​For Airhart Avionics, It’s Flying Simplified

When you think about the future of flight, it’s easy to conjure images of flying cars and electric aircraft darkening the skies. Yet we rarely see massive quantum leaps in aviation. Instead, improvements are usually eked out in small incremental ways.  

But every few decades there’s a profound change that reshapes the general aviation landscape. Examples are the advent of GPS and whole airframe parachutes in the 1990s and glass cockpits in the early 2000s.

Now, in a small hangar in Long Beach, California, the next big leap forward may be taking shape at Airhart Aeronautics. 

This Article First Appeared in FLYING Magazine

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When I flew to Long Beach to visit the company, I thought I’d be writing about the design of a new small airplane with safety features to reduce accidents. What I found was that the firm pivoted in the past year.

While it still plans to eventually design and sell its own cutting-edge aircraft, in the near term it’s selling a revolutionary avionics system that can be installed in any experimental light sport aircraft (E-LSA) or MOSAIC-category aircraft. The idea is to make airplanes safer and easier to fly by improving the pilot-machine interface first, rather than waiting for an all-new airframe. 

The Vision

Airhart’s long-term goal remains the same: Design and sell its own clean-sheet, personal aircraft. But the company’s path to getting there now has three distinct phases. When I asked founder and CEO Nikita Ermoshkin what prompted him to start the company, he pointed to getting his private certificate in 2020. Ermoshkin worked at SpaceX at that time and flew out of Hawthorne Municipal Airport (KHHR) in California.

• READ MORE: Airhart Is Bringing the Future of the Cockpit to Oshkosh
• READ MORE: A Look at the First ‘Context-Aware’ Avionics Platform for GA

“That’s really when I started thinking about all this, because that whole experience of learning how to fly really was like a double-edged sword for me,” Ermoshkin said. “I loved what I could do with flying a plane. I love being able to go see my friends up in the Bay Area or take friends on a day trip to the Grand Canyon.

“But the amount of effort it took to fly, combined with the level of risk that we take on by flying, it just didn’t sit right with me. So, I was like, ‘All right, that’s the problem I want to fix.’ I want to make airplanes safer and more accessible, and I want more people to be able to fly, and I want everyone to be able to do it safer than driving a car.”

To achieve that vision, Airhart realized that it first needed the avionics that would go into its new airplane and that they could stand on their own as a product. 

I initially wondered whether the system was still more concept than reality. But company officials told me that the first customer installation is well underway, and the aircraft will be on display at the Airhart Aeronautics booth at Oshkosh.

Phase 1: Airhart Avionics

To view the new Phase 1 avionics, I climbed into Airhart’s flying test bed, a red Sling TSi, which is a four-seat, single-engine, low-wing homebuilt aircraft.

Company president Nate Thuli sat beside me and talked me through the system. Its core is two separate 14-inch displays mounted side by side behind a single pane of glass wrapped in an aluminum bezel. 

At launch, the standard product is VFR only, or IFR capable with an optional Garmin GPS 175. In the future, Airhart units will include IFR capability at no additional cost.

The layout is a classic PFD on the left and MFD on the right. The MFD can be divided in half, so effectively the system has three separate panes plus two sidebars for navigating the system. The sidebar on the PFD includes tabs for comms and aircraft switches for lights and flaps. The MFD sidebar has tabs for whether to display maps, checklists, flight plan, or radio information on the MFD.  

Most of the intelligence for the entire system resides in two small identical black boxes mounted on the back of each display. Having separate displays and separate boxes provides full redundancy and eliminates single points of failure. Those black boxes contain all of the intelligence for the flight instruments, radios, GPS, transponder, and autopilot. 

The only other system boxes are a power distribution box, effectively electronic circuit breakers, a network switch that all modules plug into, a magnetometer mounted in the tail, and an engine interface box. Currently, only Rotax engines are supported, though the company is also developing FADEC for both turboprop and turbine engines to offer full control of those powerplants. 

