10 Best Experimental Airplanes to Build and Operate 

Thank you very much Reed, I just pinned your commented, viewers will find it helpful for sure

@@Dwaynesaviation My pleasure.. I " stumbled " upon your channel and started viewing your past videos . Don't know how I missed your channel this long. Do you fly professionally or just pleasure? Where are you based? Anyway.. subscribing now and looking forward to seeing more of your work!

I don't fly professionally, my base is Halifax... I've been around light airplanes and I love them, I'm working on building a Sling 2 by next year

I agree the zenith line is amazing the factory and people are as solid as it gets great aircrafts and talk about short runway needed for takeoff!

Lancair Evolution will now be made by JMB (makers of the wonderful VL3) and are now looking into German-made heated de-icing system as an upgrade to current and future Evolutions (thanks to Experimental flexibility).

@@abel4776 Seriously? If true, that would be FANTASTIC. I want one.

@@speedomars3869 Best platform in its class. Epic is another level of awesome too. Well have to wait for the DarkAero and see how much it will be.

@@abel4776 Will be interesting to see what price JMB brings the plane in at...I wanted an Evolution right at the time they had the crashes and folded up. I had a builder lined up and everything. I ended up ordering and its nearly finished, a Velocity. If the Evolution is real again, I will sell the Velocity new. DarkAero has been very slow, but it looks like a fun plane. Epic is way over priced. Nice plane, but they want $3.5 million for it. At that price might as well get the Cirrus SF50.

@@speedomars3869 Wow you were steps away from an Evo! Not sure how it will play out though, now that it is coming from Europe. I'm guessing kits will be sold and transferred to U.S.? Let's hope so. Is the Velocity a good platform though? Don't know much about it.

Yes... That's a great idea, I'll consider making them

The last aircraft in this video, the Vans RV-12, will do that.

Mixture full rich. Probably hot start

Pete Smith did you build yourself. What build package did you use. What is your background was the build challenging?

The avionics in Experimentals are different in every build. Most people these days are going with glass panels from Dynon, Garmin, etc. I prefer Dynon for lower cost and easier usage, but either way they’re 21st century tech. My fully capable autopilot cost $1,500. Dirt cheap.

Thanks for the recommendation.... What's the best 10 experimental airplanes to you?

@@Dwaynesaviation I would recommend planes that are most popular and most often build, like Sonex, KR2, MiniMax/Himax, Hummel, Sling, Kolb, Zenith, Fisher Flying Products, KitFox, etc... There is plenty not too expensive experimental planes available and are being built and flying all over the world. Quantity wise in way bigger numbers than Lancair or RVs. Do not get me wrong, but your list apart of Velocity is mostly Lancair and RV, where Lancair is really out of reach for most people, not worth to be mentioned unless you care only about speed, as performance is not just a speed alone. As you noticed all listed companies I provided did not mention any particular models, I will leave this research for you, as it depends on the mission of the plane. I hope to see a new and revise list of the best and most popular experimental aircraft of 2020-2021. Good Luck!.

Popularity is not the same as best. The kartrashians had many viewers but they were still trash. Lancair is simply head and shoulders above the rest. But interestingly the king of kings the Lancair IV-P, is not listed here :) That said, it could be done significantly better than that. But no one has done it. IV-P stands unchallenged. The best selling Cirrus SR22 certainly can't match it.

@@DanFrederiksen Once again, you are missing a point here. The best is the one that is selling best, the rest is just something that exists and is either too expensive or unavailable. The factor is simple -> Demand and Price, so if the price is right the demand is high and that is why the product is best for the money you are paying for it. If you are looking for performance then jets will bit sh*t out of props but how many jet planes are available on the market today? How much are they? What is the cost for operations and insurance? BD5 jet is the best example here... There are planes made a long time ago where performance was extraordinary as for today's standards but apart from knowing these planes and even prototypes, I do not see them flying. SR22 is best because the price to performance ratio and safety is simply best! SR22 is easier to fly than any Lancair aircraft and you are buying a factory-made and ready-to-fly plane rather than a kit or secondhand. It is even stupid to compare these ones. Be real and look what the demand is and at what price. Concord is not flying as tickets were too expensive, one accident was enough to terminate the whole Concorde program, due to price and demand and at the same time, please do not tell me that people do not want to fly faster?! They do, but they are not willing to pay a premium price for such a fast fly (at least not every one of them).

@@michaelksiezopolski I'm a polymath genius, I did not miss your oddly arbitrary and frankly quite unintelligent point that sales determine which is best. By that argument the original VW beetle is the best car ever and that's just not quite the whole truth, is it. Or an F150 as a more recent impressively embarrassing display of stupidity. There is a tendency that good value for money will sell better but it's only a tendency and doesn't account for the particular complexity there is in GA. A Lancair IV-P could be produced for a very manageable price and thus might well outsell Cirrus SR22. But it was never for sale. Still a better plane. The BD5 is a quite noteworthy plane. It cruised at 370km/h with a 70HP engine. It's not necessarily the ultimate configuration as a 1 seater but it's a good datapoint.

Lol.. Why?

Rotax engines have roughly the same reliability as Lycoming and Continental. That's actual data, not anecdotes. There are over 600 Slings flying worldwide and I've yet to hear of an in-flight engine failure. The Slings are very efficient, so would certainly deserve to be on this list.

Rotax is the highest quality, most reliable small aircraft engine made. They are the most technologically sophisticated also.

I have 600+ hours on my 912ULS without as much as a burp. 100% reliable, starts easily no matter the weather, and it’s glass smooth. The only thing I don’t really like is balancing the carbs, and that’s only difficult when I can’t find a helper. I can do it alone, but it takes a bit longer.

Silly and untrue comment.

@@CraigMaiman Even if petroleum disappears in the future, prop planes will probably be the easiest aircraft to keep in the skys.

Petrol won't bw gone in the next 50-100 years. It will get more expensive and as ( and when) better energy sources become available they will be adopted and displace petrol.

@@scottwhitcher265 you cannot extract petrol and its an alternative energy source that will be depleted so you wont be driving flying bricks.

Almost half the planes listed are not "plastic" airplanes. The Vans and the Slings are all-metal aircraft.

I wonder why the BD-4C was left out... that's my dream plane😊

The Sportsman is high-wing.

Sling is working on a high wing TSi.