There are cheaper powerplants, but builders will end up spending more because they will have to buy a propeller speed reduction unit, Panzera adds. “Mostly because it can go direct-drive”-the propeller is bolted directly to the crankshaft and turns at the engine’s rpm. “The Volkswagen conversion engine seems to be the best bang for the buck,” says Pat Panzera, editor and publisher of Contact! magazine, which covers kitplane and homebuilt powerplants. The Easy Eagle’s powerplant, a basic hand-start, single-ignition, 1,915-cc VW engine, goes for $3,620, including the carburetor but not the exhaust system. One of the most expensive parts of any homebuilt is the engine. It ends up heavy and impossibly expensive.” If you’re going to build an airplane for that little, warns Scott, “you have to keep it down to what you absolutely need.” Some buyers, he says, “try to imagine everything they can possibly do in an airplane…. Or you can build an affordable airplane from scratch. A few kits out there fall in your price range: Steve Bennett, owner of kit dealer Great Plains Aircraft in Boys Town, Nebraska, sells an aircraft called the Easy Eagle for $8,000. But if your budget tops out around $10,000, you do have options.
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