The original concept and final design Stinger appear to share only two things. First is the name - S-17 Stinger - and the second is the little bumblebee logo. In every other case I could discern, the finished Stinger is a totally new design from Randy Schlitter's original idea. Stinger version two flew for the first time on September 10, 1999. Barely a week later, I found myself aloft in the new ultralight. Normally, I'm not anxious to jump into a manufacturer's brand-new design. I much prefer waiting until they have the design fully worked out. However, Randy Schlitter has an excellent reputation for airplanes that seem to fly right off the drawing board (or out of the CAD program these days). He'd put some hours on the Stinger and had given it his blessing. I observed him fly it first and by all measures, it appeared to be ready for evaluation flying. I leaped at the chance. I'd flown from St. Paul, Minnesota in my Cessna 150/150 for the annual RANS fly-in. Hays, Kansas appeared to be a pretty remote spot, located way out on the endless Midwestern prairie. But I knew the Stinger was ready, and Ultralight Flying! editor-in-chief Scott Wilcox asked if I would make the trip. Since I'd never seen the RANS factory and considering the company is one of the most successful in the ultralight or kit business, I was happy to take the chance to see it all at once. I even got to put in some time on the company's recumbent bicycles. It was easily worth 8.9 hours clocked on the trusty Cessna. Radically New The original prototype Stinger sported a tractor engine, short-span wing, high boom, tri-gear and windscreen - a fairly hot-performing ultralight. The final Stinger has a pusher engine, longer wingspan, low boom, taildragger, open cockpit (at least for now), and modest performance. The two bear little resemblance to one another. Randy invited me to fly the prototype and I would have, but the experience would have only lent more basis for comparison. It would not have been meaningful to evaluate the final Stinger just as driving an Edsel doesn't tell you anything about driving a modern-day Ford sedan. I never took the chance to fly the prototype Stinger in my short 24-hour visit to RANS and Hays. The new Stinger makes use of the wings from a single-seat S-4 Coyote, and the tail from the also single-seat S-14 Airaile. The cockpit weldment is brand-new. Unlike the first prototype, this new Stinger evokes a comparison to other ultralights, and some of these are quite useful to understand the bird. Several of the 100 or better pilots attending the RANS annual fly-in perceived the Kolb UltraStar when they looked at the Stinger - an analogy easy to understand. Like the older UltraStar - before pods were added to Kolb designs - the Stinger features an ultralight where the pilot is seated well forward of the plane and is supported by a welded steel structure. The RANS structure looks to be quite substantial, however, I didn't measure anything and this is only an image in my mind. In the UltraStar's case, I am not aware of problems related to the pilot's feet being the first to arrive after a hard landing. You simply are not supposed to fly airplanes headlong into immovable objects like the ground. If you do, something is going to yield and injuries are probable. This is no condemnation of the UltraStar or Stinger designs; it is a simple fact of flying. A tractor engine, tri-gear airplane that smacks something head-on is also going to result in significant problems. Given the need to land normally, I didn't feel at all threatened by the Stinger's feet-first seating environment. Perhaps more so than Randy, I looked forward to a flight in the Stinger. My background is loaded with flights in aircraft that offer little reference to airframe structure in order to determine the airplane's attitude in the sky. I love the Drifter and Talon with their far forward seating (even though both now use a pod to give the pilot some illusion of a cockpit around you). The Stinger is merely the newest iteration of such designs. To me and to many ultralight enthusiasts, contact with the air is part of the mystique that makes ultralights different. Yet that won't change the fact that some pilots fret over the lack of forward enclosure. If a thin fiberglass wall around you or the presence of a few aluminum tubes at your side make you feel more secure in an aircraft, then the Stinger may not interest you. Of course then, neither would you be interested in a number of other designs like the Quicksilver MX series, Drifter, M-Squared models, Talon, Air-Bike, Weedhopper, Merlin's E-Z Flyer, many trikes, most powered parachutes, and all powered paragliders or hang gliders. In my (possibly old-fashioned) mind, "real" ultralights are open cockpit machines with little surroundings. Other ultralights that look like "little airplanes" may fly similarly but isolate the pilot from the smell and feel of the air, and they block visibility to a greater extent. The Stinger seats the pilot forward of the wing with a center-mounted joystick and throttle to the pilot's left, leaving right-handers with the joystick in their preferred grip. The simple seat is surprisingly comfortable, no doubt benefiting from RANS' long work with recumbent bicycles (for which they claim to be the country's largest builder). Takeoff is quick, climb is strong with the Rotax 447, handling is good if not fast, and speeds are definitely ultralight-like. What look like flaps on the inboard trailing edge are actually fixed surfaces. Staying within Part 103 (not with the Rotax 447) did not demand flaps (as it did on Kolb's FireFly with Rotax 447), and the linkage to make them work might push the Stinger