Pilot report rating on the Aventura II amphibious light sport aircraft. |
| Rating from 1 to 10 with 10 being the best or easiest. | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 |
| Design - Structure, history, safety, resale value, | | | | | | | | | |  |
| The Aventura II, has a sound history, safety record and holds it's resale value. It's bolt together construction allows quick and easy repair and replacement of parts. Other than regular engine maintenance, and control system lubrication the plane is literally maintenance free. The covering material is dacron sail cloth which requires a UV barrier be applied and touched up every couple of years. |
| Kit - Construction style, complexity, knowledge requirement | | | | | | | | | | |
| It is a relatively simple kit to construct. You basically start from the main landing gear and work back, then forward. Wings are simple bolt together ladder style construction, with wire bracing. |
| Factory - Years in business, kits produced, kits flying. | | | | | | | | | | |
| The plane has been produced since 1994. Aero Adventures has been building them since 2002. Over 120 are currently flying. |
| Manuals - Ease of reading, completeness, drawings and diagrams | | | | | | | | | | |
| The construction manuals in the past were not very good. Bob Boswell of Aero Adventures indicates that they now have new manuals, which have been updated, with parts and description boxes. Plus additional pages of information with reference to FAA doc. for experimental aircraft. The new manual include CAD drawings, and come in a 3 ring binder, and will be shipped with kits starting June of 2007. |
| Cockpit - Comfort, noise, visibility, | | | | | | | | | | |
| The Aventura II is a very comfortable plane to fly, trim, flaps, throttle, sticks are all comfortable located. Visibility is excellent. Noise in the cabin is is good when you consider the plane is being flown with no doors, a lot like driving a convertible. |
| Ground handling and suspension - System, complexity, does it work | | | | | | | | | | |
| Ground handling for a tail dragger is good. But the overhead thrust will take some pilots a little getting use to. Suspension is via the flex in the landing gear and use of low pressure tires. On water the hull performance is one of the best I have ever flown on. |
| Flight Controls - Pressure, comfort, effectiveness, | | | | | | | | | | |
| This is one area where I was disappointed. Pressures on the control systems were about the same as the BUC II. Which were heavy. I expected that they would have been redesigned to be lighter. |
| Propulsion Package - Reliability, noise, vibration, | | | | | | | | | | |
| The Rotax 912 S mates to the Aventura II like they were made for each other. It has proven to be a reliable power plant. The engine mount passed no vibration through to the airframe that I noticed. The only negative experienced was the hard starting. The engine temperatures were all running quite a bit colder than recommended by Rotax. Which would indicate a redesign or modification of the cooling system might be necessary to bring them into the proper ranges. |
| Performance - Compared to other craft with same weight, power and style of control systems. | | | | | | | | | | |
| Excellent |
| Overall Rating | | | | | | | | | | |
The Aventura II gets a good rating. It holds it's resale value. Has an excellent safety record. Fun and easy to fly. The area's that it fall short in like manuals have nothing to do with the plane, and have apparently been addressed by the factory, but I can only report on today, not tomorrow.
It will take a conventional pilot 5 to 10 hours to convert especially if he doesn't have any tail dragger time. |