The test bed’s front panel has more switches than final customer installations will have. When installed, in addition to the main display, the only other items in the front panel will be the engine push-to-start switch, a small backup display module, and an ELT switch. All other switches, including for flaps and lights, will be operated from the main display. 

The system also includes Starlink satellite internet for real-time, in-flight connectivity. It will also enable over-the-air system software updates, which means you’ll never have to plug an SD card into the system to update charts. It also offers the possibility that company support can dial into the aircraft should you ever have issues while in flight.

Thuli described the avionics as being “context aware.” He said the system goes beyond just presenting data, also taking into account phase of flight and pilot characteristics. By doing that, it can present data that’s more relevant and useful. 

The system also incorporates a true large language model (LLM) artificial intelligence (AI) for one feature I wish I had in every plane I fly. The system continually listens to the radio and transcribes the words in real time, so you can see what was just said. 

It then presents information such as headings, altitudes, and new frequencies, so that you can load them into the system with a single gesture. That lets pilots fly with confidence knowing they have the right information and decreases the need to ask ATC to repeat information. 

The Phase 1 product includes Airhart Aware, which uses magenta trend vectors to provide pilots with visual cues showing how far they’ve deviated from bank and pitch targets. In Phase 2, Airhart Assist will provide force on the sidestick to nudge a pilot back toward those targets.

The airspeed tape along the left side of the PFD is conventional, but it also
includes a bug for maneuvering speed and shows the current fuel flow rate. To the left of the airspeed indicator is another vertical tape that indicates current engine power and a bar showing the maximum power limit. 

On the right, there’s a conventional altitude tape and a vertical speed tape that is as long as the altitude tape. Behind the instruments is a synthetic vision view that shows the terrain below in graphic detail, including local streets and roads. 

Customers can order Airhart Avionics for $49,900, which includes installation of the system in their aircraft in Long Beach. 

Airhart Aeronautics also plans to partner with multiple aircraft manufacturers who will offer Airhart Avionics, including STOL manufacturer Draco Aircraft. 

Phase 2: Airhart Assist and Fly-by-Wire

In Phase 1, an aircraft’s standard flight controls are used. But in Phase 2, the stick or yoke, rudder pedals, and throttle are replaced with a single sidestick and a speed lever. The goal is not just to clean up the panel but to rethink how pilots command the airplane. 

Rather than constantly juggling pitch, power, trim, and rudder coordination, with Airhart Assist turned on, a pilot will command outcomes, such as speed, heading, and altitude, while the system handles the achievement of those outcomes. Airhart sees this as the next major step in reducing workload and preventing loss-of-control accidents, while keeping the pilot in charge of the mission and decisions.

I flew the Phase 2 simulator, and the first thing I noticed was that, much like flying a gyro-stabilized drone, if I kept my hands off everything, the aircraft would maintain straight-and-level flight. So oddly, if pilots start to lose control, they’ll want to take their hands off the controls. 

Leaning the sidestick left and right sets the desired heading, and pushing and pulling the stick sets the desired vertical speed rate. Pushing and pulling the speed lever sets the desired speed. The system then automatically makes the required engine adjustments to achieve the target speed. 

When turning, the maximum bank angle is limited to 45 degrees. Also, when in a turn, the engine power comes up automatically to compensate for the loss of vertical lift, so pilots no longer need to pull back on a yoke or stick when turning. 

Landing is simple. Ermoshkin suggested setting a target descent rate of 500 fpm, an airspeed of 65 knots, and pointing the aircraft at the numbers. The system automatically compensates for any crosswind. If you’re high and need to slip, just push the sidestick forward, pull the speed stick back, and the aircraft will enter a slip. 

As the aircraft approaches the runway, it will automatically flare at an appropriate height. Power is automatically reduced, and the aircraft starts pitching up to a nose-high attitude. 

After touchdown, pulling the speed stick all the way back applies the brakes. To maintain the centerline while on the runway, just lean the sidestick left and right. 

