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Ikenga 530Z
Ikenga Cygnus 21
Ikenga Cygnus 21 T
Ikenga Cygnus 21TX
Ikenga Cygnus 21P2
Ikenga E.Z. Bird
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Ikenga Cygnus 21TX  -  1991

Developed for Flying Doctors

Grand Champion: Albuquerque Intl. Airshow
A little known fact is that small autogyros are the most numerous types of homebuilt aircraft (over 4,000 built) and of all of those there has never been an in-flight failure if built/assembled according to plans; a record that fixed wing types or helicopters cannot touch.

Cygnus 21TX was completed many months after the destruction of the Cygnus 21T autogyro in a taxi test accident at Albuquerque's Coronado airport. It was the last in a series of Ikenga autogiros built in New Mexico. In many ways a duplicate of the prior ship, it featured a redesigned empennage with all flying twin rudders and the addition of a California Highway Patrol First Arrival Trauma Pack to set it apart. There were many utility applications projected for the Ikenga autogyros and their use as a vehicle for border patrol and flying doctors was high on our list of marketing applications.

The tractor design placed the prop in clean air and contributed to the Ikenga's climb rate of 1,000fpm, cruise of 95mph, Vmax of 125mph, and a range of 320 miles on a full tank of automobile gas. The service ceiling was 14,000 feet and the fairings were S-Glass over polyurethane foam.

The rotor control system for the Cygnus "T" series of autogyros was unique in that the fore/aft sweep of the rotor was controlled by a central pushrod that ran up the front of the forward mast to the front of the offset gimbal rotorhead. The side-to-side sweep of the rotor was controlled by two cables running from the joystick, up each side of the forward mast, to a horizontal plate on the rotor head. The two-stroke Suzuki 95hp engines used to power the Ikenga line of aircraft were oil injected and liquid cooled.