On Jun 22, 4:20 pm, clare at snyder dot ontario dot canada wrote:

The ONE I'm aware of had bolts not properly installed.
The other one, the wings were torn off when a couple of
drug-compromized idiots put it into a dive or something that GREATLY
exceeded VNE and tried to pull it out, or something like that.
The Aeronca Champ would have suffered the same fate in both cases.


I'm a very strong supporter of Chris Heintz, I have CH701 plans and
parts I will someday build on, and I am aware the Heintz is a very
highly accredited designer. However, the earlier 601 aircraft do not
have these problems, and the 601XL was a version that they had to work
very hard to get into the LSA weight class. The XL skins and
structure is not nearly as over-built on this airplane as is normal in
the light aircraft world. You cannot simply blame this on drug-crazed
hippies. An Aeronca Champ flown in turbulence, or over redline speed
would not suffer the same fate. It is a more rigid aircraft with
higher structural margins in my opinion. You can walk up to a CH601
and move the tip of the horizontal stabilizer fore and aft a very
disturbing amount (I have on three separate aircraft). The loads are
SUPPOSED to be symmetrical, so it SHOULD not be an issue, but the
structure is very light and can be moved far more than a Champ.