Phase 3: Clean-Sheet Aircraft

The third phase is Airhart Aeronautics’ long-term “North Star”—a clean-sheet aircraft designed around modern avionics and simplified controls.

The plan is for a fast, fuel-efficient, four-seat, MOSAIC-compliant, personal aircraft that will be released under Part 22. Company executives were remarkably open and gave me full access to their facility with one caveat: Don’t take photos of the aircraft design they showed me.

Suffice it to say that it will be unique and make a contribution to the industry.

Pilot Training Ecosystem and United

Airhart’s vision goes beyond avionics and simplified controls. The company is also developing a digital logbook that tracks how well a pilot flies, including where Airhart Assist had to nudge or intervene. Airhart has already landed an investment from United Airlines Ventures centered on the training pipeline and capturing pilot performance in greater detail.

Airhart’s mission to build an airplane that is safer, simpler, and more intuitive to fly could reduce loss-of-control accidents, while broadening the pool of people who could fly safely. In some ways, it’s doing what the self-driving Waymo rideshare cars, now available in many U.S. cities, have done. They’ve identified the weak link—the human—and substituted technology to handle low-level control tasks, thus freeing drivers and pilots to focus on higher-level tasks.

Waymo now has an accident rate that’s 80 percent lower than cars with drivers. If Airhart Aeronautics succeeds, its new technology can’t come fast enough.

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Long Beach and Aerospace Innovation 

Long Beach Airport (KLGB) sits at the center of one of Southern California’s deepest aerospace legacies, so it’s no accident that Airhart Aeronautics and other next-generation aviation companies have chosen to locate there.

Douglas Aircraft opened next to the field in 1941, and its plant became a huge World War II production center. After the war, Douglas and later McDonnell Douglas produced jetliners, including the DC-8, DC-9, and DC-10. Boeing acquired the company in 1997, and the plant was shuttered after the final C-17 left the facility in late 2015.

Today, lots of newer aerospace companies are based at KLGB to take advantage of the former Douglas/Boeing land, a trained aerospace workforce, and network suppliers.

For example, JetZero is trying to reinvent the airliner. Its core idea is a blended-wing-body (BWB) aircraft called the Z4. The design integrates the wings into the body, reducing drag and cutting fuel burn by up to 50 percent. United Airlines has announced a deal to purchase 100 of these aircraft that could hold up to 250 passengers. JetZero is also producing a version for the U.S. Air Force that might serve as an aerial tanker. 

Ampaire, which is focused on hybrid-electric propulsion, has relocated its headquarters to Long Beach Airport. Its Electric EEL, based on a Cessna 337 Skymaster with one piston engine and one electric engine, first flew in 2019. It has also developed a plug-in, hybrid-electric powertrain that’s now flying in its Eco Caravan, based on the Cessna 208B Grand Caravan.

Odys Aviation is designing long-range vertical takeoff and landing (VTOL) aircraft that it says “can take off and land anywhere.” These heavy-lift cargo drones have both defense and commercial applications. For example, Fiji Airlines is planning to use Odys’ Laila drones to shuttle cargo among Fiji’s 330 islands.  

Space-based companies are now so prevalent that the city of Long Beach markets itself as “Space Beach.” Some of these firms include Relativity Space, which builds reusable rockets; Vast, which wants to build the first commercial space station; SpinLaunch; and Orbital Operations. 

Airhart Avionics at a Glance

• Dual 14-inch touchscreen displays in a single integrated bezel
• Redundant avionics architecture for increased reliability
• Dual nav/com radios
• WAAS-enabled GPS for VFR navigation
• Integrated 3D autopilot
• Starlink for worldwide internet connectivity
• Remote diagnostics and automated OTA software updates
• Designed for experimental and light sport aircraft (E-LSA) applications
• Current engine support includes Rotax, with additional integrations planned
• Priced at $50,000, including installation at Airhart’s Long Beach Airport facility
• Home simulator available at additional cost for at-home training and familiarization
• IFR-capable at launch with optional Garmin GPS 175

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This column first appeared in the July Issue 972 of the FLYING print edition.