I'm Ryan, a private pilot based in New Plymouth, New Zealand.

Ryan
Ryan

After getting my PPL in 2015 and doing some flying in NZ and Australia in a Cessna 152 and a Piper PA-28 Warrior II, I realised that hiring an aircraft was never going to be a satisfactory way to do the kind of flying I wanted to do, namely cross-country and touring with the family in a modern comfortable aircraft at reasonable speed. That means 4 seats, 400kg+ useful load, 140+ kt speed, and 500+ nm range.

The certified used market is generally old and maintenance-intensive, and the certified new market is prohibitively expensive. That leaves experimental...

The most practical options for a home-built are the Van's RV 10, and the Sling 4 or TSi. The Van's is a nice fast plane, but thirstier and slower to build than is ideal, leaving the Sling as the best choice for me. The upgrades from the 4 to the TSi are welcome and don't seem to add too much to the build time or complexity.

I had considered travelling to Oregon to complete a factory-assist build, but the outlook is not great given the pandemic. Consequently I'm going to construct a quick-build kit in my garage, and have had some initial discussions with the NZ distributors - slingaircraft.nz.

Sling TSi