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Past, Present and Future |
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The Early Years – The Mid 80’s
Hughes Engineering began as a boat building and general engineering company in the late 70’s in Smith Drive, West Ballina, NSW, and we engaged in marine manufacture. The neighbourliness that existed at Smith Drive was astounding, fun and joyous. Our kids grew up in this wonderful environment of work and play intermingled and totally blurred in the overlap. I’m sure this stamped on ours and other children in the area an indelible mark of respect for the process of living to work, rather than vice versa. It was a true mix of hard-nosed individuals who all enjoyed their work and also enjoyed producing quality products. |
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Pictured Above: Our very first LightWing Aircraft, way back in 1985. We've come a long way since then! |
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We began building two seat single engine high wing aircraft in 1985 in response to a new set of government regulations that permitted if not encouraged such development. Our birthday is known as 29 September 1986, as this is the date we registered our first certificated Australian LightWing (ALW), a GR-532 and the AUF number was 25-0032, its factory airframe number was 001. We aimed at producing a safe, enclosed cockpit aircraft. When we began, the only ultralights aircraft that were produced in Australia were made of alloy pipe and covered in yacht sail material, they where generally open and offered little protection from either the wind or collision. We have found that our lightweight welded steel space frame fuselage provides the best protection in the event of an incident. Our safety record is our pride, we design our airframes to withstand severe impacts and keep the occupants safe. In these early years up to twenty aircraft were produced each year and the company enjoyed a significant market share of the Sports Aviation market in Australia. |
Jenny, Shelly, Leena and Nicky with the First LightWing Kit Parts. spread out outside John Heards factory unit in Ballina Taken 1986-1987 |
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Relocation – Mid 90’s In 1995 Hughes Engineering re-located at the airport, Peter Thorpe, the then Ballina CEO, instigated this subdivision and was delighted we where to the first business attracted to his new airport. Since 1985, about 160 aircraft have been produced averaging about 10 per year. Our aircraft have been mostly sold as fully built. |
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| Certification
During the 90’s, the company’s focus shifted to the certification of the range of light aircraft and at the end of the decade the company held two Type Certificates for the ALW Sport 2000 and the GR 912 aircraft. Both these aircraft are high wing monoplanes and are certified to the Australian Standard CAO- 101.55. |
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It is now anticipated that the introduction of the SPEED Range of two and four place aircraft will increase our market share and also result in import replacements and the export of the range of aircraft hopefully to China the USA and Europe. We recently established a US distributor, a company called called ‘AirGyro’. The CEO Don Oldham test flew the SP-2000 prototype in late 2006 and was so impressed by the vehicle and its performance that he placed ongoing orders for 2007/8 and onwards into the next decade. Don Oldham has dealership networks established around the USA where he currently sells a basic sports gyro plane and it is anticipated that the SPEED Range will slot into this sales and distribution network with around six aircraft to be produced in 2008 twelve in 2009, eighteen in 2010. These will be supplied as a mixture of both two seat LSA certified aircraft and four seat kit aircraft. |
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Why Aircraft? Flying is our hobby, our passion and our life. It’s for this reason that we love to pass on our skills to others. We love to fly, its the last frontier, there are no speed limits in the sky, rules are simple and this century will see some pretty interesting advances in personal aviation. At Hughes Engineering, our company strategy is to provide products that have practical applications throughout the four market segments that we serve, which are |
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The approach to sales and marketing at Hughes Engineering is personalized and friendly as we are a family company. We know our customers by name and we offer a high level of personalized service and after sale service. |
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| Our aircraft and products are competitive due to the relative simplicity of manufacture and the way in which we use our manufacturing techniques to produce stylish functional and above all safe means of transport. | ||
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Where are we? We are located at the Ballina Airport and Ballina is located about 30 kilometers south of Australia's most easterly town Byron Bay. This is located about the middle of the east coast of Australia. Click here for a map and contact details |
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What are we ?
We are a limited liability company, privately owned , we employ about 14 staff. Our main aim is to produce light aircraft, we hold a number of CASA approvals to do this, recently including LSA approval. We also produce / develop business support software Precision Costing and Payroll and Oz On Hold and the Cunning Cat Catamaran. |
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We have now developed a Low wing 2 or 4 seater we call the SPEED. The SP-2000 is the designation for the 2 seater and the SP-4000 is what we call the 4 seater. We began the project in 2003 and it has taken 3 years to complete, mind you it will always be work in progress but the prototype has now been in the air since mid 2005 and has over 100 hours on the clock without a single problem. Furthermore, we have 4 confirmed sales. Gary, from Sydney, purchased the first, Peter from Brisbane, has the second, Lionel has the third aircraft and the 4th sale has been taken by George from Canberra.
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All these valued clients have made the decision to purchase from us based on our prototype SP-2000 which is just that.. a prototype ... and this has shown a lot of faith in our company so on behalf of all the crew here at LightWing, thanks guys, I am sure you will be happy with the result.
The SPEED range will come under a variety of approvals but mainly the 2 seat LSA approval.
In the near future, we intend fitting an Innodyne turbo prop to both the SP-2000 and the SP-4000.
The distant future (3 years on) will see the export of our 2 seater SP-2000, a joint venture will see these aircraft partly manufactured in China and the certification to FAR-23 of our 4 seater SP-4000
In 5 years time, look out for the SP-5000 and -6000, our 5 or 6 seater twin engine featuring club seating, 2 pusher props or optional turbo-fans, a mini Biz-Jet you might say.. "dream on indeed" but watch this space !
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" Dream on ! " Nick, Howie and Shelly Hughes and the rest of our talented team
of course, Terry, Mal, Andy, Zac, Mick, Brian, Wayne and Wayne
again |
ALW
SPEED Range:
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ALW
Range:
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Hughes
Group of Companies ~ Mission Statement/Capability
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Features:
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SPORT2000,
GR912...
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Precision
Costing & Payroll
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BiPE,
Amphibious...
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Shelly
~ Music/Web
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