After quietly building their aircraft plant in Los Alamos, BAC decided to construct some planes for their own protection first. However, the mountains of the Jimez range made full-sized airfields difficult to employ. The designers felt that perhaps autogyros, so far relatively unused in Arixo, might be the answer. Their first ideas proved less than ideal, being too slow or too lightly armored. After many trials, they came up with a small, workable chassis, but couldn't decide what weapons to give it. Then they had the bright idea of using partly modular weapon pods . The pods, either in side mounts or in the nose, must be installed when the autogyro is first built, but the common chassis lowers construction costs and speeds up output. This was especially useful once these autogyros went on the open market and proved quite popular. Spotlights and cameras are other options recently offered to potential customers. 
     The four most common designs in what became known as the i-series are the i100 Cricket, i200 Grasshopper, i300 Locust, and the i400 Cicada. All i-series models have a top speed of 250 mph, plus all the advantages of an autogyro's turning abilities. All but the better protected Cicada carry 270 lbs of armor. The i-series is notable for being the first mass produced autogyros to use retractable landing gear. The most popular and versatile variant, the Cricket, carries four .40-caliber machine guns, two in each side pod. The Grasshopper has a mix of weapons, with one each of a .30-caliber gun, a .40-cal, and a .60-cal cannon, all mounted in the nose. The heavy assault Locust carries in its nose a .70-caliber cannon as well as a .30-cal gun. The sturdy Cicada has two .50-cal cannons, one in each side pod, and a .30-cal in the nose; it also carries more armor than the other models. One problem they all have is, due to a need to properly distribute weight, the vertical rotor had to be placed in front of the cockpit, causing some visibility problems.
     While the first several of this series went right into protecting the local area, many more have been sold elsewhere. The BAC is willing to sell to anyone, so it is likely that some of these are in the hands of pirate groups, as well as militias from other countries. The AADF so far does not have any of the i-series in its squadrons, and is not sure it wants any.

Class:  Autogyro (Pusher) 
Manufacturer: Baca Aviation Concern, Los Alamos, Arixo 
Engine:  Pratt and Whitney R800 (852 hp) 
Rotor Span:   28 ft.    Length:  20 ft., 10 in.     Height: 10 ft., 2 in.
Loaded Weight:  7,000 lbs     Service Ceiling:  10,000 ft     Range:  275 miles Max. Speed:   250 mph     Max. Accel: 65.6 fps/s     Max. Decel:  65.6 fps/s 
Weapons:  (4)  Carver Series II .40-caliber machine guns