the Dulles Airport. Leo Windecker's Eagle, No. 5, is on display in the Lake Jackson Historical Society Museum in Lake Jackson, Texas. The YE-5 Stealth prototype is in the Army Aviation Museum at Ft. Rucker, AL.

[edit] References

• Burmeier, Beverly. "Plastic Fantastic." The History Channel Magazine, September/October, 2005, pp. 22-23.
• "The Eagle Returns", Private Pilot Magazine, Sept. 1978.