Originally Posted by MEON VALLEY FLYER
DBo
The savannah is basically a pirate copy of the 701 from a company with no design background. I also here they were grounded last summer after a structual failure in Norway.
Just get a bad gut feeling about pirate copies on anything
True enough that the Savannah is a "chinese copy" (actually Italian) of the CH701.
However, the company who make it in Italy have JAA approvals and make sub-assemblies for Boeing, the BMAA team (all of whom I know) did an incredibly professional job of getting it right for UK approval (admittedly including a number of design fixes) and, last I looked, it was about £10k cheaper.
I've flown (the UK versions of) both, and to be honest, there's not a great deal to choose between them.
On another note, there are basically two modern 4-strokes you're likely to come across: the Rotax 912 and the Jabiru 2200. They'll both run on either MOGAS or AVGAS, but in general the 912 is much happier on MOGAS, and the 2200 is much happier on AVGAS.
I'd also by the way take a look at the Zenair CH601 Zodiac.
G