Welcome fellow aircraft builders and aviation enthusiasts! My channel showcases the scratch-build progress and tips for construction of my Zenith Aircraft STOL CH 750. The STOL CH 750 is a two-place, amateur-built airplane, designed by Zenith Aircraft Company. I'll be installing a 1966 Chevrolet Corvair 6-cylinder, air-cooled, 100-horsepower engine. My main goal is to help people avoid making rookie mistakes (by seeing my struggles with them) while simply having fun. I'm no professional videographer, RU-vidr or airplane builder, but hopefully the information is useful to others with similar projects! Please feel free to comment and subscribe! Thanks for visiting, and good luck with your projects.
Doing okay. Thanks for the inquiry. Project has been on hold for a while. Hoping to restart it in the next year or so. Unfortunately, life has taken some unexpected turns since my last video.
Dude. Thank you for making these. I couldn't find anything from Zenith on the horizontal stab. building and got stuck with so many questions probably overthinking it...
I made a survival vest too but as usual I got carried away & it became somewhat heavy. Gear-a- holic! I definitely need to declutter. I also wear cargo pants & managed to put 2 military pilots flasks with some energy bars in them for extra measure. My wallet & pocketknife are in my regular pocket while my Bic lighter & mini flashlight are in the other one. My Leatherman Wave+ is clipped to my belt. Hopefully i don't lose my pants! Hope that God's your copilot. Stay careful. Great presentation.
Unfortunately I don’t see any way of actually calling for help. I’m not talking about a mirror or whistle. I mean like a radio and PLB. A survival vest is supposed to help keep you alive for a very short time until recuse can arrive. But if they have no way of knowing you need help, it might be a very long time until someone realizes you are gone, then they need to figure out where you might be based on where you were last known, hopefully it’s accurate, and hopefully they see your mirror or hear a whistle. Looking at past and current airmen survival vests, I recommend you get a hand held radio. Either HAM (if you only use it for emergencies and never to just chat on, you can have and use it. Anyone can transmit in ham without a license in an emergency situation), or a VHF air band radio. Also, a small emergency personal locator beacon (PLB). I recommend the ARTEX as it is smaller than most other PLBs, does not require a subscription like other PLBs on the market do, and in addition to using GPS, also transmits a low power blip signal on 121.5 MHz to be more accurately homed in on. Most new PLBs do not have that homing beacon anymore. Oh and a flare gun.
A bit late,but you could pre-mark the water level on the bags that your tablet can purify. This way you don't have to guess on the go. Doesn't have to be big, a simple permamarker tick would do.
I really enjoyed this video!! One thing that I would add would be a CAT tourniquet. If you severed an artery in your arm, you would need to apply a tourniquet with only one arm. The CAT TQ was designed specifically for this. 😎
@@GregsZenithSTOLCH750 I’m still on the fence. Both Corvair & VW has their merit. I love the 6cy for safety margin. If corvair, I would go with FlyCorvair since that guy is so animated & passionate on his channel. For VW, I don’t know who I would go with. AeroVee & RevMaster seem to be the ones “in my face” on YT searches. A coworker, he’s into VW. He suggest the VW due to more (automotive) parts available, his experience. He said it’s still possible to get a new created engine if i search hard enough. Ultimately, I wish corvair & vw has a diesel version of their engines. Delta Hawk or Gemini (I think) caught my interest but they were on the higher end of cost. The airplane I’m looking into is a Quickie. It’s light enough that I can get away with it being an LSA. One option is to put an elec motor just to fly within a tiny radius, no cross country. In some future, I can install something that would allow cross country.
@@peterxyz3541 I think both Corvair and VW are valid options if they meet your power/weight requirements for the airframe you select. If you've never built an airplane or converted an engine for flight duty, I would follow some kind of proven airframe/engine combination so you don't have to solve a lot of engineering/fabrication problems. AeroVee, Revmaster and Great Plains Aircraft Supply are the "big 3" when it comes to VW engines, as far as I understand it. Parts availability for the Corvair is currently pretty solid (and way better now than when I started my conversion), whether it's stock parts or the flight conversion parts. AeroMomentum and Viking are other engine options based on more modern tech but aren't kit engines. Electric would be an awesome thing but you're diving into a lot of unknown territory there, depending on the airframe & a lot of other factors. Also, I wouldn't get too hung up on the engine until you've actually built/bought the airframe. I started with the engine conversion in 2004 and I'm still waiting for the machine work to be finished (long story). It's kind of a backwards way to do it, and I don't recommend it.
