Hi, I'm Lee, In the summer of 2006 I bought Wade Braaten's Affordaplane project. The Affordaplane is an ultralight style aircraft. My research did not reveal any bad flying characteristics as long as it was powered by an engine of sufficient horsepower. There have been reports of difficulty in getting the plans from the designer, but I had no problem. Hopefully these kinds of problems have all been resolved by now. You can order hard copy plans, a CD with the plans on them, or download them in PDF format. I opted for the Internet download method, and printed the plans from the PDF files. That is the cheapest way and I would recommend it. But if you do this, PLEASE make backup copies of the PDF files AND the password required to open those files. Wade began the project in a one car garage and built an ingenious table that folded up against the wall, so after a day of building his wife could still park the car. Hey, peace in the family is a pretty important too! Half the battle of a big project is convincing the family. Hats off to Wade for finding a way to start his project AND allow his wife to park in the garage. |
| The A-plane is assembled using "match hole drilling," a process that has been successful in the gyroplane community for many years. If you can drill a straight hole, you can build the Affordaplane. The frame material is 2 x 2 6061 T-6 aluminum tubing. (6061 T-6 aluminum tubing is the aircraft grade material.) The bolts used throughout are AN aviation bolts. Here is a good picture of the fuselage construction process. |
| Wade’s workmanship was good – the tubing is assembled tight and square. It is obvious that he intended to strap himself into this little airplane and fly away. When building an airplane a bit of perfectionism is a good thing! Below we see the basic frame completed. |
| The plans show a Rotax 477 two cycle engine mount, but the engine in this project is an inverted two cycle snowmobile engine. The reason for inverting the engine is to achieve the proper thrust line with a belt driven power reduction unit. And an inverted engine will improve the view over the nose. The plans engine mount will not work at all so Wade used a U shape design patterned after the successful installation in Mike Robbins’s Affordaplane. In the picture below you can see the U shape engine mount and the engine in the background. I may post another picture of this later. |
| A-Plane Links Official Affordaplane Website Mike's A-Plane Wade's A-Plane If you have an Affordaplane website contact me and I'll list it here |
| Ultralight Links The Ultralight Homepage The Homebuilt Homepage Yahoo Cheap Aircraft group Green Country UFO |
| Wade has allowed me to reproduce His Affordaplane Web Page at Thinker's Nest and it gives more details about the early stages of this airplane. The picture below shows the state of the Affordaplane when I bought it from Wade. Thanks Wade for the effort and thought you've put into this project so far. Now we'll see if I can keep it going here at Thinker's Nest! |
| Credits: All photos and aircraft construction displayed on this page by Wade Braaten. |
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| Thinker's Nest Lee's Affordaplane |
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