Interesting site!
I do think their claimed fuel savings are based on the Continental owners flying full-rich all the time.
I cannot find the conversion cost however.
They just don't have the money to tie up huge amounts of working capital in inventory.
Is that really a problem?
Nobody with a brain will be buying anything other than airframe parts from the airframe manufacturer. And the other bits are obtainable for much less, but the point is that the airframe mfg has no need to stock it in the first place. And airframe parts are dirt cheap to make. The cost of knocking up an elevator is a few hundred $ - sell it for $10k.
Is there a problem with taking a C152 and throwing 15 grand at it?
Yes but options are limited. One option was to sell the aircraft when at TBO for say 10 grand to a private individual and then source another aircraft on the market with say a 1000 hours left for say 14.
However the number of suitable airframes is at an all time low so forking out 15 grand is becoming the only option. Although if the air frame gets written off immediately post zero engine hours then you will be somewhat out of pocket.
Corrosion can be a problem but the Rheims built ones tend to be less prone to this and thus command a slightly higher price.
As for 7 grand annuls that tends to be the highly polished syndicate hanger queens. Airframes that are flying say 600 hours a year (I wish) tend to have money spent on them in drips and drabs over the year and don’t have too many massive annual surprises. Bank on 4 grand.
We use a 150 that hardly flew for 18 months before we started using it. Since then its been flying about 30 hours a months and at first it was a bit of a dog with loads of little bits and pieces going wrong however know those bugs have all been fixed its running beautifully and I only wish it flew it a bit more.
The 2006 fliegermagazin article on the homepage speaks of €40600 incl. VAT for the conversion.
source another aircraft on the market with say a 1000 hours left for say 14.
Good luck with that, somehow the prices of old, high time 150/152s or Tomahawks are ridiculously high, compared to rather cheap PA28-140 or old C172(A-H). I know of a PA28-140 being sold for 7-8k recently, no knowledge of the times, but she was flying and had a fresh annual.
But yes I can see an O-200 burns more juice than a Rotax because the O-200 needs to be full-rich for climb, for slow flight, and anything else where there isn't enough cooling, whereas the Rotax should be running at a more optimal operating point.
That's big engine experience applied to a little engine. Small air cooled aircraft engines don't typically have the same issues with cooling - my four cylinder Continental has a problem with low oil temperature and CHT is OK with full throttle operation for some time while stationary on the ground. The surface to volume ratio is greater...
The biggest issue with the Rotax is no PMA parts... In the US market that is a HUGE (likely insurmountable) competitive problem because the buyer locked in to one manufacturer for cylinders and everything else. Nobody feels comfortable with that for the same reason few feel comfortable with manufacturer-centered LSA maintenance.
MH - I couldn't agree more with your post on used aircraft. From my POV there has never been a better time to be buying an aircraft. There are so many wonderful aircraft available at reasonable cost and for the sole owner flying once or twice a week and storing them inside, they will literally last a lifetime. A older fellow I know, still flying his Luscombe daily, is selling a '50s Bonanza that he has spent 15 years in retirement making perfect. Its gorgeous and the price is the same as some used cars. So many aircraft, so little time :-)
Silvaire,
You prove my point. In the US, where private flying is possible in uncertified airplanes, that is where people go to avoid the expensive certified market which is expensive just because it is certified!
In one way, it is pretty alike the N-reg way Europeans do. Americans can not live with the cost of certification either, but they do have that way out. So you can get a fully equipped and capable touring machine for a fraction of a price, with twice the performance and real inovation. These planes and avionics never make it into certification, primarily because they don´t want to even. But they are mainstream as hell.
If you look at avionic packages alone, you will see the huge difference in price between a certified and non certified G500 for instance. Or if you compare a fully equipped G1000 cockpit with the fully equipped Dynon suite, well, the difference is not that striking in terms of functionality but it is worlds apart in terms of money.
Yes, Peter, a simple C172 costs above 300k these days, a Cirrus between 500k and 800k. This is ridiculous in terms of what you get, still a single engine spamcan with fancy electronics, but which, were it not for the horrendous certification and monopoly costs, would probably sell for 150-200k. USD that is.
In Europe, this is a no go, as we well know. No IFR, not even VFR by night, 2 seats only, e.t.c. The anti GA mafia has this strongly in their hands and won´t let go, ever. So basically, you can buy planes for the price of a used citation which still will only do 140 kts and burn 15 gph doing it.
We could well have capable airplanes in our skies today, were the certification process for privately used planes up to, say 2500 kg to be adapted to what car manufacturers have to prove. We could have them for the price of a luxury car, which is fine, but not for a bloody business jet!
I have been talking to a manufacturer from Eastern Europe whose planes are reasonably successful in Europe, but have a major payload problem not because of structure or integrity but because of the cap set by EASA to the VLA class. We were talking about the possibility of a 200 kt, 5 gph, 2 seat travelling machine, IFR, with a service ceiling of maybe 25k ft, or a 4 seat version of it. His answer was, that is easy, we actually had a 2 seat variant with a stock IO320 with turbo normalizing, 790 kg MTOW which ran 180 kt at 15000 ft and at 6 gph, which gave it a range of over 1500 NM. But he sais, for those figures they need to certify it, which would mean it would cost about 400k Euros, IFR certified once finished. Unsellable. Without certification, he figures about 120k Euros, IFR equipped but with components used in the non certified range. Which for Europe means, a lovely kit plane but not usable for IFR.
