A little of Dean's background history
I've always been interested in flying. Making models as a child. Growing up on my parents family farm, my parents instilled a respect, love, and pride for doing things yourself. As a young adult my brother Larry introduced me to RC planes. A few years later my brothers and I bought our first Ultralight airplane, a Weedhopper. A few years went by, we picked up more ultra lights and my brother Larry got his private pilot license. Soon after he purchased his Cessna 170.
A few years ago a co-worker and friend, Bryan Koepke, renewed my interest in flying as a private pilot. I went through the Cessna CD training program and got my private pilot. But the costs of owning and maintaining a small plane was an issue with owning our own plane.
A long time co-worker and friend, Cliff Davies, has been showing me kit plane pictures for years. Through his influence and a few others, I started looking at kit planes. I came close to purchasing a kit fox. I liked the portability built into these little planes. But I really wanted a 4 seat plane. After looking at many kit planes, I was drawn to the Zenith Aircraft products. As I'm no small pilot, I was drawn to the hearty CH701 and CH801 aircraft. I was excited by there wide cabin areas. As a low hour pilot, I was also looking for an easy to fly aircraft. One of our regular destinations would be my parents farm in NE Colorado, a 100 mile trip and a pasture to land on. So a rugged short field aircraft was a priority. My wife and I visited the Zenith Aircraft factory in Missouri, and after a demo flight with there staff, we were both sold on the CH801. After flying 172's, the ease of control and the visibility in the 801 was unbelievable.
My wife Sherrie and I bought the entire kit package with the extended tanks and marker light kit. We decided to save the shipping costs and scheduled our pickup at one of the scheduled building workshops, which we registered for. It was a wonderful experience. We highly recommend there workshops. You meet other people with the same interests. The entire staff is friendly and helpful. I think that everyone that attended our workshop got an opportunity for a demo flight in the model they were interested in. In a few days you've worked with the basic tools and completed the rudder assembly for the specific aircraft you signed up for. See the Zenith Air web site for more details on there scheduled workshops.