Book Review:Maintenance/overhaul guide to Lycoming aircraft engines, Christy

Gene Kearns wrote:

On Wed, 22 Dec 2004 11:14:50 -0500, alexy wrote:

Some of these engines may not be that far from a 1937 tractor engine,
but, you know what? 65+ years later, we still haven't found anything
affordable and reliable enough to replace them.... AND if they were
sold for what they were *worth* they probably sell for less than $1000
per cylinder, new..... but that is another story....

I guess "worth" is subjective. They are worth far more than that to a
lot of pilots who fly behind them. And if pilots suddenly decided that
they would only pay $1,000 per cylinder, I wonder if any would be
made? I suspect that the increased market at that price would be small
enough that they could never get the economies of scale to manufacture
for that price.

Then by the same logic, that 8 cylinder engine in your automobile is
"worth" $40,000+.
I don't see how that is the same logic. People are willing to pay
$20k+ for a 4-cyliner aircraft engine, but I doubt if any of them
would be willing to pay $40k for an 8-cylinder auto engine. So for
them, the aircraft engine is worth $5k+ per cylinder, while the auto
engine is not.

How do you define "worth"?

It is hard to make the economy of scale argument
and the "these things haven't changed in 50 years" argument at the
same time. The second year you go into production you have your
tooling and a track record.

First, I wouldn't make the "these things haven't changed in 50 years"
argument. No question that the changes haven't been as dramatic as in
other engines based on this Pre-WWII technology (the internal
combustion engine), but it's a matter of degree.

Secondly, if the tooling for the annual production of 100,000 units of
product x were just 500 copies of the tooling for producing 200 units
per year, this argument would have merit. But I am not aware of any
manufacturing processes that work that way.


If we forget that these are aircraft engines and just look at the fact
that they are machined castings and forgings.... there is no way we
can justify the astronomical price tags....

Well, there is liability insurance, testing, and above all, the law of
supply and demand.
1) People are willing to pay those prices,
2) companies making these products have assessed the market and
determined that lowering prices would not sell enough additional units
to increase profits
3) companies with the engineering and manufacturing expertise to
create competitive products have for the most part decided that they
can't produce them inexpensively enough to attract enough market share
to make a profit, and
4) the few companies who have tried to enter the market with
competitive products have proven the others in point 3 right.

What kind of "justification" do you have in mind? By all means, if you
can make a profit building and selling them for less, put together a
business plan and go talk to venture capitalists! g

--
Alex -- Replace "nospam" with "mail" to reply by email. Checked infrequently.

The manufacturers of certificated aircraft pay LyCon prices because the
only alternative until very recently was an Allison or P&W turboprop at
ten times the cost. I'm not sure any of the other supposedly
certificated engines being talked of are 1) actually certificated in
the U.S, and 2) actually shipping. The Zoche and DynaCam were thinly
veiled efforts to pimp up some venture capital; neither had any real
desire to produce engines.

Homebuilders use these same engines because most homebuilders today
just want to fly and are "building" as a dodge around type
certification: most lack fabrication skills or any desire to
experiment. Look at Richard Van Grunsven, who is making a lot of money
on the RV kits. If people will pay those prices for sheet aluminum
and assorted widgets why should he get his airplane certificated and
tool up and manufacture them? His margins are as high as a certificated
lightplane, he is making a lot of money with relatively little work.

If the Lycoming or Continental engine were really more reliable than
commodity general purpose engines, they'd be used in many other
applications. They are 1930s designs that if not protected by
certification would have been out of production for decades. General
purpose production engines have been installed in aircraft, usually by
people with a lack of resources in manufacturing and design, and yet
flown pretty well. If a company like Mercury Marine chose to get
involved in powerplants for experimental aircraft, they could put
Lycoming out of that market segment in a couple of years.

"Denny" wrote in message
oups.com...
The manufacturers of certificated aircraft pay LyCon prices because the
only alternative until very recently was an Allison or P&W turboprop at
ten times the cost. I'm not sure any of the other supposedly
certificated engines being talked of are 1) actually certificated in
the U.S, and 2) actually shipping. The Zoche and DynaCam were thinly
veiled efforts to pimp up some venture capital; neither had any real
desire to produce engines.

Homebuilders use these same engines because most homebuilders today
just want to fly and are "building" as a dodge around type
certification: most lack fabrication skills or any desire to
experiment. Look at Richard Van Grunsven, who is making a lot of money
on the RV kits. If people will pay those prices for sheet aluminum
and assorted widgets why should he get his airplane certificated and
tool up and manufacture them? His margins are as high as a certificated
lightplane, he is making a lot of money with relatively little work.

Relatively little work? Hmm, I'd call designing, tooling, and fabricating,
and test flying 1 or 2 prototypes for each new aircraft significant. Add
production tooling costs, build manuals, etc, and the development costs for
each new type are probably surprising. Also, liability is probably a
significant cost for someone like Van's. Add Van's customer support and the
other benefits that come from their overhead (I'm sure they have 10x the
staff of any other kit manufacturer) and their prices are a pretty good
value.


If the Lycoming or Continental engine were really more reliable than
commodity general purpose engines, they'd be used in many other
applications. They are 1930s designs that if not protected by
certification would have been out of production for decades. General
purpose production engines have been installed in aircraft, usually by
people with a lack of resources in manufacturing and design, and yet
flown pretty well. If a company like Mercury Marine chose to get
involved in powerplants for experimental aircraft, they could put
Lycoming out of that market segment in a couple of years.

And, being good capitalists, why didn't they do that? Because the market is
too small, the barriers to certification too high, and the liability is a
real monster. Apparently, they have decided that aviation isn't a
worthwhile market. If the aviation engine market was a panacea, you'd have
more than 2 real players. Right now, you don't. You have two, plus a
couple (Rotax and Jabiru) who are trying to make a go of it, then you can
add a few more which are perpetually "almost there", or "next year", or
whatever, but don't seem to ever get to market with product that earns and
keeps a place in the market.