FIRST LOOK: Spacek SD-2

The best of both worlds: neatly designed, and constructed using a blend of traditional and modern techniques, Spacek’s top-performing two-seater is most definitely not ‘just another’ Rotax-powered European ultralight

- Marino Boric

Czech designer Igor Spacek has been active in the European ultralight field with his Spacek/SD Planes aircraft since launching the SD-1 Minisport in 2007. A decade later comes the SD-2 Sport Master, the numeric part of the designation standing for the number of seats.

While we have flight-tested the SD-1 (Pilot, December 2017) the two-seater is something of an unknown quantity, not yet available in the UK and rarely seen at airfields even on the Continent. For this reason we went to the German importer, Uwe Post in Hamm to see and fly the SD-2. This visit presented some real surprises.

If you had strolled through the exhibition halls at AERO in Friedrichshafen, you would have seen hundreds of similar ultralight two-seaters. Among this mass, Igor Spacek’s low wing SD-2 could easy be overlooked. Indeed, Uwe Post and SD Planes stood out primarily because of the sleek and distinctive single-seat SD-1.

When I visited Uwe at Lippewiesen airfield (EDLH), Hamm in north-west Germany, he wheeled out from the hangar first Spacek’s original creation, the SD-1, and then the new SD-2. From a distance, the two aeroplanes look very different. To my eye, the single-seater has some similarities with Reno racers, with those sexy bumps on the cowling, while the SD-2 looks more like a down-to-earth UL two-seater. The two aircraft appear fundamentally different, but as you look closer you discover many similarities. For example, both aeroplanes have almost identical tail units and flying surfaces. When I asked about this, Uwe smiled and said “actually, the wings are the same− they’ve just been extended for the SD-2”.