Reliable Steering for the Dream of Easy, Safe Personal Flying
Volz servos operate Skytron’s control surfaces and throttle valve: Flying your own airplane is an icon of freedom — but it’s also complex, expensive, and tied to long, intense training.
Skytron wants to change that: the company is building an entirely new class of aircraft for the next generation of pilots, with radically simplified, intuitive controls and smart automation that keeps things safe in the background, including automatic takeoff, navigation, and landing.
And we’re right in the middle of it.
A few years back, we supported a student project at California Polytechnic State University with some of our actuators. One of those students later joined Skytron — and remembered how well our servos had performed. “This is one case where our research sponsorship has paid off,” says our Chief Commercial Officer Felix Thun. “People already had confidence in our actuators.”
Today, nine of our DA 58-D servos — the most powerful duplex actuators in our lineup — handle the aircraft’s entire flight control system: elevators, ailerons, and rudders. For engine control, we supply a fully integrated throttle actuation solution for the Rotax 912, 915, and 916 engine series, combining the DA 15-T servo with the Rotax throttle body. “The solution is tailored to the Rotax throttle architecture,” Felix puts it. “It enables fly-by-wire throttle control, reduces integration effort for the aircraft manufacturer, and offers a compact, robust setup designed to support reliable engine operation.”
Skytron’s Flight Control Computer runs hundreds of calculations per second to keep the airplane stable. Again Felix: “This is the basis of fly-by-wire, But then you need actuators like our DA 58-D that can reliably keep up, translating the required movements to the control surfaces.” Our actuators’ redundant, two-channel design — duplicated motors, electronics, and power supply — keeps things running even if one channel fails.
“Volz has been an outstanding engineering partner throughout our aircraft development program”, says Skytron founder Greg Mercer. “Their responsive, hands-on support and proven actuation technology have been instrumental in helping us move quickly from concept to flight-ready integration.” On what makes the aircraft special, Mercer adds: “Flying this airplane is going to be pure joy: grab the stick, tell the airplane where you want to go, and get a crisp, spontaneous, speedy response. At the same time, our airplane will not let you do anything unsafe.”