The clearest most useful review of 30 gallon oiled models. They all look the same to the novice like me but I missed dual cylinders, cast iron blocks,warranty etc. thank you!
Hello Greg, hope this message finds you and your family doing well. I am finally starting my scratch build Zenith CH750. It’s been a long time coming. The aluminum has almost doubled in price. I want to order all the aluminum at one time to save on shipping cost. Could you let me know how many sheets of each thickness needed? You made a video and said the amounts on a couple of thicknesses. It would be so appropriated. I’m still looking forward to new videos from you in the future. Thanks for making those videos.
The complete bill of materials you'd need are highly dependent on what version of the plans you have, what substitutions you'll make (for example, zenith calls for .093" angle extrusion - a custom size for which most of us substitute .125"). Zenith never put out a materials list for the 750 in any iteration. The closest I found was on Zenith.aero, for a Edition 2 scratch build. This isn't the whole plane, but this is what I came up with as a minimum for my Edition 3 plans: .016” - 5 sheets, .020” - 9 sheets, .025” - 4 sheets, .032” - 2 sheets, .040” - 1 sheet, .063” - ½ sheet, .090” - ⅛ sheet, .125” - ⅛ sheet, 1”x1”x .125” angle - 48’, ¾” x ¾” x .125”, Misc. .250” and .500”, Assorted 4130 sheet and tubing. None of that accounts for mistakes and also isn't enough to do the options or what's in the finishing kit.
Thanks Greg, that is great information. My plans are the addition 4. Just wanted to order as much at one time that I could. At $180 per 4x12 sheet, it could add up pretty fast. You listed the .025 sheet with no quantity. Did you have a rough idea how many of .025 sheet needed? Thanks
I'm still around. Content & the Zenith project are on indefinite hold for now for personal life issues. Hope to restart the project and make content again in the near future. Glad my videos have been useful.
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No idea, since rivet pitch is usually specified for a shear/pull strength requirement. As far as I know, an airtight joint would require some kind of sealant before rivets are put in place, but I'm not an engineer and that's just a guess based on what I've read.
Super helpful video!!! Thank You So Much for taking the time to make this!!! Excellent editing too, video was straight to the point with no extra useless conversation. Great Job!
Hi Greg. What gauge aluminum are the ribs made of? I am looking at the manual and it says .025 so 1/4 but that can't be right. This looks like 1/16 or 1/8th ?? Thanks man
It is indeed .025" sheet, which is 25/1000 inches thick. 1/4 would be .250, not .025." Aircraft aluminum is sold in thicknesses in thousandths of an inch for sheet in the U.S.A. Aluminum plate would be sold in 1/8" (.125) or 1/4" (.250), etc. In other parts of the world, it is sometimes sold by gauge.
@@GregsZenithSTOLCH750 ahh OK that lends a lot of clarification. I was watching you handle your nose ribs and looking at the thickness after just looking at my manual I was wondering what wasn't adding up... haha. I'm in Canada, so gauges are used.
I've added a new link to the Dave Clay Brake, which hopefully will resolve the need to request access after Google changed their security settings on Drive. If anyone has any trouble downloading the Dave Clay plans, please let me know.
I'm not sure I understand the question. Clecos are the aviation and racing industry standard for use as temporary rivets during fabrication and assembly. I buy all mine from aviation supply shops but I've never had any issues with them. They work great.
Hi I have been going through ur videos and they are amazing and filled with lot of information which is very helpful for new builders. I my self planning to scratch build zenith 750 and was doing research before I buy blue prints from zenith. I was trying to figure out the international shipping cost for the aluminium but unfortunately could not find the required number of sheets and extrusion prices required for the built. I would really appreciate if you could help me with the material list. Regards.
