08/31/2014. Remarks by Walter van Tilborg: "The Highlander was a light two-seat aircraft intended for amateur construction and was derived from the slightly smaller Escapade, a design which had been developed jointly by Reality Aircraft in the UK and Just Aircraft, LLC in the USA. Prototypes flew in February 2003 (USA) and June 2003 (UK) and the type was available with choice of tri-gear or conventional (tail wheel) landing gear and was suited for a variety of engines. As in the later Highlander, the Escapade had foldable wings for easy transport/hangarage.

The Highlander was announced in 2004 and was mainly aimed at bush operations and therefore usually had a tail wheel type landing gear as standard. It had a slightly increased wingspan and was also had a stronger construction, was slightly taller due to the rough field landing gear with larger wheels and tires, had gull type cabin doors and a more powerful engine (such as the 100 hp Rotax 912UL). Furthermore, improvements were made to the elevators, rudder and trim and it could be operated on floats or skis. An extended wing was available as option.

A more recent version was the Highlander SuperSTOL, flown in prototype form in 2012 and becoming available the following year. The new model had new design wings with leading edge slats and together with large Fowler flaps provided a very good STOL performance and slow flying characteristics. It could be built with tri-gear or conventional landing gear and could operate on large so called Tundra tires. By late 2013 well over 25 kits had been sold and over ten examples had been completed and flown. Baseline engine was the 100 hp Rotax 912ULS with optional the 130 hp turbocharged Rotax 912ULS.

N196CB was built by Carl A. Bauknecht of New Richmond, Ohio, USA, and certification and airworthiness date were August 2 and September 24, 2010 respectively. Engine was an 100 hp Rotax 912ULS."