a twin-engine, six-seat amphibious

[aklavia13]

Greetings, everyone. Colleagues, may I ask for your opinion? Please tell me—would there be demand today for a twin-engine, six-seat amphibious aircraft designed so that, after landing on water, you can conveniently lower a two-seat jet ski or quad bike into the water and then lift it back aboard? It would be powered by two 180 hp Lycoming engines, and if the aircraft carries the jet ski of course only two people would be on board . Setting aside the price of a new amphibian of this kind—around one million dollars—I’m interested purely in whether such a capability would be in demand. Thank you in advance for your response.

[The Dread Pilot Roberts]

I mean cool toy idea for sure, but honestly I would say a very small market like maybe 5 sales and you ain't going to be able to make any money back on 5 airplanes.

R&D including certification and prototypes would likely set you back $100 million, I get that number from the recent Icon A5 that was got started with an initial 25 Million plus a chinese company tossed in another 60 Million just to keep it afloat and into productions.

You need to ask yourself who is this for? Rich guy wanting another toy?
Logically thinking a Seadoo weighs 800 pounds so now can you think you can build a plane with two 180HP Lycomings that will lift it and 6 people or a combo of that and enough fuel to go anywhere. Good Luck


If you got the money for a toy like that and you're into aviation you likely own a plane that can go fast and far or whatever you mission is and have the boat on your lakefront house. If they want to fly to their house on a lake I bet they would already have a Twin otter or Caravan to do it or a charter op on speed dial.

[Scudrunner]

welcome to the forum.

I don't think there would be much demand for such a toy.

[Colonel]

Certified is probably not the way to go, for a little airplane.

Look at the success of the Van's RV series. Go Experimental!