over weight limits. I felt they weren't needed unless you have an impossibly short runway with a difficult approach, a situation you can avoid with good planning. The Stinger is not really a taildragger, even though its nosewheel is in the back. Note the flat "deck angle" by comparing boom tube to the ground. This means the likelihood of the tail coming around in front during ground roll is most unlikely. Given the slow approach and touchdown speeds, I don't even see how you could ground loop unless you completely quit paying attention. Lesser Changes to Stinger The throttle arrangement is different than the prototype Stinger... and much better in my opinion. The prototype Stinger used a twist-grip throttle. I was much happier with the present one as I don't believe twist grips are universally accepted like push-pull throttles that have long been standard on most aircraft. The joystick got simplified in the final Stinger and its front-side brake lever is far enough away not to interfere in flight, while allowing easy-enough access when you need some stopping or slowing power. The instruments are located a little farther away and switches on that panel would be too far to reach with the seat belts tightened about you, so RANS moved kill switches overhead to a place not easily bumped in flight. The Stinger uses a pull-start system that must be done outside the cockpit, meaning no in-air restart is possible. Schlitter says the pulleys to allow in-air restart capability force too many tight turns, so the option may not become available. Keep your maintenance up-to-spec and you shouldn't need such in-flight restarting. With a tiny little tab placed strategically, RANS added a parking brake to the hand brake lever. This isn't the first I've seen - some trikes use something similar - but it helps when you start the Stinger from outside the "cockpit" and not have the ultralight creep forward on you. My feet didn't fit in the rudder "stirrups" very well, but that should be something you could adjust yourself. I'd also change the angle; the ones on the Stinger were aimed back at me a bit too much for my taste. The stirrups are needed as you have no other place to rest your feet. The Air-Bike is similar and solves the need with a wire loop that hangs down and can hook around your shoe heel. I think I prefer the Air-Bike solution, but this is something an owner could adapt according to his personal preference. Since I did not take the chance to fly the prototype Stinger, I didn't experience how challenging it was on the ground. However, Randy indicated it could tip too easily and touch a wing if you weren't on top of proper taxiing technique. The final Stinger had none of this unsettling tendency. However, the final Stinger needs taller main gear to help lift the nose a bit for landing touchdown since it's common to touch the tailwheel first. Randy had forewarned me so I wasn't unduly critical of my landings, which were exactly as he predicted. The Stinger is very controllable throughout the landing process, so on one of my landings, I went to an extreme to attempt the preferred three-point taildragger touchdown. This resulted in my touching the mains first with a pretty firm bounce. My impromptu test of the landing gear strength showed no deformation, so RANS engineers' confidence in the gear robustness appeared reasonable. Randy said, "Expect to tap the tailwheel first, which is `normal' for the present." He plans to investigate taller main wheels and feels that will solve the dilemma, a worthy effort as he also acknowledges that whacking the tail regularly can't be good for the aircraft. Stinger In Flight Randy also said he didn't find the controls particularly fast. I think he's become spoiled by the instantaneous response common to RANS' designs like the S-10 Sakota. Indeed, some RANS planes like the S-16 Shekari are so responsive that a couple of fly-in visitors I overheard said, "I sure wouldn't want to fly this plane in instrument flying conditions." Perhaps Randy has forgotten the more typical ultralight controls that seem "sluggish," a sensation that is more likely tied to slow flying speeds than any shortcoming of the control system. While I agree the Stinger isn't a fast-handling aircraft, it never left me in any doubt and I imagined I could handle the ultralight in a vigorous crosswind without any concern. RANS indicated some adjustment may also be made via linkage adjustments so as to increase control forces slightly to quicken response. This may be desirable but is not critically necessary in my experience with the Stinger. Delightfully, I found almost no adverse yaw in the Stinger. When I applied significant stick movement with no rudder input, the Stinger hesitated briefly and then turned in the desired direction. It did not wander off the wrong way first as is common with many ultralights. Certainly the outboard ailerons (versus full-span ones) account for some of this. Schlitter also mentioned the control differential that puts one aileron down less while the opposite goes up more. Another related area where I think Randy has become accustomed differently is cruise speed. His 2-seat Coyote II, S-9 Chaos, S-10 Sakota, and S-16 Shekari are all pretty speedy airplanes, good for cross-country flying. By comparison, the Stinger is a slowpoke. "From our factory to [Hays Municipal] airport seems like a cross-country flight," says Schlitter, whom I believe is simply spoiled by regularly flying his racy S-16 Shekari. However, he loves the way their newest creation flies and I do also. The Stinger operates at ultralight speeds. You may not want to take one across the U.S; but it cruises in the speed realm that makes