Milholland Legal Eagle
The Milholland Legal Eagle is an American high wing, strut-braced, single engine, tractor configuration, conventional landing gear-equipped ultralight aircraft that is available as plans from Better Half VW of Brookshire, Texas, and is intended for amateur construction.
The Legal Eagle is so named because it is capable of being built in compliance with the United States FAR 103 Ultralight Vehicles regulations, even when equipped with a four-stroke engine.
Design and development
The Legal Eagle features an open cockpit and is powered by a Half VW engine. As of 2023, the Legal Eagle and Legal Eagle XL can alternatively be powered by a Briggs and Stratton Vanguard engine.The design features a fuselage of welded 4130 steel tubing, mated to an all-wood wing made from spruce. The struts and tail surfaces are made from 6061 T6 aluminium tubing. The flying surfaces are covered with doped aircraft fabric. The rear fuselage is normally left as an open truss structure to save weight and to ensure that the aircraft does not exceed the FAR 103 maximum speed of 55 knots. Like the fuselage, the taildragger landing gear is sprung steel. Additional plans were released that would allow Legal Eagle and Legal Eagle XL planes to be modified to allow wing-folding within 30 minutes.
The aircraft has been developed into several variants of the basic design including the XL version for larger pilots and a two-seat ultralight trainer and light-sport aircraft.
Variants
;Legal Eagle;Legal Eagle XL
;Double Eagle