Sonex High Wing – Aircraft of the Month

With the recent announcement that Sonex Aircraft is facing bankruptcy I wanted to do this month’s article on their last project known as “the high wing”.

Sonex has always been a value packed and innovated kit plane manufacture. One of my first experiances around Sonex was Dan Weseman Corvair Powered Sonex often called a Cleanex to draw a line on what powers it. Very impressive aircraft all around. The Local EAA chapter 203 in Palm Beach had a Sonex motor glider going when I was part of the group.

Hopefully a well funded / aviation minded investor can come in and save the company and continue operations.

The Experimental Aircraft Channel has been covering what’s been going on with the recent events along with a flight in the high wing

https://www.youtube.com/@ExperimentalAircraftChannel

As of the time of this writing the Sonex page is still up and running, this is the detailed page for the high wing: https://www.sonexaircraft.com/highwing/

It seems like a very good entry into the high wing, off airport market.

With it being a new aircraft there are quite a few YouTube Videos on it:

Sonex’s main playlist:

No RC options I’m aware of but seems like it would be easy to scratch build a scale RC via Balsa or 3D printing.

Monnett Moni – Aircraft of the Month

The Moni is the precursor to the Sonex line of home built aircraft both designed by John Monnett. 380 kits where shipped during its 1982 – 1986 run. The aircraft was powered by a 30 hp 2 cylinder engine and is a motor glider.

One is on display suspended from the celling at the National Air and Space Museum at Dulles VA, another is on display at the EAA museum in Oshkosh

They show up every now and then at Air Venture and Sun N Fun.

The Xenos motor glider is a modern interpretation of the Moni, with 2 seats and a more capable engine.

More info at: https://www.sonexaircraft.com/xenos/

YouTube has a few Moni videos:

Outerzone has a 40″ 1/8th scale RC version:

https://outerzone.co.uk/plan_details.asp?ID=7595