Trek Aerospace Nytngale (concept design)

(Image credit: Trek Aerospace)

Nytngale (concept design)
Trek Aerospace, Inc.
Folsom, California, USA
www.trekaero.com

Trek Aerospace, Inc. is a small engineering company based in Folsom, California, USA. Founded on March 18, 1996 as “Millennium Jet, Inc.”, the company changed their name to Trek Aerospace on July 3, 2002 because people thought the company was building jets. To clarify, SoloTrek was a name for certain models of Trek Aerospace's aircraft. SoloTrek was never the name of the company. The company is dedicated to understanding and improving shrouded propeller performance and efficiency. In the process, they developed their own proprietary CFD (Computational Fluid Dynamics) software, TASPA (Trek Aerospace Shrouded Propeller Analysis).

The company has stated all of their aircraft designs are very flexible when it comes to scalability, electric motors used, propeller types and the type of power source used. That is, all previous conventionally powered aircraft the company has created can be converted to eVTOL aircraft and can be updated with the latest in avionics, electronics, propellers and electric (all batteries or hybrid-electric) power sources. All of the company's aircraft have been designed for advanced air mobility (AAM).

The company has designed and made multiple vertical takeoff and landing (VTOL) aircraft including its exoskeleton backpack "helicopters" using shrouded propellers in the airframe design. Some articles refer to the exoskeleton backpack helicopter as a jetpack, even though there are no jet engines involved in the backpack aircraft. The company has also designed and made watercraft. Trek Aerospace also assists and teams with other companies, large and small, in the design, fabrication, and licensing of projects involving shrouded propellers and/or autonomous control systems. For example, Trek Aerospace built XTI Aircraft Company's TriFan subscale proof of concept (POC) aircraft.

Trek Aerospace Shrouded Propeller Analysis
Testing at NASA and university wind tunnels has validated the accuracy of the Trek Aerospace Shrouded Propeller Analysis (TASPA). Flight testing of both crewed and uncrewed vehicles has further verified the real-world applications of Trek’s technology. The company states their core technology has the highest specific thrust (lb/kW) in the industry. Aircraft designed by Trek define the efficiency curve used in the UBER Elevate white paper.

This efficiency allows aircraft to carry more weight in a smaller footprint. According to the company, their shrouded propellers require less power, use fewer batteries, have a greater payload and have a farther range than other battery powered aircraft. Furthermore, the company states their shrouded propellers have outperformed similar free propellers to airspeeds in excess of 230 mph (371 km/h), negating much of the drag penalty associated with ducted propellers.

Nytngale one passenger eVTOL concept design rescue multicopter
The Nytngale is an autonomous one passenger (or one patient) eVTOL concept design multicopter. The aircraft's fuselage is concave allowing a basket stretcher to be fit securely and attached to the fuselage. Currently, the design does not have a cover for the patient and the patient would be unprotected by the elements, such as wind, dust, debris, sand, rain, snow, hail, sleet, cold and heat. The company has stated this design and all of its aircraft designs are very flexible when it comes to scalability, its power source, motors used, engines used and propeller types.

The rescue aircraft has four ducted propellers, four electric motors and is powered by batteries. The open fuselage and propeller ducts are made from carbon fiber composite to give the aircraft a high strength to low weight ratio. The aircraft has fixed quadricycle strut landing gear with a middle wheel under the center of the fuselage

The aircraft is being designed for emergency search and rescue, to keep rescue costs down and increase the reliability of rescue aircraft. The company hopes this rescue multicopter could be used for small towns, remote areas, developing countries and disaster zones.

GoAero Prize Competition with the MiniNyt Concept Design and Subscale Prototype
The GoAero Prize is a new competition of Boeing's that replaced the GoFly Prize competition. Trek Aerospace entered the GoAero Prize competition and won the Phase 1 portion of the competition which was the concept design phase. In Phase 2 of the competition, with Trek's MiniNyt subscale prototype, the company lost. The Phase 2 portion of the competition was flying a subscale prototype. Note: The spelling of the MiniNyt aircraft name is correct.

Editor's Note:
It is important to remember that all concept design aircraft specifications are estimated and can or will change as prototypes and production models are made, tested and flown with real world avionics, components and payloads.

Specifications:

• Aircraft type: Rescue passenger eVTOL concept design multicopter aircraft
• Piloting: Autonomous, remote or preset autopilot
• Capacity: 1 person
• Cruise speed: Unknown
• Propellers: 4 ducted fans
• Electric motors: 4 electric motors
• Power source: Batteries
• Fuselage: Carbon fiber composite
• Landing gear: Fixed quadricycle strut landing gear with middle wheel under the center of the fuselage
• Safety features: Distributed Electric Propulsion (DEP) uses multiple propellers or electric ducted fans, each powered by electric motors, to increase safety through redundancy. If one or more components fail, the remaining ones can still ensure a safe landing. There are also redundancies of critical components in the sub-systems of the aircraft providing safety through redundancy. Having multiple redundant systems on any aircraft decreases having any single point of failure.

Related Aircraft:

• Trek Aerospace Dragonfly (prototype)
• Trek Aerospace DuoTrek 1.0 (concept design)
• Trek Aerospace DuoTrek 2.0 (concept design)
• Trek Aerospace Elesi (concept design)
• Trek Aerospace FlyKart 1 (prototype)
• Trek Aerospace FlyKart 2 (prototype)
• Trek Aerospace FlyKart 3 (prototype)
• Trek Aerospace LogDrone (concept design)
• Trek Aerospace Mule (concept design)
• Trek Aerospace Nightingale (concept design)
• Trek Aerospace OAV-II (concept design)
• Trek Aerospace OVIWUN (production model)
• Trek Aerospace Scorpion (concept design)
• Trek Aerospace SoloTrek Springtail (prototype)
• Trek Aerospace SoloTrek XFV (prototype)
• Trek Aerospace SoloTrek XFVC (concept design)
• Trek Aerospace SoloTrek XFVM (concept design)
• Trek Aerospace Tern (concept design)
• Trek Aerospace Tyrannos (concept design)

Company Insights:

• Crunchbase

Resources:

• Trek Aerospace website
• Trek Aerospace Twitter
• Trek Aerospace LinkedIn
• Trek Aerospace Wikipedia
• Article: Meet the Teams: Trek Aerospace, Stage 1 Winner, Go Aero, Mar. 18, 2025