Malibuflyer wrote:
Sorry, but that is a very bad example – and actually harms the case more than it helps:
It is not a safety issue if you know that before takeoff.The safety issues is some pilots attitude to commence flights of which they know they can’t perform safely.
It’s not that simple. Everything that restricts a flight is a safety issue. If it’s a thunderstorm or opening hours makes no difference. The difference is that opening hours are man made. It’s a safety issue because the PIC will be restricted in his options of planning a safe flight.He may no longer be able to chose the safest option given there were no man made restrictions.
If a flight can be made safer, but regulations prevents it, either in general or per individual flight, then the regulation is a safety issue. That’s just simple cause – effect.
Malibuflyer wrote:
It’s not a safety issue that regulations “force us” to fly VFR in IMC because IFR is not allowed in an airspace. It’s not a safety issue that regulations “force us” to fly overweight because microlights have a weight limit.
The way many regulations make flying “safer”, is by restricting flying altogether. It’s a no brain, no headache solution. A flight isn’t made safer if the flight isn’t executed. If the flight isn’t executed, then no flight has been done, and there is nothing that has been made safer. The logic is of course that the risk of certain flights are so large that the outcome most probably will end in a disaster. Flying VFR in a blizzard is plain stupid for instance (and pretty much impossible, as well as being illegal).
Many restrictions make sense, safety wise, but not all of them. Restrictions that mainly restricts the options of the pilot, in planning and execution, are very far from being restrictions based on safety. Their effect is the exact opposite.
To your examples. Flying VFR in IMC is stupid. Preventing, restricting, making it difficult for PPL pilots to get IFR rating is equally stupid. Flying overweight is also pretty stupid, but only if that overweight is based on physical limits of the aircraft. If it’s not, as indeed is the case with most microlights, then it is not a safety issue at all, but merely a “rule is a rule” kind of thing. We cannot change the weather, but we can make it easier for PPL pilots to get IFR rating. We cannot change the laws of physics, but we can remove nonsensical regulations.
LeSving wrote:
… but only if that overweight is based on physical limits of the aircraft. If it’s not, as indeed is the case with most microlights, then it is not a safety issue at all, but merely a “rule is a rule” kind of thing.
First: A pilot who has not done the flight testing and certification has no clue about any “physical limit of the aircraft” that goes beyond the certification limits. Everything beyond this is just pilot chatter or personal justification of illegal behavior that has been …
Second: …actually proven in the last couple of years! That myth that the “physical limits” of ULs is much higher than certification limits has been preached by some UL pilots as justification for their illegal overloading for many years. When EASA and some member states opened the way for certification of ULs with heigher weight limits it came extremely transparent that almost no existing design was able to prove that its “physical limits” go beyond certified limits w/o (partly significant) design changes.
Malibuflyer wrote:
First: A pilot who has not done the flight testing and certification has no clue about any “physical limit of the aircraft” that goes beyond the certification limits
1999 kg MTOM Senecas?
Silvaire wrote:
Car models as a whole are not government certified in the US prior to sale, nor are parts and accessories certified prior to sale, and cars are not periodically inspected for compliance against any Federal automotive ‘type certificate’. What is Federally certified are specific items of useful interest, notably safety equipment and exhaust emissions compliance. The car does not have a type certificate or TCDS because it and the bureaucracy/inspections associated with it would add no value.
Yes – technically there is no such thing as a type certificate for cars in the US. BUT:
Demonstrating FMVSS compliance is not less effort than the certification process in European or Chinese markets. It’s just due to the general nature of the US legal system, that you do not receive a type certificate but you rather go the risk of multi hundred million punitive damages if they fail to demonstrate it in front of a court.
But you could look at it this way,
When it is tiny it is called a cornichon or gherkin
A little bigger and it is called a courgette
Bigger still and it’s called a marrow.
Is this a regulation or is this something that has evolved for other reasons?
That myth that the “physical limits” of ULs is much higher than certification limits has been preached by some UL pilots as justification for their illegal overloading for many years. When EASA and some member states opened the way for certification of ULs with heigher weight limits it came extremely transparent that almost no existing design was able to prove that its “physical limits” go beyond certified limits w/o (partly significant) design changes.
Sure you aren’t an EASA bureaucrat, and not a pilot? 
We are in the midst of changing the rules to MTOW 600, for better and for worse IMO, but that’s another issue. The fact is that not a lot of older ULs will manage 600, or more. They can however be increased to 495 kg with no problems, since they already are (450 is for land planes). Then, most are designed for 540 kg or thereabout.
The main problem (for many) is they cannot increase MTOW without also increasing the lowest stable speed in landing configuration, which is 35 knots. This is also increased to 39 or 40? with MTOW 600 kg. Flying overweight, one breaks 2 regulations, not one. None of which are safety regulations, and if anything it is the speed that is, not MTOW.
There are also CG considerations, but usually this is more or less irrelevant because pilot and passenger sits at the CG.
Let’s not derail this conversation by throwing in more details.
The question is extremely simple: Which former 472,5kg types have already been certified for 495kg under the new regulation w/o any changes other than paper?
Airborne_Again wrote:
1999 kg MTOM Senecas?
This is a completely different thing – there is no regulation forcing someone to 1999kg MTOW. So it is not at all regulation driven. It is rather owners/operators actually cheating the system because they first declare their own plane to <2t to save some bucks on airport and airway fees but then fly with >2t anyways. It’s fraud, not unsafe.
Malibuflyer wrote:
No – the equivalent of closing airfields if mandatory personal is not present is closing parking garages if mandatory personal is not present – and guess what! At least in Germany there are many garages that close over night!
As I understand it, in Germany the equivalent treatement would mean that anyone driving a car could only stop and park it somewhere where the mandatory person was present. This means no single person coming home to their garage. I think clearly pretty stupid.
In terms of answering the original question. I have a suspicision that some required major maintenance does more harm than good. We’re all aware of problems / infant mortality following maintenance. I’m not sure how one could gather enough evidence to prove or disprove it though.
ULM’s are not certified anyway. I have a friend who lectures in the use of wood for housing.
He also teaches the BIA ,courses with some 15 -20 students at a time from the local lycee.
He built his own wooden ULM stuck an engine in it and went flying. It was up to him to be aware of the MTOW, stall speed etc limitations just as he has to be aware of the building regulations for wooden houses or the syllabus for the BIA.
IIRC for all 3 an inspector comes round and says okay it meets regs or in the case of the BIA they take a test which goes towards the Baccalaureate, end of story. The MTOW now in France is 500kg or I think 525.4kg with parachute which most have. The avionics are not tested, design as such is not tested etc. All that is checked are the limitations set out for MTOW, VS, Max speed. ( I think that is it I am not a ULM owner or builder)
Other than that you are entitled to go and kill yourself by crashing it. The MTOW is set between the ULM association and the DGAC safety branch according to an algebraic equation, which I cannot remember, which shows that there is minimal acceptable risk of fatality to third parties if the ULM should crash on them or their house or car etc.
So the regulated MTOW of a ULM has nothing to do with the structural strength of the a/c, only what damage it can do to 3rd parties.
I write only of France of course.
