A new video from Zenith Aircraft postulates that building an airplane is “worth a college degree.”
It’s not because it replaces formal education, but because the skills, problem-solving, discipline, and confidence gained from building an aircraft kit rival what most learn through the traditional college experience — not to mention the ability to maintain the aircraft once finished and the massive amount of utility and satisfaction that the finished aircraft brings to its owner/pilot, according to Zenith officials.
The conversation occurs while Zenith Aircraft’s Sebastien Heintz flies with Wairworthy’s Carson Stilson in his STOL CH 750 Super Duty.
This is stretching the skill set too far. A skilled machinist , welder , plumber etc all have considerable skill sets. Having been involved in BUILDING Experimental Aircraft from scratch i.e. a set of datum tables and datum lines, I believe this requires more skill and can truly be classed as building a homebuilt aircraft as it also requires building all the jigs etc. as well as the airframe etc. Buying someone else’s expensive jigsaw puzzle and assembling mostly premade parts reguires a sound skillset but does not equate to the level of a university degree. It requires a large degree of dedicated effort as do all skilled trades. I certainly do not consider myself as meriting a degree for building my GY 20 despite having started my project from a log of spruce imported from Canada and built it without any outside input to the project.( For the record I went through school in the bottom classes and built the GY 20 starting it in the late 1970’s
Thanks for sharing!