I am interested in the Seagull Zero but it only comes in a silver color. Any one have one of these and how is the visibility in the air? Is the plane a nice flyer?? [8D]

My experience with this plane has been a learning one. I got three flights in before this beautiful bird drilled in on a deadstick landing. I am no stranger to the deadstick landing. The plane is very tailheavy, and will require a lot of weight in the nose. Fortunately, I stuck it in the mud, which limited the damage to broken formers, wing saddle, and wingtip. The cowl stood up very well, but the engine mount and my carb didn't. I am almost finished with the restoration. All in all, this is a pretty tough bird. In flight the silver color is easy enough to see in sunshine or overcast. When I replace the weight in the nose, I will use strip lead, and epoxy it to the furthest forward point in the LOWER portion of the cowl. I had the weight stacked on top of the engine mount. The battery was over the line of thrust also. I believe this caused a TOP HEAVY condition, leading to a tip stall condition. It "capsized" like a boat with the ballast above the waterline. I am NOT going to let this plane beat me!! It will have some scars, however, I will let everyone know how the project turns out.[>:]

My son and I are building one of these right now. We are solving the tail heavy condition by installing a BAE on the firewall. That is a Magnum .91 four stroke. We moved the firewall back about 1.25 inches, so the prop washer was not too far in front of the cowl. We have not installed the radio gear and pushrods yet, but our estimation is that the weight and balance will be just about right without a lot of lead weight.

If you do a search, there are several threads already posted here about the Seagull Zero, a lot of good information. Like throw the supplied clevises away and stuff like that.

Regards from old bird.

Hi Guys, I finished the re-build on my Seagull Zero. SUCCESS !!! By knocking out the former inside the engine mount box, I was able to put the battery in below the thrust line. (In the bottom of the box) I made two bracket arms out of 1/2 X 1/8 X 6" aluminum and mounted each to the lowermost sides of the box. I added some wood to the inside of the box to have a more solid mount. I cut three Prather stick on weights in half and removed the double sided tape. I drilled and screwed three half-sections (each 3" long) to each bracket arm and mounted them so that they came flush to the end. I left room to mount a fourth piece if needed. With 9 ounces of lead as far forward as I could get it, parallel to the leading edge of the wing, a K&B .40 with an 11X5 prop pulls it around surprisingly well! The complete fuselage with radio, cowl, and engine w/ muffler, without the wing attached, balanced like a football! Attach the wing, and the lateral balance comes right to upright dead center from any angle. This arrangement allows for good CG balance as well. It is much more stable, and I'm not afraid of it anymore. It's fun to fly!! Make sure you mount the weighted bracket arms with the engine and muffler attached so they don't touch any part of the engine, muffler or cowl. Bend to adjust if needed.

Hello, I flew my silver zero for the first time today and thought it was easy to see, no noticable problems. I flew it high and far out, the big red dots are very easy to see.
Denny