Watch A $200 Homemade Airplane Take To The Skies

What kind of projects have you got on the go at the minute? Are you fixing up something on your car? What about a cleanup on your motorbike? I imagine that for most of us, these projects involve staying firmly planted on the ground, but that’s not the case for this build being undertaken by one handy TikTok user.

World’s First All-Electric Passenger Plane

Over on Gen Z’s favorite app, user Farminglog is working to build a functioning airplane on a budget. How tight a budget, I hear you ask. Well, they hope to take to the skies in a homemade plane that they’re fixing up for just $200.

So far, progress has been pretty impressive for the user, who posted an update on the project this weekend that saw them take to the skies in their craft, which resembles something like a trike with a massive kite strapped to the top.

The user’s adventures in aviation started a few weeks back, when they purchased the old plane and decided to set about making it airworthy once again. In the first video of the plane, they showed holes in its fabric wing, as well as zip ties holding elements of the engine in place.

Before they took to the skies for a first test, Farminglog first made a few updates to the plane, including fitting a new battery, an airspeed indicator and new fuel lines — all of which were zip tied in place. They also fitted a custom expansion chamber to the engine’s exhaust.

After those updates, the first flight saw them carry out an emergency landing in a field of wheat. Naughty.

Still, Farminglog hasn’t been put off and has since made a heap of updates to the craft. First, they added a 3D printed three-blade propeller, as well as a recoil system to make starting the plane easier. There’s also now a light so that they can take this contraption up after dark. Clearly, they’re a lot braver than me.

Now, they’ve taken to the skies in the rebuilt craft, and it honestly looks great. A video update from Farminglog shows them flying the plane over the wheat fields they crashed into just weeks ago, where you can hear that mighty two-stroke motor singing.

But there’s still work to be done on the craft, which is in need of a specially fabricated exhaust for the engine, and a more aggressive propeller to try and keep the RPM of the motor down. We’ll keep an eye on Farminglog to see how they get on rebuilding this $200 aircraft.