What's new
Van's Air Force

Don't miss anything! Register now for full access to the definitive RV support community.

Sad Story of Pilot New to EAB Kit Planes Crashes 1st Flight (No One Hurt)

gmcjetpilot

Well Known Member
So I just got done going over the story of a guy who buys a Zenith 750 Cruiser and crashes it on first flight. He and his passenger were OK. The passenger was a more experienced pilot asked to come along by new owner to help fly it back home a few states away. However this Zenith had single controls, so the experienced pilot was along for the ride. The new owner/pilot had experience only in small lower HP fixed gear Cessna and Pipers. He elected to not get transition training or even a familiarity flight. He had gone for rides in one or two other Zeniths as a passenger with different engines, but no actual meaningful experience.

The first flight they did almost no preflight, no W&B and not super familiar with the plane's avionics. They took off down wind a minute or two after start. The takeoff and climb out was normal (there is a video). They elected to return to airport a short time later, to sort out their navigation (day VFR, they had EFIS, iPads and phones etc). The first approach they did a go around. 2nd time same thing go around. The 3rd time stalled it about 10 feet above the ground, left wing hit, full power applied (causing it to roll left more) and they went for a ride into a water retention pound near the runway. It flipped and they were not hurt.

The new owner made a bunch of observations and excuses. One the plane was uncontrollable on takeoff, stating at 75% power he needed 50% rudder. OK a light plane, powerful motor (for this size and weight plane), P-factor, Slip Stream, Torque, pression, kind of normal. Never the less a P-51 has too much power as well. This guy said this plane had too much HP and was dangerous. Many of course many are flying this make/model with this 135 HP Honda engine. A Cessna and Piper with longer rudder moment arm, steerable nose wheel is different than a Zenith for sure.

After the accident he realized he was over max gross. He realized the empty weight was much higher than the generic one Zenith publishes for smaller engine installation. The new owner/PIC never did a W&B and jumped in. He goes on to say the Certified planes he flew he never had to worry about W&B. Oh really? Any small GA plane will all seats full of adults, full fuel are near or over gross, much less baggage. Not until you get to the higher HP planes can you fill the seats comfortably within gross wt. limits. C152/172. Cherokee/Warrior all had limits to payload. Never the less he later observed that his plane weighed almost 200 lbs more than the generic empty weight published by Zenith, in part due to the automotive engine package. This he felt severely limited his payload and not being practical for his 230lb weight. He was right there. He is figuring all this out after he bought it and crashed it. Also I did not know the Zenith 750 Cruiser has 48 gallon capacity. So when flying with passenger and bags, partial fuel is always in order with this plane unless the pilot and passenger are super svelte Swedish bikini models with baggage only having a spare bikini in it. Ha ha. :D (Hey a guy can dream)

The conclusion by the owner is EAB Kit planes are un safe and don't have to meet any regulations or standards. You will be surprised when I say he has a point about safety...:eek::eek: Of course there are regulations and standards, just not Part 23. If you look at the statistics EAB's are a little more prone to crashes. Most of that is people like his Gentleman crashing a good plane. However his salient point is Experimental planes are different than the Cessna's and Piper's he flew. True.

Also he goes on to say he is only going to buy a Certified plane from now on. Yes they are all the same and standardized made by a manufacture to Part 23. Experimental planes are amateur built. Of course a Zenith or Van's kits are high quality and standardized which helps. However when it comes to engines, props, panels, systems the sky is the limit. Workmanship is another issue.

So please help folks who want to transition into an experimental built EAB planes with a reality check. Strongly recommend they don't fly without training. The WHOLE idea of EAB planes was EDUCATION, not an alternative to factory planes. When you build you learn a lot. Now that they became so prolific and popular with easy to build high quality kits (resulting in very desirable and expensive planes fetching more than a factory built plane and now a commodity), many folks are buying them like they would a Cessna or Piper. This is why experimental planes are less safe.... mostly to do with training and experience issues. Accident rates is a whole other topic.

Even if you built it, if you have no experience in this type of plane, or even recent experience not flying much as you built, by all means get some transition training. Many people don't and get away with it, build experience and all is well. However too many times it does not work out. The incident or accident with people flying new planes (even certified ones) is totally preventable with training and some initial experienced with an instructor. So many accidents of people buying a plane they never flew and flying it home and having an accident.
 
Last edited:
So I just got done going over the story of a guy who buys a Zenith 750 Cruiser and crashes it on first flight. He and his passenger were OK. The passenger was a more experience pilot asked to come along by new owner to help fly it back home a few states away. However this Zenith had single controls, so the experienced pilot was along for the ride. The new owner and pilot had experience only in small lower HP fixed gear Cessna and Pipers. He elected to not get transition training or even a familiarity flight. He had gone for rides one or two other Zeniths as a passenger with different engines, but no actual meaningful experience.

