Dornier Seastar – Push–Pull Boat! Review, History and Specs

if you've watched our historical series before you've probably heard of planes whose production spans over 20 30 or even 50 years but sadly there are many that never progress beyond the Prototype stage and it's not always because they're experimental sometimes even a well-designed project doesn't secure the necessary funding or support when this happens the best these aircraft can hope for is to be displayed in a museum or preserved in a private collection with a faint hope that their Innovations might be used in future projects the story of today's plane is somewhat sad as this bird didn't receive the appreciation and recognition it deserved but don't you worry this is a story with a happy ending welcome to big metal birds and in today's video we explore the beauty of German engineering D near sear of course building a plane is a resource heavy task I mean financially technically and legally it's very demanding but this bird probably holds the record for the number of production challenges it faced The Story begins with dorier aircraft the famous German aircraft manufacturer that designed and built the dorier do X if you're not familiar with this Flying Fortress let me just mention that it had 12 engines was 130 ft long and its max weight was 56 tons this blew my mind when I was researching dorier sadly this project didn't last long and while dorier made a few great military Birds during World War II after its end dorier had rough times and was forced to focus on smaller general aviation unfortunately Claudius dorier the owner of dorier passed away but his son Claudius dorier Jr continued his business establishing two new companies Claudius dorier aircraft and dorier composite aircraft in the late 1960s technically it was just a matter of legal paperwork as dorier was still manufacturing the d27 and do28 in the late 1970s Claudia's son conrado entered the aviation scene the young engineer proposed a concept of a utility C plane which was warmly welcomed by his father but the company couldn't afford new Endeavors and dorier aircraft was just on the edge of bankruptcy at that time then conrado founded his own company dorier sea wings and began working on the first prototype the proof of concept plane first took to the skies on August 17th 1984 from Hamburg after its first successful flight the work began on a second prototype which was closer to the original design larger and made from Composite Materials this led to its first flight on April 24th 1987 from a place named OB faenov the fullscale development of the project was completed in 1991 by that time three aircraft had been produced and the sea star got its airworthiness certificate in Europe and the US however a lack of funding and interest from potential buyers halted the production or to be fair serial production didn't even start as dorier hadn't received a single order yet if this were any other aircraft we might roll the outro as its fate seemed sealed but as we all know the sea star didn't give up so easily after failing to fund the production themselves sea Wings started a source partnership around the world in 1993 dorier sea star and a Consortium of Malaysian investors signed an agreement to create a joint venture with an assembly of the sea star plant to take place at a factory in Malaysia however in July 1995 the Malay asan branch of dorier announced that it would be closed until further notice due to a lack of capital investment it was reported that investors had concerns about the Project's Technical and financial viability such as obtaining internationally recognized certification for production in Malaysia and once again history nearly repeated itself however Doria remained optimistic by the time of the closure all the manufacturing tools molds and fixtures needed for the air aircraft's production had already been moved to Penang Malaysia along with a prototype aircraft for sales demonstrations at subang airport in sangor because of that dorier continued to focus on Asian market but was also considering relocating production to another country the search for partners was complicated by rumors that an additional hundred million us was needed to complete the aircraft's development dorier denied these rumors a few times and to me it sounds like an absurdly large amount for nearly completed design right anyhow in 1998 dorier announced a partnership with Hindustan Aeronautics as there was a possibility for using sea star in the Indian market as a utility aircraft but once again it all halted in 2003 one of the prototypes was rebuilt and dorier announced that despite all the financial difficulties they were facing for the last 10 years they are evaluating potential production sites in Europe and Asia aiming to begin the long awaited serial production awaited by who you may ask well the research showed a global interest in 250 sea stars over the next 10 years Additionally the company would offer three different variants of the aircraft each aimed at different market segments an observation aircraft variant for the military a 12 seat Regional airliner designed for Charter operators and a six-seat configuration suitable for VIP clients but as you might expect it was a flop once again no sea stars were built in 2004 2005 and so on up until 2009 when dorier finally made an official statement remember the rumored $100 million funding well yeah the company officially proved those were rumors because now they were seeking 150 million to begin production inflation you know later they announced it was a mistake and they needed just 65 anyhow two years passed by and no plane had been built in 2013 sear was acquired by wuky Communications from China but the facilities remained in Germany with plans to build another one in China 3 years later still no plane but another announcement fuselage will be made by Diamond yeah sounds cool but dorier enough announcements where's the plane and Fin finally in 2018 the Chinese company invested $150 million and in March 2020 the first sea star made it to the skies what a turbulent story now let's check this bird closer and see if it was worth all the hassle as you already know sea star is a flying boat with a high mount of parasol Wing traditionally for sea planes sea star's fuselage is made of composits which are resistant to corrosion and less prone to leaks when compared to rivet and metal unlike typical floats which are often found on variants of planes that initially weren't intended to land on water the sea star has sponson that also serve as fuel tanks storing 363 gallons inside and giving the sea star an even lower center of gravity besides adding stability on water and eliminating the need for wing tip floats they also house landing gear when the plane is on water or in the sky in terms of power it's equipped with a pair of Pratt and Whitney Canada pt6a engines mounted in a single Nel above the wings in a pushpull configuration its overall layout somewhat resembles the Innovative of its time dorier do J Wall from 1924 and also its direct successor the larger dorier doe 18 from the 1930s the central location of both engines allows their weight to more effectively reduce any induced rolling movements and it also protects the engines from water spray reducing corrosion and eliminating asymmetric thrust two engines were necessary for this bird as it's quite a big one 42 ft in length with a wingspan of 58 its max weight is 10,000 lb while the empty weight is just 6,000 each of the two Pratt and Whitney pt6 A's generates 650 horsepower and is equipped with five-bladed mcau prop the front once slightly bigger than the rear one this allows sear to cruise at 160 knots while its Max is at 180 knots of course a pair of PT 6s is not the most environmentally friendly solution and it needs a lot of fuel so the estimated max range is around 900 nautical miles unfortunately I didn't find any exact numbers or anyone selling sea star but Market researchers estimate the price of around 7 million what a story Sear truly holds the record of challenges the plane would overcome to finally enter production at least from those that we reviewed anyhow you're welcomed to share your own opinion about this bird in the comment section below if you enjoyed this video please don't forget to like And subscribe to our channel for more fascinating stories from above the clouds fly safe and until next time

Channel: Big Metal Birds

Views: 16,635

Keywords: aviation, avgeek, general aviation

Id: CV5KkNq8zAk

Length: 9min 54sec (594 seconds)

Published: Tue Jun 25 2024