ultralights interesting to many of us. For a long time, I felt "ultralight" may be the wrong word for our type of aircraft. If we had started calling these machines "ultraslow," we might have better identified what it is they do that makes them unique and desirable among all aircraft you can fly. The current Stinger had no vertical speed indicator (VSI) installed, but Randy reports he has timed 1,000-foot climbs numerous times to arrive at a 900-fpm climb rate in the 40-hp Rotax 447-powered model. Instrument work is still somewhat ongoing. For example, the static port for the airspeed indicator (ASI) wasn't quite right. All numbers read a little high. Randy has since remedied this and says stalls come in about 25 mph, a figure that agrees with my sense of speed. All my checks of stability issues were benign. Stalls were slow (even given the ASI inaccuracies when I flew it). Stinger wandered a bit at incipient stall - like many other designs - but even when left uncorrected, the stall was brief and normal flight resumed very quickly. My series of pull- or push-and-release tests of stability were positive, although you have no in-flight trim to adjust for pilots of different weight. Randy and I are similarly sized so I expect it felt good as I was in the weight range of the designer. Lack of aerodynamic trim isn't a problem unless you regularly let pilots of very different weights fly your Stinger. If you look closely, you can easily see the Stinger is equipped with a massive restraint system. In addition to padded shoulder belts, Randy used dual lap belts with a cinching system to tighten one of them. You could get them so snug that you could cut off circulation in your legs, but you sure wouldn't fall out of the plane. In truth, the Stinger was a new experience for Randy who hasn't spent much time recently sitting out in front of the plane he's flying. This is one of those designs that fits a favorite expression of mine: "Sitting on a lawn chair on the edge of forever!" When you sit in the Stinger, your head is ahead of the wing and all airplane parts except the slender welded steel structure on which your feet are resting. To me this exemplifies ultralight flight and I truly enjoyed it. Some of you will not love this. For those of you who want some protection and forward structure, RANS plans a windscreen setup probably much like that used on the prototype Stinger. Randy says to figure about another $1,000 to get a forward fairing and windscreen, but it will be fully built for this cost. Stung by the Stinger? On September 27, the Stinger entered production, reports Randy. The final phase of documentation is nearing completion and this work is being done with the fully equipped model, so you will have instructions covering optional equipment as well as the basic airframe. "Parts are going together in the welding shop," adds Randy. By the time you read this, you should be able to order and get a Stinger. Should you? Well, there's a lot to be said for the Stinger. I had a ball flying it and I think many ultralight pilots would, too. You have to determine your own preferences but I feel very good about recommending this brand-new design - something I don't do everyday. RANS is a company I think you can expect results from and I find the boss to be a solid citizen in the aviation community. I'm sure a few bugs will need to be cleaned up, but if you were the very first to order a Stinger, I think you'd be very pleased with your decision. The Stinger as evaluated is the base model. This includes the Rotax 447, brakes, instruments, 4-point seat belts, and presewn wings for $10,995. For clear-coated wings add $500 more. I haven't covered all the options or details, but Randy assured me all this could be found on the company's Internet Website (www.rans.com). I encourage wired pilots to examine the details for themselves. To obtain a Stinger compliant to FAR Part 103, you'll have to deduct some hardware found on our test aircraft. Lacking a truly popular lightweight engine, many companies end up like RANS, building an aircraft that is certainly 103-like in spirit but which still misses the mark by a few pounds. Randy listed the changes needed to make the Stinger fully comply to Part 103. For starters, you have to swap the Rotax 447 that comes standard in the base price for the 35-hp 2si 460F-35 2-cycle engine as used on other ultralights such as the Aero-Lite 103 and Kitfox Lite, for example. Despite some valiant efforts by supporters and entrepreneurs, this engine does not enjoy universal acceptance yet. Randy has not tested the 2si engine on the Stinger, nor has he made any plans to do so. Nonetheless, it can be installed and some buyers will do so to stay within Part103. Other changes needed to make Stinger Part 103-compliant include using a 2-blade IvoProp propeller (versus three blades on the test plane), a lighter tailwheel (a "roller skate wheel," says Schlitter with a grin), no shaped ribs in the tail surfaces, and no clear coating of the wing (an option that adds a surprising 10 pounds). In addition, you'll have to swap round struts for the streamlined ones (faired ones are heavier), you'll have to do without brakes (hardly needed on turf), plastic main wheels, and no instruments ("Just a Hall meter," says Randy). Even further, he alluded to possibly having no seat cushion and using a lighter fabric for the wing and tail covering. Will all this discourage some buyers? Yes. Some pilots will scoff at the Spartan nature of the Stinger that fits Part103. However, you'll still have a terrific little ultralight that is strong, flies very nicely, looks contemporary, and is supported by a successful and popular company.