The Story

I retired in June of 2000 and decided that I’d pursue one of my childhood dreams of becoming a pilot.  I took my checkride in November of 2000 and got my “wings”.   About a year later, I purchased a Piper Warrior in parnership with a friend.  We owned that until March of 2006 when we sold it.  My partner decided he wanted a bigger plane and I wanted a smaller, more economical plane.  I had joined the EAA (Experimental Aircraft Association) in 2001 and got interested in the idea of building a plane. I thought it might be something to keep me from being bored during the winter when there’s not much to do, but I didn’t want something that would be a second career for the next several years. 

I did a lot of research on the various kit planes on the market. I was looking for a plane that was relatively fast, carried a lot of baggage, was inexpensive to fly and maintain, and could be assembled in a reasonable amount of time.  Estimated assembly times for kit planes range from 500 hours to well over 2000 hours.  I was looking for something on the low end of the range.  I finally settled on the Zenith Zodiac series of planes.  There are 3 different Zodiac models with the main difference between them being the wing design.  I decided that any of the 3 models would be fine and that I’d try to find a deal on a partially completed kit.  I located a partially completed Zodiac 601 HDS series kit airplane in May 2006 in Grand Rapids, Michigan.  It appeared to me that he had completed  (from a volume perspective) about half the plane.  However, I was soon to learn that there’s great truth in the old homebuilder’s saying “90% done, 90% to go”.  I contacted the Technical Advisor from the local EAA chapter in Grand Rapids and asked him if he’d go over and have a look at the kit to see if it appeared to be assembled well up to this point.  He called me back after his inspection and said that it looked really nice and the workmanship was top-notch.  I contacted the owner and said we had a deal.

I was concerned about damaging  some of the fragile semi-assembled kit components on the way home so before heading up there we visited our local  trash depository and requisitioned some foam rubber cushions from various old chairs and sofas that were laying about.  We also brought along several rolls of duck tape, all the blankets we had laying about, a dozen or so ratcheting tie-downs, and a bunch of bungee cords. I borrowed a trailer from a friend, then Maggie and I headed up to Grand Rapids to haul it home.

We arrived in Grand Rapids in the early afternoon and spent the rest of the day loading up the trailer and truck.  We spent about 6 hours the following day finishing up the packing.  I was very concerned that we wouldn’t be able to get everything on the trailer but we finally did.  Then we headed on down the road.  It took us about 12 hours to get home (4 hours longer than it took to get up there), due to frequent stops to check the load.  Every time we stopped I would find another spot on the load that needed “ducking”.   I was wishing I’d brought along another 2 rolls of duck tape. We got some really strange looks as we headed down the highway at 55 mph with our Beverly Hillbillies load.  We finally got home in the late evening.  I took a few pictures the following morning, then spent several hours unloading and storing all the kit parts.  I spent the next 2 weeks going over the plans in order to get a mental picture of how everything fit together.  Then I started working on the firewall.  I continued working on the plane until this past week (mid-June 2007) when I finally put on the finishing touches.  My FAA airworthiness inspection will be the first week of July.  Before the inspection there’s a mountain of paperwork to complete and I will need to perform a weight and balance check on the plane.  I hope to be flying by mid July, about 2 months later than I had originally anticipated.  Considering how much more work it’s been than I had estimated, that’s not too bad.  I’ve put about 475 hours into building the plane.  Based upon what I’ve learned from other builders, I estimate that the original owner must have put about 150 to 200 hours into it.  Zenith says it should take about 500 to 600 hours to build the plane so I guess they’re fairly accurate.  I haven’t had the plane painted yet because I want to make sure I won’t have to take anything apart to fix a problem before I paint it.