The ARV Super2 (Air Recreational Vehicle) is a British two-seat light aircraft with strut-braced shoulder wings and tricycle landing gear. Designed by Bruce Giddings, the Super2 was available either factory-built or as a kit. It was intended to be both a cost-effective trainer and an affordable aircraft for private owners. Later called the "Opus", it gained US FAA Light-Sport Aircraft approval in February 2008. While it looks almost identical to the Bolkow Junior and SAAB Safari, the dimensions, performance and powerplant are different. The SAAB's tailplane is also mounted higher on the fin. About 35 aircraft were produced in the 1980s before the Isle of Wight-based company went into liquidation. Subsequently, there have been a number of attempts to restart production, all unsuccessful, of which the most recent was by Opus Aircraft. In November 2013, Opus Aircraft announced that its assets had been auctioned off successfully, adding: "We hope to see our plans continued and to see the all-aluminum plane flying by 2015." Since 2015, little has been heard of the ARV and no resumption of production has occurred. Richard Noble, the world 1983 land speed record holder and UK entrepreneur, identified a gap in the market for a low-cost lightweight two-seat trainer, after expensive product-liability lawsuits in the USA had driven the major American general aviation manufacturers temporarily to abandon production of such aircraft. Noble established a factory at Sandown on the Isle of Wight to build the ARV Super2 aircraft, with the first prototype flying on 11 March 1985. The factory used some novel manufacturing techniques, including British ALCAN's "Supral" (a superplastic aluminium alloy), adhesives (to reduce the number of rivets and thereby save weight), and a bespoke new British engine, the Hewland AE75. These innovations gave the ARV an empty weight 40% lower than the Cessna 152, making the Super2 both cheaper to buy and to operate. The manufacturer claimed it could reduce pilot training costs by 25%. The ARV Super2 is a side-by-side configuration two-seater with a shoulder wing for improved visibility. The wing is swept forward 5° to maintain correct centre of gravity balance. The wing area is a small 92 sq ft (8.5 m2), giving a wing loading of 11.9 lb/ft2 (58.1 kg/m2). The forward sweep may also promote a spanwise airflow inwards towards the root, thereby reducing the likelihood of a wingtip stall. The ARV's tapered fibreglass wingtips help to reduce drag from wingtip vortices. For more details of the development, design, manufacturing and operational history, click here.
