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My name is Paul Kuntz, and I will be using this web site to describe my progress as I construct a kit for the aircraft
pictured on the left. This plane is a motor glider, manufactured by Pipistrel D.O.O., located in the lovely town of
Ajdovscina, Slovenia. That's me in the picture on the right (red shirt), with my wife, Mary and Ivo Boscarol, the CEO
of Pipistrel. The picture was taken at the Pipistrel factory in Slovenia in April, 2006 when we visited to look at the
aircraft and the factory, and to fly with the factory pilot. The factory web site is: http://www.pipistrel.si/intro The specific model that I am building is the Sinus 912 (That's pronounced seen-us, not sine-us). The Pipistrel
line of aircraft is imported into the US by Pipistrel USA http://Pipistrel-USA.com Briefly, the Sinus 912 is two-place, side by side, high wing aircraft, powered by the Rotax 912
80 hp engine. It weighs 612 lbs empty, 1200 pounds max take off, has a controllable-pitch feathering propeller, a 15-meter
wing with a 30:1 glide ratio, cruises at 110 knots while consuming 3.1 gal of fuel per hour, with a range of 650 NM.
There's plenty of room and load capacity for two people, luggage and full fuel (26 gallons). All in all, it's just a
delightful aircraft.
The Sinus has a sister aircraft -- the Virus (pronounced Veer-us). It is identical in
all respects to the Sinus, except that the wing is truncated just outboard of the flaperons, giving it a 12.5 meter span.
The shorter wing yields a 120 knot cruise at the expense of glide ratio, which is reduced to 24:1. Both the Sinus and
Virus are available in tail wheel or nose wheel configuration. Pipistrel introduced the Virus Short Wing (Virus SW)
in 2007, which has a 10.7 meter wing with impressive performance of 147 knot cruise at 75 percent power on the 100 HP Rotax
912 ULS and is fully aerobatic, although with reduced glide performance. Pipistrel has continued with innovative development,
now offering USA Light Sport versions of all three models, and recently announced a removable wingtip version of the Sinus
for easier hangaring, as well as the very practical and reasonably-priced Alpha Trainer. The latest addition to this
product line is a pure electric version of the Alpha Trainer, called the Alpha Electro.
So,
please use the links on the left to see more about the purchase and shipping process, the FAA kit evaluation, and follow my
progress through the kit build process.
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What's New?
August 11th-27th, 2015 It's been awhile since I have updated this site. In the past two
years I've flown 200 hours, mostly under power, including two trips to EAA AirVenture Oshkosh (2013 and 2015). I had
one memorable hour-long soaring experience in wave near my home base in Sequim, Washington. I have also added some things,
including seat back support panels, a Dynon ADS-B In receiver for panel display of traffic and weather information, a white
tail light, a landing light, Dynon wi-fi adapter, new push-to-talk microphone switches on the sticks, a dedicated USB charger
jack, and made a few minor repairs.
8/11: Expanded description of the Phase
1 flight test period (Flight Test page) and added a description of seat back support panels (Fuselage Interior page - July
3, 2013 entry). 8/12: Added some more detail on the wing installation-removal cradles to the Wings page
(Wings page - June 18, 2011 entry). 8/13: Added description of installing a Dynon ADS-B weather
and traffic receiver (Instruments and Avionics page - August 22, 2013 entry). 8/27: Added the Going Places
page, with description of the trip to Oshkosh AirVenture 2013
I'll be
updating the site over the next several days to describe more of these changes, plus some of my flight experiences. Total hands-on time for the entire construction period: 782.4 hours. This does not include
time spent studying the kit manual and deciding how to approach things, writing emails to the Pipistrel factory, unpacking
and inventorying parts, updating my builder's log and maintaining this web site.
Pipistrel Builders Information Exchange
If you have questions or want to exchange information with other
Pipistrel kit builders or owner/operators, please join the Yahooo Pipistrel on-line builders group. You can do this
by going to http://groups.yahoo.com/group/pipistrel and click on the Join This Group! link on the right side of the page.
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