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If you looked carefully at the home page you already know we chose the Lancair Legacy FG kit.
We used the following criteria (in order of importance) to select our kit:
Click on the links to the left to see our thoughts on each criteria or scroll down to read the entire document. [ Next ]
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Placing our mission parameters at the top of the list helped quantify our necessities. We have family spread all across our great nation and if we want to see them often we have to travel. I have family near U42 (SLC, UT), and that represents our longest trip. A 1000nm trip from 3K6 (St Jacob, IL) to U42 became our baseline mission. We want to make a 3-day-weekend trip to SLC viable.
Map provided by Karl Swartz's Great Circle Mapper
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We agonized over the "4-place vs. 2-place" decision eventually deciding a 2-place works best for us. Our youngest child is nearly 17 meaning soon it'll be just Lisa and me. Aside from our children, it's very rare that anyone ever rides in the back seat. We decided that paying to haul (and insure) the extra seats wasn't worth it. With the money we save, we can rent a 4-seater if the need should ever arise. We also had to carefully consider seating height and width. I'm 6'3" and weigh 200 lbs so we needed something that would fit and still have room for our bags.
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We placed manufacturer reputation fairly high on the list because we realize that eventually (lost medical, too old, etc.) we'll have to sell this plane. Since we hope it'll be many years down the road, we needed a company with a good rep and a chance of being around a long time. Below you'll find links to some of the companies we considered.
Click to see a short history
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Since I've not actually built a plane before (duh!) it was important that we could get help assembling the major structural components. I'm really confident in my ability to properly "attach" components to an airframe, but not so confident in my ability to construct a straight, strong airframe to attach things to! Because we're relying on the factory assistance to ensure a properly built airframe, the efficacy of that assistance becomes very important. There are companies that specialize in helping builders construct their kits, but I judged that the factory techs would have the latest poop on the design. Additionally, the engineers that designed the thing are right there if any questions should arise. The cost of factory assistance for this (to me) critical part of the project is balanced against the value of confidence and peace of mind. Working under the direct supervision of a factory tech using the factory jigs is the best (read high certainty of getting it right) way I can think of to achieve the goal of a straight, strong, confidence-inspiring airframe.
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Lisa and I have another hobby: SCUBA! We like to use our own equipment, so our plane will have to carry it. We set our payload at 450 lbs to account for both of us and all our SCUBA gear (not including tanks and weights, these are usually provided by the dive boat/shop/tour company).
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Range was defined by our mission parameter. 1000nm with IFR fuel reserve is very doable in many of today's kit planes. Current Federal Aviation Regulations (FAR) require that one have enough fuel to land at the planned airport with at least 45 minutes of fuel remaining.
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Service ceiling is only a consideration with respect to getting to and from western-US locations. Our Grumman struggles to get over 12,000' so trips west are limited to summer mornings when the weather is good! Our kit choice should allow a flight to any hard-surfaced runway in the lower 48 states.
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Cruise speed (the criteria that seemed to drive this decision in the first place) kept slipping down the list once we started analyzing our mission parameters. Initially we thought we needed to go at least 200 knots; for some reason it just didn't seem "worth it" to spend this much money unless we were going that fast. But is 200 knots really that necessary? If we depart STL on a Fri after work, we can spend Sat and Sun at SLC then return to STL after a leisurely breakfast on Mon; a very nice 3-day weekend visit. 1000nm at 175 knots is 5.7 hours. Since we gain an hour heading west, that would put us in SLC around 9:00pm--perfect! Anything over 175 knots is icing.
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As form follows function, I always thought anything that'll fly 175+ kts would have to look fast. I wasn't disappointed! Just take a look at some of the high-performance kit offerings; none of them are ugly. Like fast cars, fast airplanes are inherently beautiful; even sitting still.
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Once we considered all of the above factors our choices were narrowed considerably. Glasair's Super II FT and Lancair's Legacy FG were both at the top of the list with a relative unknown, Tango, also in the running. We looked briefly at the Van's RV(6, 7 & 9), but interior space was a problem. Pulsar has some nice looking offerings, but in the end I wasn't comfortable with their [lack of] reputation. You may be asking yourself how the Tango surpassed that hurdle. Mostly because they have a build center less than 45 minute's drive from my house! In fact, because of the proximity of the build center, my conversations with the build center's manager, Jim Gray, and the advertised performance of the airplane, I was willing to swap priorities. Ultimately, after a flight in the factory demo bird, we discovered the seating height was going to put my head against the canopy, and the Tango dropped off the list. That left the Glasair and Lancair. After my experience with the Tango, I went back and looked very carefully at the specs for both of these planes. The Glasair has 1.5" less width across the cabin, less headroom, no factory assist (although it is available thru 3rd party vendors) and the kit costs more. The Super II FT with all the jumpstart options costs $45,600; that's $12,700 more than the Legacy FG. I can buy lots of factory assistance for $12,700! As it is, I plan to spend a week at the Lancair factory which'll bring my total to $35,900 (I got a $1,000 discount because I ordered the kit during Sun-n-Fun). For almost $10,000 more without a commensurate increase in performance, the Super II FT just didn't add up and the Legacy FG became our choice. Whew, glad that part's over! Click here to read about our powerplant choice.
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