The first flight they did almost no preflight, no W&B and not super familiar with avionics. They took off down wind a minute or two after start. They elected to return to sort out their navigation (day VFR, they had iPads and phones etc). The first approach they did a go around. 2nd time same thing go around. The 3rd time stalled it about 10 feet above the ground, left wing hit, full power applied (causing it to roll left more) and they went for a ride into a water retention pound near the runway. It flipped and they were not hurt.

The new owner made a bunch of observations and excuses. One the plane was uncontrollable on takeoff, stating at 75% power he needed 50% rudder. OK a light plane, free castor nose wheel, powerful motor (for this size and weight plane), P-factor, Slip Stream, Torque, pression, kind of normal. Never the less a P-51 has too much power as well. This guy said this plane had too much HP. Many of course are flying with this 135 HP Honda engine. A Cessna and Piper with longer rudder moment arm, steerable nose wheel is different.

After the accident he realized he was over max gross. He realized the empty weight was much higher than the generic one Zenith publishes for a smaller engine. The new owner and PIC never did a W&B and jumped in. He goes on to say the Certified planes he flew he never had to worry about W&B. Oh really? Any small GA plane will all seats full of adults, full fuel are near or over gross. Not until you get to the higher HP planes can you fill the seats comfortably. C152/172. Cherokee/Warrior all had limits to payload. Never the less he later observed that his plane weighed almost 200 lbs more than the generic empty weight published by Zenith, in part due to the automotive engine package. This he felt severalty limiting his payload and not being practical for his 230lb weight. He is figuring all this out after he bought it and crashed it. Also I did not know the Zenith 750 Cruiser has 48 gallon capacity. So when flying with passenger and bags, partial fuel is always in order with this plane unless the pilot and passenger are super svelte Swedish bikini models with their baggage only having a spare bikini in it. Ha ha. :D (Hey a guy can dream)

The conclusion by the owner is EAB Kit planes are un safe and don't have to meet any regulations or standards. You will be surprised when I say he has a point about safety...:eek::eek: Of course there are regulations and standards, just not Part 23. If you look at the statistics EAB's are a little more prone to crashes. Most of that is people like his Gentleman crashing a good plane. However his salient point is Experimental planes are different than the Cessna's and Piper's he flew. True.

Also he goes on to say he is only going to buy a Certified plane from now on. Yes they are all the same and standardized made by a manufacture to Part 23. Experimental planes are amateur built. Of course a Zenith or Van's kits are high quality and standardized which helps. However when it comes to engines, props, panels, systems the sky is the limit. Workmanship is another issue.

So please help folks who want to transition into an experimental built EAB planes with a reality check. The WHOLE idea of EAB planes was EDUCATION, not an alternative to factory planes. When you build you learn a lot. Now that they became so prolific and popular with easy to build high quality kits (resulting in very desirable and expensive plane fetching more than a factory built plane and now a commodity), many folks are buying them like they would a Cessna or Piper. This is why experimental planes are less safe.... mostly to do with training and experience issues.

Even if you built it, if you have no experience in this type of plane, or even recent experience not flying much as you built, by all means get some transition training. Many people don't and get away with it. Build experience and all is well. However too many times it does not work out and totally preventable with training and some initial experienced with an instructor.


Also he goes on to say he is only going to buy a Certified plane from now on.

that's if he has a certificate after the 709 ride that he will probably get after the feds hear of his extensive pre-flight.
 
Methinks the type of cert on the plane was not the issue, but the quals of the pilot.
 
My opinion

I have seen a number of videos related to this incident, including the one published by the PIC. He made a large number of poor decisions, resulting in the accident you describe, then slinged mud wherever he to could to shift blame. IMHO the fact that the plane was experimental wasn't really a factor here. Any plane new to the PIC requires careful consideration of "all factors" pertaining to that flight before you take off.

I appreciate you writing this up as we should strive to learn from incidents like these.
 
Accident

He is probably a charter member of the club that is somehow able to "groundloop" Cessna 172' and Cherokee's etc on wide paved runways.
 
The airplane was powered by the Viking (Honda) engine. There is a Youtube video by someone should be known in VAF forum. While this isn't about the Viking engine, you can glean a lot of the decision making process from the interchange between the PIC and the video author. The last bit of the video was the PIC flying the airplane at another time. Seems to be a good flying EAB aircraft.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o6TMqYfnpWg
 
Let’s see - no transition training, passenger on first flight, over gross. I wonder how his insurance company will view this . . . Oh, wait . . . :mad:
 
I watched the video by the engine guy. Then the accident pilot.. seems the accident pilot is blaming everyone else.. too much power, not enough engine offset, locked controls etc.. good thing he was such a great pilot that he was able to get that deathtrap thing on the ground and put it out of its misery!
 
