Partnership between Sky Power and Cavok UAS for European long endurance UAV

Words By: Edward Weston-Davies - Sky Power

Sky Power GmbH is the leading manufacturer of 2-stroke combustion and Wankel engines for unmanned aerial systems (UAS) with an MTOW between 25 and 120kg. The propulsion portfolio consists of TRL9 fuel injection, carburetor, hybrid and heavy fuel engine systems. In addition to its own development and manufacturing, Sky Power manufactures all engines in Germany using the latest technology. 

Cavok UAS is a premier professional drone manufacturer, located in France, with a wide range of electrical and internal combustion drones for security, logistics, and industrial applications between 2 and 1360kg MTOW. 

With the objective of producing European-made drones, Cavok UAS has selected Sky Power’s SP-110 FI TS propulsion system to equip the CK50 VTOL convertible UAV. Thanks to the SP-110 FI TS performance, the CK50 can fly over 10,5 hours, allowing full capacity of CK50 high-efficiency design. 

This partnership is crucial to be able to demonstrate European capacity in large UAV production. In a situation where the supply chain is critical and production capacity could have to ramp up significantly due to a pandemic or conflict situation, an alliance between European producers is a key factor of success for institutional clients that require a regional production for strategic equipment delivery, technical support and MRO. 

It is not only the origin of components which is critical, the performance, reliability and interfaces must be in adequation with the platform so that the full capacities of the technology can be integrated for the benefit of the user. In this respect, the availability of information from SP-110 FI TS engine parameters is crucial to assure flight safety as a primary value for Cavok UAS thanks to the close technical collaboration between technical teams.