E-Hawk: ‘Iolani School and the EMG-6

In 2017 Martin Emde brought a group of ‘Iolani School students into the hangar to talk about building an EMG-6. We handed them the same open-source drawings we put on the internet for anyone else: A-size PDFs, DXF files, eDrawings.

They called the airplane E-Hawk. Phase I was the EMG-6 airframe. Phase II was their own electrical propulsion and avionics. The long goal, in their words, is to fly the Hawaiian islands on renewable energy.

They did the work. Fuselage and tail-boom. Landing gear, flight controls, ailerons, rudder. Motor mount, motor, propeller, brakes, jury struts. Indoor taxi tests and motor run-ups. Wing ribs, covering, wing box, wing tips. Seat and tailwheel. Then the part that was always going to be theirs: battery work, a motor/battery display, the main power panel, the instrument panel and shroud.

A lot of that happened through distance learning and still they kept posting shop notes. The team turned over as seniors graduated — some of the early project managers went on to Embry-Riddle, Rose-Hulman, and the rest — and the next class picked up the airplane.

This video is their own summary of the last stretch. Watch it. That is what the drawings are for.

Follow the project at ehawk.iolani.org — blog, team, and the record of a school that took the EMG-6 plans and built an airplane. The video is also here: www.youtube.com/watch?v=qzCWZc5SFlc

If you are a teacher looking at the same idea, start with the plans.