Hi, thanks for watching! There is no published materials list for the 750. As editions of the drawings/aircraft change, so do the required materials. Significant changes were made between the Edition 2 and 3 plans. A while ago, someone on the Zenith.Aero group put together an Edition 2 materials list for reference but this would not be accurate for a current version of the blueprints. I've linked it here so you can reference it but there will be some differences in what's required to fabricate the plane from a current edition of the blueprints: docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/0B0-6GVEviY-7STRDRG1nRk5RNmc/edit?usp=sharing&ouid=112958108910125426288&resourcekey=0-hSoqCxbf_0FdHNA32-wywQ&rtpof=true&sd=true
@@GregsZenithSTOLCH750 Thanks for the reply. Pls correct me if I am wrong so zenith does not tell you the material requirement when one buys the plans. I mean if now I purchase the latest edition plans would there be a list of required aluminium sheets along with the thickness.
@@captavsgill5960 That is correct. Zenith is primarily a kit manufacturer, so they don't provide materials lists to scratch builders. They support scratchbuilders with parts and blueprints and whatnot, but they do not provide a list of raw materials.
Your surgical tube can also be use as a pocket bellows for fire starting. It provides a concentrated stream of air when blowing to encouraging a newly started fir and keeps your face away from it. The second thing for fire is tinder. Take along a pencil sharpener. Even if the wood is wet when cut the slivers are only wet along the edges. They are easily lite. The process Leaves you with a very pointy stick. There are sharpeners for Carpenter pencils about three times the size of the school pencil ones but will process lager sticks. You might what to use better fishing line. Use Spyder Line or one of the newer super lines. They are the size of 10 lbs. test with the strength of 60. Sport fishing with lite tackle is all well and good. But you are talking survival fishing where a broken line means the loss of a meal but more important maybe the loss of you last hook from a limit supply. The rattle in your fishing kit might be lessened with sections of heat sealed straws stuffed with Vaseline cotton ball fire starters. The same can done with liquids and lotions in the first aid kit.
Cooking Pot Rich “Raspy” Shawver Here is an idea that I picked from Origami. Start with very heavy foil. Like those disposable oven liners the ones that look like a cheap cookie pan not simple heavy duty foil. Take a piece 13 X 13 inches. Clip a ½ X ½ inch square out of each corner. Fold each edge ¼ inch twice to form a rim. Fold so the rim will be on the outside. This gives a 12-inch square. Now you need to put in the creases to form the box. Fold in 1/4 or 3 inches of one end and crease. Do the same for the other side. Unfold and rotate 90 degrees. Take the other two sides and repeat the creases. This forms a crease pattern of a 6-inch center square 4 3-inch squares at the corners. The sides are then 3 X 6 inches. Now you fold the large square diagonally. But you only need to crease the portion that crosses the corner 3 X 3 square at the corners. For carrying you fold in the 4 sides to form a 6-inch square and the fold it in half. This gives a packet 3 X 6 inches, which happens to be approximately the size of a dollar bill. Making just right to slip into the bill compartment of a wallet. To set up you unfold the packet. Using the diagonal creases you form triangles at each corner. These start at the base of the box and extend out 3 inches at the top. Two of these triangles are then folded along the same side. The other two are folded along the opposite side. The tops of these triangles are tucked under the folded under the rims to help hold them in place. Making the box more ridged. This gives you a 6 X 6 inch pan 3 inches deep. The box is 108 cubic inches or almost 60 fluid ounces. Which is just 4 ounces shy of 2 quarts. Since you won’t fill it to the rim call it a quart and a half of usable space. Not bad for something that fits into a wallet. You can also slip a couple of paperclips over the ends to make it even more solid. Yes, repeated folding and unfolding plus the wear and tear from the friction in a wallet will eventually open holes and cause leaks. And once it has been used in a fire it will accelerate the deterioration. But because of the heavier gauge of the pans they last much longer than regular aluminum foil. I’ve gone through a couple both carrying and testing. They have lasted for several years or a half a dozen or so reuses before they became iffy.
