Down the Wrong Path – Did Light Sport Aircraft Hurt Forward Progress in GA?

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Sometimes when you choose between two paths in the woods, you choose the path less taken. Sometimes this is the wrong path. General aviation has chosen the wrong path when we started walking down the road toward Light Sport Aircraft.

A little over a decade ago, our industry and the aviation community got behind an initiative to develop a sport pilot certificate that didn’t require a medical certificate for pilots to exercise limited privileges. One of the main restrictions of this certificate is that the pilots only operate aircraft that fall under 1320 lbs (1000 kg) gross weight (with some limited exceptions for sea-planes, etc.). This created a boundary under which aircraft manufacturers sought to develop their aircraft. Continue reading →

Is GA Aircraft Manufacturing a Boutique Business? – Considerations of Consumer Aircraft Buying Power

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New aircraft are expensive. I doubt anyone will disagree with this statement. But exactly “how” expensive are they and are they “affordable” for Americans? And has their cost in relation to consumer buying power relegated modern GA aircraft manufacturers to boutique aircraft production instead of large scale manufacturing? I think this is exactly what they have become and unless we critically analyze our industry they will remain as such. This doesn’t mean that businesses can’t make a profit when they are structured as boutique producers, but it does mean we aren’t going to see the quantities of aircraft being used as much we see the average household automobile. Continue reading →

Proper Documentation Means Better Aircraft Maintenance – Documents Aircraft Owners Should Have

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Owning an aircraft comes with additional responsibilities beyond that of just being the pilot that flies the plane. The owner of an aircraft is responsible for ensuring that it is maintained and operated in accordance with FAA inspection requirements. Most of the time this means that once a year we drop our aircraft off to our maintenance shop for its annual inspection and hope that no other maintenance is needed during the year. As the owner of an aircraft, something you can do to help make sure your aircraft will receive the best possible service is to make sure proper documentation for your aircraft is in your library.

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Aviation Roots…

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I still don’t know why I learned to fly, but for some reason I almost feel like it was always in my blood. Perhaps it was, even though when I began, I didn’t know it.

Yesteray I received a letter in the mail from my Uncle Jim, who had been going through some old family documents. Included was an old promotional packet from the American School of Aviation in Chicago for pilot training that had been sent to my grandfather’s brother back in 1928. It got me thinking about how much aviation affects people and how many times it goes overlooked in our family roots. The material also got me thinking about our aviation roots collectively and how aviation has changed and how it hasn’t. Continue reading →