It's funny about the W&B part of this. I've been pondering buying an LSA or some not too expensive but still capable plane to fly while I finish my RV7A. One of the real limitations of these planes is the limited weight they can carry within CG limits. Some show examples with limited fuel or no baggage but I want to be able to carry 2, full fuel and some baggage. I've gone through these calculations on a few planes now. Guess where that leads... to our very own RV-12.
 
Let me ruffle some feathers....

It's funny about the W&B part of this. I've been pondering buying an LSA or some not too expensive but still capable plane to fly while I finish my RV7A. One of the real limitations of these planes is the limited weight they can carry within CG limits. Some show examples with limited fuel or no baggage but I want to be able to carry 2, full fuel and some baggage. I've gone through these calculations on a few planes now. Guess where that leads... to our very own RV-12.

The original intent of LSA was for a simple aircraft for fun, day VFR, weekend flying. But now days everyone wants full IFR instrumentation, auto pilot, heavy leather interior, kitchen sink, etc. Then they complain about no room left for baggage.

If you want to fly cross country, IFR at night, in comfort, there are other categories available. There's Experimental Amateur-Built, and Certified to name a couple.

Flame suit on!!!
 
Last edited:
I'm not sure that's what I said. However, I do want to be able to carry my backpack, a passenger (maybe their backpack or equivalent) and travel 400nm to my intended destination without only being able to fill the tanks half way.

Also, relevant to this original thread its easy to get overweight on some of this type of aircraft.

Sorry no flaming here. :D
 
I'm not sure that's what I said. However, I do want to be able to carry my backpack, a passenger (maybe their backpack or equivalent) and travel 400nm to my intended destination without only being able to fill the tanks half way.
Also, relevant to this original thread its easy to get overweight on some of this type of aircraft.
Sorry no flaming here. :D

I'm sorry. I should not have quoted your post. My comment was meant to address the general population. Not you specifically.

Just because it is easy to overload an aircraft is no excuse to do so.
 
Kinda doubt "too heavy" was the root problem. Have you seen the new Zenith Super Duty?
-
 

Attachments

  • ScreenHunter_932 Oct. 25 20.02.jpg
    ScreenHunter_932 Oct. 25 20.02.jpg
    25.4 KB · Views: 225
Kinda doubt "too heavy" was the root problem. Have you seen the new Zenith Super Duty?-
Ha ha ha. Yea weight was not the issue except when the wing stopped flying and supporting weight.

Not to disparage the Zenith (although the shipping container is funny), it has a loyal following, but the basic airframe structure is kind of stout. Even an exceptionally light Zenith Cruzer has 600 lbs useful (480 lbs useful with LSA 1320 lb gross limit) and it carries 320 lbs of fuel.

As Mel said people stuff the plane with heavy options. My point was the pilot approached this like any other Piper Cherokee and did not do a W&B.

MAIN point is don't let people do this. There were people around this owner/pilot who were a bit concerned and said nothing, including telling him to let his safety pilot fly from the left seat. People stayed silent. I get it. you don't want to tell someone what to do. However in aviation you have to be blunt sometimes for safety. Of course he owner/pilot assumed the plane had dual controls like a Piper Cherokee. The safety pilot later indicated the guy could not fly at all. :eek:. That must have bee fun for him.
 
Last edited:
I could not get 5 minutes into any of the boring, dragging, stream of consciousness videos with a wandering topic and POV.

I did watch the tailwind takeoff into what appeared to be very calm air. And see a pretty airplane all bent. The only good thing is the old codgers came out unbroken and not leaking.
 
I liked how the crash pilot is very precise with what happened.. 50% power, 75% power, 50% rudder etc.. and it’s not like he was approximating because upon landing, he flew 72 knots, then 65 knots.. very specific and precise. I bet he can’t fly within 10 knots of a target, let alone one knot. He crashed the plane and blamed it on 100 different things, including locked controls! A guy like this brings a bad name to general aviation and especially experimental aviation!
 
Reminder of Paul Harvey

As a moderator, I confess I almost deleted this thread early because my initial reaction was “this is not about an RV.” Now I’m glad I didn’t.

There are a lot of lessons to be learned here. I’ve watched all of the pilot’s videos as well as the video by the business owner. And I think there’s more (as Paul Harvey used to say, “The Rest of the Story”) but I think I’ve heard enough.

We all need to learn what we can from this experience and apply those lessons to the decisions we make as we participate in this “educational and recreational” hobby.
 
Reading this post I started putting the pieces together and realized this happened recently at my home airport. I was not around and had been wondering what happened. Thanks for the post.
 