He also figured, a 4 seater with 360 kg payload with full fuel would be possible with a stock 180 hp machine or a diesel, making equally about 180 kts and 1500 NM range, but cost would be that of a Cirrus. So why bother. Were it possible to market them with Dynon or other avionics, the uncertified Lycoming engine which came out for the experimental market e.t.c. It might reach 150 k Euros.
So the major problem in Europe with the GA list is overregulation and innovation killing certification criteria all over the world.
Equally, we could easily do a ¨pimp my ride¨ thing for spamcans as I see them done in places like Lithuania, where a paint and cabin guy will turn any garden chair equipped PA28 into a Cirrus interior, throw out the steam gauges and beef them up in order to create pre-used but better than new aircraft for those who can´t afford new planes. It would be easy to do and very cost efficient. BUT: again, the regulators will not have it.
They want a separate STC for every single radio, every single instrument, every single item you want to change, making this process unpayable. They actively prevent innovation this way as only STC´s granfathered from the pre JAR days can be still installed without tens of thousands of Euros wasted on paperwork.
The fact of the matter is, our politicians do not want us in the skies. They want General Aviation dead and buried so they can continue on their plans to turn Europe in the brave new world of Eurosocialism. GA is one expression of freedom any totalitarian regime hates. So this is why they have no interest whatsoever in accomodating us.
I am sorry, I do get quite mad at times looking at this whole problematic. I would have loved to equip my own airplane with up to date avionics, put some US STC d mods on it and enjoy it, but if I see that the cost for those major alternations in paperwork alone will be inferior to the value of the airframe, I can only say, if that has not system, then what does.
It is not long ago that I attended one of the most frustrating presentations of my life. ATC explaining the airspace use of tomorrow. Guess what, no GA in it whatsoever. Quote of the day: ¨We see no benefit in aviation below 20 tons and approach speeds of below 150 knots at any instrument equipped airports, as they disrupt the traffic flow, do not serve a public purpose and are generally just rich man´s toys.¨ I could have killd the idiot there and then, him being one of Europes higher ATC specialists who has an open ear in Brussels and Köln. No wonder.
Best regards Urs
They want a separate STC for every single radio, every single instrument, every single item you want to change, making this process unpayable. They actively prevent innovation this way as only STC´s granfathered from the pre JAR days can be still installed without tens of thousands of Euros wasted on paperwork.
It's actually nothing like that... unless you are talking to a totally bent avionics shop.
It is not long ago that I attended one of the most frustrating presentations of my life. ATC explaining the airspace use of tomorrow
ATC (and Eurocontrol) presentations are always utterly depressing, to anybody who knows the front end of a plane from the back. But they almost never get their way, because (having spent €millions on some 10,000 page proposal, somebody realises it isn't going to fly, and it gets binned.
I've been to a UK ATC presentation where they stated they would ban all single pilot jets, and another one where they said anybody setting 7600 will get shot down (and yes the senior ATCO from NATS repeated this with a straight face when I queried it).
Doesn't stop pointless nonsense like 8.33 but there are solutions, and this isn't a cheap hobby...
In reality, ATC individuals are very professional (in most places), and the biggest fish to fry are other things like airport opening hours, avgas, etc.
If somebody was going to make a 200kt 2-seater plane which burns 5 USG/hr, he would get a Nobel Prize for discovering a new type of energy.
I wonder, if the certification itself is really the problem, or if part of the problem is sloppy engineering, as suggested by Alfred Scott (http://www.seqair.com/Other/LiteEng/LiteEng.html). He sure has a point here and for what I have experienced so far, be it as an aerospace engineering student or during work at a known German avionic manufacturer. It would be interesting to hear Pilot DARs opinion on certification processes and the standard of engineering with different manufacutrers. You can see bad engineering or bad design on nearly every second microlight design and you don't have to be graduated in aerospace engineering for figuring that.
In my earlier post I raised the issue of US kit-built aircraft because the original discussion was about new aircraft, and in that arena kit-builts are where the numbers are in the US. That said, the other growth area is restoring inexpensive older airframes as Urs and MH suggested. There's a lot of it going on in the US. My own choice has been to 'cherry pick' the used aircraft market, buying what I think are nice low time aircraft for low prices. Then the upgrades and restoration work is limited and can mostly be done in my hangar by A&Ps I already know.
Re STCs, upgrades and maintenance, I see a lot of justifiable frustration in the EU with FAA STCs not being accepted by EASA, but what is the situation with PMA parts? They are a huge cost saver, with an 0-200 field overhaul (or top overhaul) managed by a private owner being done for perhaps half the cost of similar work on a Rotax.
MH, Alfred Scott has always expressed a somewhat different view of the world, and the article you mention was released 20 years ago. Since then, the 'Vans kit built industry' has really grown to the extent of a paradigm shift - Van's designs are not perfect but very few would question the integrity of their engineering. I think Ed Swearingen (an engineer, unlike Scott) had it right in that article :-)
Well, Silvaire, the 200kts/5GHP/4Person wonder won't be a Cub-class design, mentioned by Ed Swearingen, would it? Point is, that with right engineering from the beginning, certification costs do reduce and the documentation gets a lot easier, if done right from the beginning, not just as a boring necessity after the plane is finished. Besides, I was aiming at bad engineering in contrast to good engineering. A degree in engineering isn't always a quality feature for a designer or engineer. There are an awful lot of uncreative blokes running around with a Masters degrees or even Ph.D. Besides, Mr. VanGrundsven has a degree.
My personal experience, however, supports Mr. Scotts article. As I said, many ultralights/microlights (in Germany) are best example of what happens with laissez-faire certification procedures.
Cheers,
