Chinook Ultralight

With the increased popularity of piloting an ultralight aircraft, it comes as no surprise that there is an increase in the makes and models. It can be very difficult to figure out which one will suit your needs. For most, the beginning of the process is reading up on as many as you can.

As you surf through the Internet there is one name you may come across and depending on what website you hit first you will either find yourself completely enamored with it, or terrified to even consider it. You may wonder why you can get two different feelings about the Chinook Ultralight but the answer is relatively simple – there have been two different companies producing aircrafts by that name.

The Chinook WT-11 was produced by Birdman Enterprises up until 1988. This Chinook had quite a few shortcomings and you will likely see many incident reports online involving this aircraft. There were four different problem areas with this plane:

• Engine – Although it had one of the most dependable engines on the market, the Rotax 277, problems have been found with the engine mounts, the belt drive system, and the exhaust system and even more recently with the wrist pin bearings.
• Wing – Incidents under which the wings twist under air loads.
• Airframe – Incidents of accidents resulting from fatigue failure of the body tube that supports the tail assembly as well as other deficiencies in the assembly that cause loss of control.
• Landing Gear

If you stop browsing after seeing the above information you will have missed reading about the Chinook Plus 2, a two place ultralight aircraft that has been produced since 1992 by A.S.A.P. (Aircraft Sales and Parts).  Brent Holomis owned a Chinook 2S, the two-seat model produced by Birdman Enterprises, when that company went out of business. He saw that there would be a need for someone to provide parts to the Birdman Chinooks that were out in the market so he began A.S.A.P. in 1988 initially for supplying parts.

In 1989, working with the University of Alberta, Brent redesigned the Chinook 2S also as a two-seater but with a new wing with a span of 32 ft. instead of the original 37 ft. He also designed it with a lower aspect ratio, more ribs and covered with Ceconite instead of Dacron. He also redesigned the landing gear.

The Chinook Plus 2 can be purchased as a kit, with your choice of the following engines:

• Rotax 912
• Rotax 503
• HKS 700E
• Rotax 582

It is important to keep in mind that the Chinook Plus 2 is a powerful plane and is not recommended for beginner pilots as it takes time to adapt to its handling. Many pilots report that they like it being a tandem two-seat instead of side-by-side so that solo flights feel roomier.

Although you may find yourself making some modifications, the Chinook Plus 2 kit is a good way to go. The company rates the plane at 220 hours of labor to complete, even for a first time builder. This does not count modifications, of course, so you may want to allow more time than that.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, April 20th, 2010 at 2:04 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.