By Jason Paur
December 7, 2011
Any pilot familiar with Van’s Aircraft probably could have guessed that when the company decided to build a Light Sport Aircraft, it would deliver a lot of performance and smiles for not a whole lot of money. For 40 years the kitplane company has built a long line of airplanes offering impressive all around performance on a relatively small budget. But there has always been a bit of a catch. You have to build the airplane yourself.
Van’s latest design is the RV-12. The two seat, 100 horsepower airplane fits the Federal Aviation Administration’s LSA category which requires airplanes to be limited to two seats, have a max weight of less than 1,320 pounds, and have a top speed of less than 120 knots (138 miles per hour) indicated airspeed and have fixed landing gear. Specifically the RV-12 is an E-LSA with the ‘E’ standing for experimental because it is an amateur or homebuilt aircraft.
With more than 150 already flying since the model was introduced just a few years ago, the RV-12 is proving to be a very popular airplane. And with good reason. The complete kit costs less than $64,000 and that includes everything you’ll need to go flying except for gas, oil and about 800 hours of your time.
We recently paid a visit to the Van’s Aircraft factory in Aurora, Oregon and were able to take the company’s RV-12 demonstrator up for a flight. Sitting along side me for the flight is Ken Scott, Van’s technical support guru and today’s demo pilot. Scott is also an RV-12 builder/owner and just exudes excitement over the performance availabe from such a relatively simple airplane.
“My lawn tractor is way more complicated than my airplane” he exclaims pointing out the lack of a suspension, steering or grass cutting systems. “And yesterday I was doing 126 knots straight and level on 100 horsepower!”
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