1st Production High Wing build has begun!
Posted: Thu Dec 23, 2021 7:03 am
Further to the Introduction post, I am excited to have begun building the first production High Wing Sling in the factory in an extended “factory assist” program in South Africa in November 2021. And yes - the high wing flies BEAUTIFULLY! Solid and stable yet light and responsive and ever so capable and accessible. Soooo excited!
It has been a great, and fun, honor to be the first to build this plane with the factory. The entire team has been great! Dayne and Dillon are our main accomplices, patiently teaching and assisting us every step of the way. They are spectacular! They have worked on and built the first two High Wing Prototypes and really really know the plane. Together we are working with the manuals and doing our best to ensure they are clear and accurate (they didn’t have manuals for the first two). As my husband and I have essentially no previous build experience, we are perfect test subjects to see how easy they are to follow.
I can not tell you how wonderful it has been to be able to walk over to the Research and Development when we run into issues or get ideas. Again, patience is the modus operandi. They listen, welcome our input on some design decisions, work with us on additional options we want to install, and patiently explain why something won't work or is not the best approach. We have been giving them feedback on the manuals and other aspects of the build and hope that will help make the Kit product and manual even better. We have enjoyed working closely with Vernon (I have included a link of a recent interview with Vernon below) and Jarryd as well as other in the R&D team. Kudos and gratitude to them all!
My build log is at http://www.slinghighwing.com and is primarily for myself and the DAR, but have been getting lots of requests from the Sling community and others to share my progress so enjoy. For those that have been though the process, kindly let me know you think I am aiming at the right level with my log, keeping in mind that this will be an elaborate factory assist. I see other builders posting about issues they run into, but given that part of my value add in this adventure is to identify those things so Sling can resolve them, I am not highlighting those, but will include that gotcha’s as best I can. I have more to post from my first visit and return mid January so stay tuned.
It has been a great, and fun, honor to be the first to build this plane with the factory. The entire team has been great! Dayne and Dillon are our main accomplices, patiently teaching and assisting us every step of the way. They are spectacular! They have worked on and built the first two High Wing Prototypes and really really know the plane. Together we are working with the manuals and doing our best to ensure they are clear and accurate (they didn’t have manuals for the first two). As my husband and I have essentially no previous build experience, we are perfect test subjects to see how easy they are to follow.
I can not tell you how wonderful it has been to be able to walk over to the Research and Development when we run into issues or get ideas. Again, patience is the modus operandi. They listen, welcome our input on some design decisions, work with us on additional options we want to install, and patiently explain why something won't work or is not the best approach. We have been giving them feedback on the manuals and other aspects of the build and hope that will help make the Kit product and manual even better. We have enjoyed working closely with Vernon (I have included a link of a recent interview with Vernon below) and Jarryd as well as other in the R&D team. Kudos and gratitude to them all!
My build log is at http://www.slinghighwing.com and is primarily for myself and the DAR, but have been getting lots of requests from the Sling community and others to share my progress so enjoy. For those that have been though the process, kindly let me know you think I am aiming at the right level with my log, keeping in mind that this will be an elaborate factory assist. I see other builders posting about issues they run into, but given that part of my value add in this adventure is to identify those things so Sling can resolve them, I am not highlighting those, but will include that gotcha’s as best I can. I have more to post from my first visit and return mid January so stay tuned.