"An Airplane In Every Garage"

I missed this article when it first appeared.

http://abcnews.go.com/Business/Flyin...=949148&page=1

Is it possible for the Light Sport category to revive that old slogan
of "An Airplane In Every Garage" in order to bolster the number of GA
pilots?

AJ

On 16 Nov 2005 20:59:44 -0800, "AJ" wrote:

Is it possible for the Light Sport category to revive that old slogan
of "An Airplane In Every Garage" in order to bolster the number of GA
pilots?

Interesting twice in Sport Pilot category: it becomes impossible to
know whether a pilot is active.

In the case of George Bush or Dudley Henriques, we know from the "no
current medical" that the pilot (probably) no longer flies.

So for all practical purposes, the number of pilot certificates
granted now becomes the number of pilots there are. Does the FAA even
purge its files when the pilot dies?



-- all the best, Dan Ford

email: usenet AT danford DOT net

Warbird's Forum: www.warbirdforum.com
Piper Cub Forum: www.pipercubforum.com
the blog: www.danford.net
In Search of Lost Time: www.readingproust.com

AJ wrote:
I missed this article when it first appeared.

http://abcnews.go.com/Business/Flyin...=949148&page=1

Is it possible for the Light Sport category to revive that old slogan
of "An Airplane In Every Garage" in order to bolster the number of GA
pilots?

AJ


Not sure whether to respond with "no" or "hell no" here....Hrm... Ok,
yeah, I'll go with "hell no"....

The darlings of the Sport Pilot rule - SLSA and ELSA - are already
priced well beyond affordability even in 2005 dollars and even beyond
acceptable bang/buck.

Bottom dollar for an SLSA is about 70 large already and I don't see that
figure coming down in the forseeable future (and it'll likely go up!).
ELSA are going to be around the same price......

In fact, some manufacturers/dealers (such as Kolb aircraft) have already
withdrawn their initial offerings into this market due to low demand.
Some are stepping out and trying it out such as Rans who are now
offering an "LSA" version of the S7 Courier (not clear from the website
exactly what certification it has tho. Might be worth a phone call to
find out). But it's 75 grand (I think you could get a quick build of the
same plane for a little more than half that). Zenith has an actual SLSA
on the market now (genuine SLSA certification) but it's 80 grand too.

Slim pickin's indeed........

Instead, most aircraft that will be flown under the rule at least in the
visible future will be standard category a/c and experimental A/B a/c
that fit within the LSA limitations.

I don't see Sport Pilot or LSA making much headway here at least not for
a long time, and even then it still looks like solidly the domain of
rich people only.....

LS
N646F

On Thu, 17 Nov 2005 14:47:36 GMT, ls
wrote:

AJ wrote:
I missed this article when it first appeared.

http://abcnews.go.com/Business/Flyin...=949148&page=1

Is it possible for the Light Sport category to revive that old slogan
of "An Airplane In Every Garage" in order to bolster the number of GA
pilots?

AJ


Not sure whether to respond with "no" or "hell no" here....Hrm... Ok,
yeah, I'll go with "hell no"....

The darlings of the Sport Pilot rule - SLSA and ELSA - are already
priced well beyond affordability even in 2005 dollars and even beyond
acceptable bang/buck.

Bottom dollar for an SLSA is about 70 large already and I don't see that
figure coming down in the forseeable future (and it'll likely go up!).
ELSA are going to be around the same price......

You have to look at the big picture.

From my numbers, the prices averaged about $58,000 and rose to about
$68,000 when demand picked up a bit. As more competitors enter the
market, supply pressures will force prices to go down. There is a lot
of interest right now. Say maybe three years before things creep down
again.

A good healty short term economic profit is not always a bad thing.
Yes, currently people like me cannot afford the plane, but since there
is a solid profit to be made, a lot of manufacturers will enter the
market that might have been on the fence. Competition breeds diversity
and innovation which is never a bad thing. I've seen some pretty damn
novel aircraft sporting features that aren't offered by cessna or
piper. And eventually the prices come down. God bless the free market
system.

Also, the prices aint really bad, if you look at it from a FBO's
perspective. I'm a little curious how Diamond is feeling about their
brand spanking new DA-20. They are marketing them to schools at
$160K. Subtract the Garmin and other goodies, the base airframe is
like $140 or so. Your typical LSA is half the price, out performs the
warhorse 152 and you can train private pilots in it.


Jim

http://www.unconventional-wisdom.org

Is it possible for the Light Sport category to revive that old slogan
of "An Airplane In Every Garage" in order to bolster the number of GA
pilots?

No reason it shouldn't.

With the proper marketing campaign (maybe AOPA & EAA can team up on this?)
we should be attracting far more people to flying.

Is anyone doing any instructing in light sport aircraft yet? (I have seen
none in my area, yet.) What do they cost per hour to operate? It's got to
be pretty affordable, no?
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

"Jay Honeck" wrote in message
news:_K0ff.579174$xm3.389762@attbi_s21...
Is anyone doing any instructing in light sport aircraft yet? (I have seen
none in my area, yet.) What do they cost per hour to operate? It's got
to be pretty affordable, no?

See eBay item 4587252624

I'm still considering getting a Sport-CFI added to my PP. It may be a while
though...

-Greg B.

A sign of the times in that ad: "Sorry, no international students" in
bold capital letters.

Is anyone doing any instructing in light sport aircraft yet? (I have seen
none in my area, yet.) What do they cost per hour to operate? It's got to
be pretty affordable, no?

St. Charles Flying Service at 3SQ is (the last time I checked) only 1
of 2 part 141 schools in the country. They had a writeup in AOPA Pilot
recently.

They have 2 Evektor Sport Star trainers. They rent for the same price
as their (beat-up) 172's, but are obviously newer. They quote a
complete 141 SP package price of less than $3k.
http://www.stcharlesflyingsvs.com/lightsport.php

I'm based at a field near there (KSET) and they are buzzing around all
the time, so they are definetely getting a lot of use. Comments I've
heard are that they are a "really fun" to fly.

I got my PP and Instrument ratings at 3SQ and they are a great bunch of
people to work with.

Brian

Is anyone doing any instructing in light sport aircraft yet? (I have
seen
none in my area, yet.) What do they cost per hour to operate? It's got
to
be pretty affordable, no?

See http://www.sportpilot.org/instructors/. There are a few Sport
instructors around...

Yep, I didn't say there weren't. I just noted the issue about part
141....