Just placed an order for a tail kit! I’ll update this thread as the build progresses
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Congrats! That’s an exciting step!
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Nice. Looking forward to seeing your progress.
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Thank you both - I’ve enjoyed watching both of your videos & they certainly played into the decision.
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Welcome! You will find many many useful things herein! Glad to see another Sonex builder!!
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Thanks! I’ve already learned quite a bit from the community here.
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Great!
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My plan was to take a wait-and-see approach to see how the ownership transition worked out, but the final 50% of the tail kit was charged the other day and my kit will be here on the 16th!
I’m still going to hold off on ordering other kits, but I get to work on something in the meantime!
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Whether you build the entire plane or not, I feel like building the tail kit is enjoyable entertainment and great experience. I found myself wishing I had bought a tail kit a long time ago. Had I, maybe I would have had a -B model or something else by now.
Yep, that’s the hope!
I ordered a Zenith rudder kit when Sonex closed and enjoyed building that. I was actually a few days away from ordering the zenith tail kit when sonex re-opened.
I’m going to build the tail kit & re-evaluate at the end of that process, but I’m fairly certain that I’ll end up building a highwing as long as Sonex remains operational.
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Our Chapter is building a 650. I find the Sonex plans are much much better and easier to work with and follow. If I were building that 650 by myself and not with the Chapter group I don’t know that I could get through the hurdles and questions. I think it’s an older 650 kit, I’d like to compare it to the plans and instructions Zenith produces now, if much has changed. I had no issues or questions with the Sonex plans.
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Awesome! Glad to see you engaged and also that Sonex is shipping.
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Yeah, I’ve taken a very initial look at the plans & they seem quite clean.
It is certainly exciting to see.
I looked at other options & nothing could really match the Highwing - especially since I’m too tall for a B-model!
I’ve completed the inventory & the only backordered item was the piano hinges. My assumption is that the UPS notification I received earlier this week has them.
I’ve also done a very quick review of the plans & one odd item is SHX-V01-02. The kit includes 3 (1 for the vertical & 2 for the horizontal assemblies), but one of them is labeled “Use on Vertical Only”. As far as I can tell, the only difference is that it has slightly different pilot hole spacing & doesn’t have the rev A label.
It isn’t terribly important, but I’d be interested in knowing why they didn’t use a different part number or call out the rev a designation in the BoM.
It will be a bit before I’m able to actually start the build - I wasn’t expecting the kit anytime soon so still need to build a workbench.
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I have the three marked the same way. These hold the fiberglass tips for horz and vert stabs. Chris Atwood had a post that the early kits had the three root holes did not match the rib holes in the structures. It appears to have been fixed in later kits. Not sure why they do not have separate callouts.
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Love the old sckool white sticker!
Yep, I get one to clean off!
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On the early tail kits these were all the same parts thus the labeling. However, the end ribs in the horizontal have different spacing. Somehow the wrong spacing wound up being saved in the horizontal on Solidworks and not caught pre-production. The easier route for people with assembled tails and the simpler way to fix the issue for future builders was to change the tip rib hole spacing to match that of the end rib. Going all the way back and fixing it at the root of the issue means the spar flange holes on the tip would need to be changed and the end ribs plus new tip ribs. Much easier to match new tip ribs to the existing holes. = 1 new part per side instead of 3 new parts. Especially for those that already assembled the horizontal before discovering this. I was the first customer to complete a HW tail assembly and this was the only part problem I ran into. Mark sent new ones out in 2 days. Pretty good for a brand new design. There was 1 other mismeasurement on the rudder skin which is updated as well so make sure you are using the latest revision for each plan page you start on. The only other issues I ran into were just typo/spelling errors. Nothing that could trip you up. I suppose the part callout is not changed because then every set of HW tail plans already printed would need to be updated in many places. 1 little sticker makes it clear where to use each. Enjoy!
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