Chinese Ultralight Aircraft for $395???

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Unbelievable post I found, but itseems to be real.  A mechanic in China built his own ultralight aircraft, with 3 (three!!!) engines, for $395.

Let's keep hope alive in ultralight aircraft!

Here's a pic:

And here's the original post.

You've got to see all the pictures.

Calculating Center of Gravity in a Tricycle Gear Ultralight Aircraft

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A few days ago, I posted information on how to calculate the Center of Gravity in a Belite taildragger ultralight airplane.  Today, I provide an update for tricycle gear aircraft.

You should review my original post, here.  After you review it, consider the following example for a tricycle gear plane.

Note that the nose wheel has a NEGATIVE arm, as it's distance is negative from the firewall.  All other arms are positive.  Remember to weigh the aircraft with an empty fuel tank; add the fuel and the pilot weight as shown in the equations as below.

Center of Gravity, Tricycle gear ultralight aircraft calculations:

DESCRIPTION, WEIGHT (in lbs.), ARM (in inches), MOMENT (lbs x inches)
Front nose wheel, 70, -5, -350.
Main wheels, 180, 49, 8820.
Pilot, 200, 39, 7800.
Fuel, 30, 56.6, 1695.

Total weight is 480.
Total moment is 17965 (-350+8820+7800+1695)

ARM of the aircraft is 17965 / 480 = 37.42"

This aircraft is in the CG range. 

REMEMBER, you must measure the actual ARMs of your ultralight airplane using a plumb bob from the firewall, and the aircraft must be level.  (This may be a little easier to do in a tricycle gear plane, as the plane is mostly level to begin with.)

I hope you find this useful, no matter what kind of aircraft you fly.

What is the world's lightest aircraft?

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I'm asking:  what is the world's lightest airplane?

I'm not asking what is the world's smallest:  that honor may be held by this airplane, the Bumble Bee II.  Read about it on Wikipedia.

The Bumble Bee II is definitely not light, weighing in at 396 pounds.  Any Belite is lighter than that.

But Guinness points to an aircraft called the Wee Bee as the world's lightest.  (I find the name Wee Bee very interesting!)

You can read about it here, and they claim it had an empty weight of 210 pounds.   It looks fairly fatal, because the pilot rides on top, face first.  Any accident is going to be a killer:

The 1949 Popular Science article this photo is taken from is a must read.

And it's a Wee Bee.  Just can't get over that.

A Belite can be built with a weight of 210 pounds.  But Belites are definitely not the lightest planes in the world:  what about the Easy Riser, of John K Moody fame?  It weighed a little more than half what our planes weigh.

And also, what about various Human Powered Aircraft?  These have been around quite awhile. Here's a pic of one, in flight:

Human Powered Gossamer Condor, in flight

So I'm really asking:  what is the world's lightest, gasoline or electric, human carrying airplane with an enclosed cockpit?

Here are the rules:

1)  Must be gasoline or electric.  (Disqualified Human Powered, which weigh less than 100 pounds...)

2)  Must have an enclosed cockpit.  (Disqualifies the WeeBee)

3)  Must be fairly conventional:  wings, engine, tail, or canard.  (Disqualifieds weird stuff, like balloons.)

Brand New Simonini Engine for sale!

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The spring cleaning sale at Belite continues....

At Belite, we officially support a couple of different 2 stroke engines:  Hirth (German) and Compact Radial Engines (Canadian).  Another type of engine that we took a look at a long time ago was Simonini (Italian).   I decided not to support this engine type in the Belite.  I believe they are very popular for some other markets (for instance, Powered Para Gliders...).

So I am offeirng a brand new Simonini engine for sale.  I *think* it is a Simonini Mini 3, which you can read about here.  After I purchased it, we never started it up.  (Simoni makes several different engine models which look similar).

I'm offering it without reserve.  It will be a really great deal for someone.  I see that Simonini is offering this engine at the new price of $4144.

Starting bid is $25.  This engine will be posted for sale on eBay.

Simoni Engine for sale

Simonini Air Filter

Simonini Carburetor

Simononi exhaust manifold

Simonini motor mounts

Simonini Muffler mounts

Simonini Muffler

Simonini redrive

Simonini Muffler mount