Kinda doubt "too heavy" was the root problem. Have you seen the new Zenith Super Duty?
-

Years ago my brother in law bought a Zenair STOL CH 801 (yes, I tried to talk sense into him). We landed and hangared it at West Texas Airport in the dead of night. The next weekend the BOL went out to fly and when he taxied it up front for fuel the airport owner chirped, "I heard you had bought a new airplane!". The BOL smiled. Then the airport owner continued, "Is that the box they shipped in in?". Smile turned to frown.
 
MAIN point is don't let people do this. There were people around this owner/pilot who were a bit concerned and said nothing, including telling him to let his safety pilot fly from the left seat. People stayed silent. I get it. you don't want to tell someone what to do. However in aviation you have to be blunt sometimes for safety.
VERY WELL SAID!!!
------------------

FWIW; I have lots of hours in a Zenith 750STOL (100hp Continental O200) and even ferried one to Puerto Rico. I can tell you it flies just fine, not a lot of cross wind capability but otherwise a fine flying airplane. IMHO this was 100% a pilot issue and not related to the aircraft.

BTW, Averaging 60Kts it took me 4 days to fly the plane from Florida to Puerto Rico and 2-1/2hrs to fly back via Jet Blue. :rolleyes:

You can see photos of the ferry trip at my webpage puertoricoflyer.com.
 
Last edited:
I was watching the original video the other day, and now youtube can't find it. It wouldn't surprise me that he pulled his videos on advice from his lawyer. The rebuttal from Viking is still up though.

EDIT: Its still up, I just couldn't find the right keywords for google or youtube to find it.
 
Last edited:
I was watching the original video the other day, and now youtube can't find it. It wouldn't surprise me that he pulled his videos on advice from his lawyer. The rebuttal from Viking is still up though.
I figured that would happen as the community consensus was not sympathetic, and may have seen Jan's video.

I left one comment where he admits he did not know he was over gross weight. Not cause of accident but still not something one should post after an accident. I commented asking why he did not check W&B on a new plane he never flew? I commented on another of his videos, sounds like you stalled above the runway on the 3rd landing attempt.

As far as Viking engines video he had video clips taken right after accident of owner/pic's talking about the accident. His comments right after accident don't jive with his later comments. I don't know but assume the recordings were without his knowing he was being recorded, which is legal almost anywhere in public where privacy is not expected and at least one person knows the recording is being made. So be careful what you say... everyone has a audio video recorder in their phone.

The happy ending is both occupants were not hurt. If you sell your RV do not allow the new owner to fly the plane unless you have verified they are competent. It is good for them, aviation and for your personal liability. After an accident the pilot can claim the plane was dangerous and you knew it.
 
Last edited:
So I couldn't find it by searching google or youtube, but if you follow the link on Vikings comment section, the original video is still available to watch. I won't link it here, but apparently its still available.
 
I think that the Skyview records and keeps the data of flights in memory. It would be interesting if the FAA took possession of the airplane and got Dynon to provide the printouts of the data for that flight. The data doesn't lie.
 
I know that plane

Keeping it RV related, it was in the hangar next to my RV-4...my hangar neighbor who has a beautiful Zenith also does vinyl wraps..I watched that one get all the polish and blue trim. It was originally built with controls for a Paraplegic pilot/owner by a local EAA chapter as I recall, but that owner didn't have good luck with it and sold it. I haven't read all the reports, but it was converted back to "normal" controls at some point...glad they were OK.
 
Ha ha ha. Yea weight was not the issue except when the wing stopped flying and supporting weight.

Not to disparage the Zenith (although the shipping container is funny), it has a loyal following, but the basic airframe structure is kind of stout. Even an exceptionally light Zenith Cruzer has 600 lbs useful (480 lbs useful with LSA 1320 lb gross limit) and it carries 320 lbs of fuel.

As Mel said people stuff the plane with heavy options. My point was the pilot approached this like any other Piper Cherokee and did not do a W&B.

MAIN point is don't let people do this. There were people around this owner/pilot who were a bit concerned and said nothing, including telling him to let his safety pilot fly from the left seat. People stayed silent. I get it. you don't want to tell someone what to do. However in aviation you have to be blunt sometimes for safety. Of course he owner/pilot assumed the plane had dual controls like a Piper Cherokee. The safety pilot later indicated the guy could not fly at all. :eek:. That must have bee fun for him.


This is an old thread, but for posterity, the Cruzer has a 30 gallon fuel capacity, not 48.

The super duty (which has a larger wing and useful load) has 48.

A very heavy Cruzer would tip the scales around 950 lbs, most are closer to 850 empty. The Honda engined cruzers are somewhere in the middle.
 
Last edited:
Back
Top