VH-WVI

VH-WVI is a Van's Aircraft RV-1, a single-engine piston aircraft operated by DAWES, William Lorn. SkyMeter has tracked 422 flights totalling 211 hours of airtime via ADS-B across 2 callsigns. The most frequent segment is YWVA to YMND. Service window in our records spans 462 days. Of those flights, 2 (0.5%) carry at least one detected incident: a go-around, unstable approach, stall warning, or runway excursion. The Van's Aircraft RV-1 has a maximum takeoff weight of 1,050 lb, light wake category.

About the Van's Aircraft RV-1

The Van's RV-1 holds a unique place in aviation history as the original prototype that launched the most successful kit aircraft family ever produced. Designed and built by Richard VanGrunsven in 1965, this single-seat, low-wing taildragger was a personal project that demonstrated the potential for high-performance homebuilt aircraft combining aerobatic capability with cross-country efficiency. Only one RV-1 was ever completed, but its clean design and impressive handling characteristics convinced VanGrunsven to develop the concept into a marketable kit, leading directly to the RV-3 and eventually the entire RV series that has dominated the homebuilt market for decades.

The RV-1 featured a wooden wing and tube-and-fabric fuselage, powered by a modest 100-horsepower Continental O-200 engine, yet achieved cruise speeds around 140 knots, remarkable performance for such a small, simple aircraft. Its light wing loading and responsive controls made it a joy to fly, establishing the design philosophy that would define every subsequent RV model: fast, efficient, and fun. While the original RV-1 itself saw limited flight hours and was eventually retired, its DNA lives on in thousands of RV aircraft flying worldwide, from the single-seat RV-3 to the four-seat RV-10.

SkyMeter has tracked flights across airframes and operators, with the largest observed operator.