Avgas in France has reached $7.50/gal !

"Dylan Smith" wrote in message
...
In article , Chris wrote:
IFR is not a big issue in Europe for the private pilot. So expensive IFR
systems like WAAS and GPS enabled approaches are irrelevant. Its
interesting
that the much hailed Cirrus cannot fly IFR in much of European airspace
and
in the UK its just a VFR machine.

That's due to assinine regulations put out by our "beloved" CAA. That's
why Cirrus airplanes in Britain are all on the N-register. Indeed, if I
was interested in buying an IFR plane, regardless of what it was (even
if it was a Diamond) I'd have it on the N register to avoid the stupid,
pointless CAA regulations that *decrease* safety, not increase it.


But even a Cirrus on the N register is not legit, no DME, no ADF, no f*****g
good.

"Dave Stadt" wrote in message
m...

"Chris" wrote in message
...

"Jay Honeck" wrote in message
news:VAT9e.5840$r53.5583@attbi_s21...
Decimated since when? Post a reference statistic and time as a
starting
point.

Well, let's start with the fact that France's efforts at flight
pre-date
our own. Is 1903-ish far enough back for you?

What taxes particularly are you referring to?

Avgas taxes. The price of avgas in France (as the subject of this
thread
states) has now exceeded $7.50 per gallon, solely as a result of their
very aggressive tax policies.

Where does France get its processed petroleum products and what
factors
make the cost of avgas what it is?

I presume that they get their petroleum from the same worldwide supply
as
the U.S. -- yet our avgas is "only" $3.30-ish per gallon.

You just pulled thos whole argument out of your ass, dear, and while
it
might make an interesting thesis for a classroom debate, you should
quit
defending it unless you have a lot of facts to back up your
assertions.

As opposed to your well-thought out, carefully crafted
counter-arguments?

;-)

The facts are clear. It is your unwillingness to accept them that is
puzzling. Why -- especially in an aviation forum -- are you (and
Larry,
Martin, and a couple of other folks) defending a foreign tax system
that
more than DOUBLES the price of aviation? This makes no sense to me.

And why are people required to choose aviation as a pursuit based on
the
population of their country?

They're not. But based on the population of France, there should be
many
times more pilots -- ESPECIALLY given their proud heritage of flight.

I'm still waiting for an answer: If it's NOT the outrageous cost of
avgas
that has nearly killed general aviation in France, what is it? Why,
in
the land of Bleriot and Saint-Exupery, are there so (relatively) few
men
and women feeling the call to the skies, if NOT for price
considerations?

The French are more culturally mature and have perhaps outgrown such
childish pursuits.

You forgot the :-). It was a joke wasn't it?
Does everything need to be spelt out is such detail. Of course it was a joke
:-(

"Jay Honeck" wrote in message
news:SK5ae.8698$NU4.1859@attbi_s22...
Move to the city - then there'll be plenty of nearby kids. That will
always be a problem in a rural area. If you live in high-density housing
in a large city, there will always be random outdoor activities for
groups of kids.

We live in a city of 65,000, in a metropolitan area of over 120,000.


Cute expression - 65,000 equals a city. That's a town, not much more than a
village.

120,000 a metropolitan area - that's just a big town.

What does it take to become a city in the US?

"Jim" wrote in message ...
Jay Honeck wrote:

So, to summarize: Yes, there is fewer GA in Europe. But even if you
would
wipe all avgas taxes, there wouldn't be more.

You admit that predatory taxation has added 25% to the cost of GA in
France
(which is a gross under-estimation, BTW) -- and in the same breath say
that
it has NO impact on it?

That is the most absurd assertion I've seen in Usenet -- and I've seen
some
whoppers over the years.

Well let's go back to the premise of the post, that avgas costs $7.50 a
gallon
in France. Avgas in France would be priced in Euros, so somebody's
converting
Euros to US dollars using the current conversion rate. That's
mathematically
accurate, but doesn't tell the whole story. The dollar is very weak to
the
euro right now, which affects Americans buying European goods and
Europeans
buying American goods, but doesn't affect Europeans buying domestic
products as
much. For example, if the price of the dollar versus euros fell tomorrow
to
1/2 of what it is today, it would appear that avgas would cost USD 15.00 a
gallon. This would appear to American to be much more expensive, but
would not
really change what avgas would cost to a French(wo)man in France.

European countries tend to tax consumption higher, the US doesn't. One
reason
avgas is kept expensive is because autogas is very expensive to encourage
public transit and excellent high speed rail service. If avgas would be
priced
lower then autogas, there would be an incentive to burn avgas on the road
(which wouldn't do cat converter much good.) Note that Jet-A is much
cheaper
in Europe. This is another reason driving the diesel piston aviation
engine
and several European companies are leading this technology.

Aviation gasoline will continue to get more expensive in the US, and
eventually
may not be available at any price. It can be found (in the US as of last
week) selling at $4.82/US Gallon so you can say that the US is working
hard to
catch up with France, and that's without all of those European taxes as
well.
Avgas is a boutique fuel that must be specially handled and is produced
in
very limited quantities compared to other products, with a lot of
liability for
the slightest mishap. More and more corporate and other high consumption
aviation gas consumption has been shifted to aircraft that burn Jet A,
further
decreasing the economies of scale for 100ll. Also very importantly, it
contains a *lot* of tetraethyl lead (despite that LL designation), and
leaded
autogas was eventually banned by 1996 in the US for a good reason.

Surprisingly essence avec plomb (super) is still available in France,
although
it does cost more then sans plomb so it isn't purchased nearly as much. .

On the price of gasoline. In the UK 82% of the price of gasoline is made up
of taxes. Therefore when the cost of the raw material doubles in price the
impact on the final price of the gasoline autogas or avgas is much smaller
than in the US.

Added to the fact that oil is priced in dollars anyway, the deterioration in
the value of the dollar has mitigated to some extent the increase in the oil
costs.

The other fact is that TEL is made in the UK and guess what, the dollar's
decline has made that more expensive. So the cost of AVGAS in the US is
doubly hit. Whereas TEL costs in Europe have not changed.

In article ,
says...

It's easy to be "post-modernist" when faced with arguments dating from the
1930's!!

One scribe equates, quite well, post-modernism to schizophrenia.

Alas, substantiation.


Well, I guess I've been shown up! Another, post-modernist, marxist/socialist
schizophrenic. Textbook case no less!

That's some very subtle work - especially the marxist part. Not everyone would
have seen that. I'm afraid it leaves me with little more to say on the
subject.

"Jay Honeck" wrote in message
news:fs_9e.7050$c24.5136@attbi_s72...
Good Lord help us all! I suppose they will be made with China steel.
That
is the softest, inconsistent crap have ever seen, let alone all the other
made in China crap.

Now you've done it, Jim, you racist pig. How DARE you launch a wholesale
assault on another culture?

;-)

Hey, I wonder how many years (months?) it will be before GA in China
over-takes what's left of GA in France?


More to the point will be how quickly GA in China will overtake Ga in the US

"Dave Stadt" wrote in message
m...

"Morgans" wrote in message
news

"Jay Honeck" wrote

Sorry, Martin. Here's more bad news for Europe and Austria:

From AOPA's member news area:
"And with that, Dries dropped a bomb. Diamond, he said, is establishing
what
it calls the Diamond China Project, a new manufacturing facility that
will
be built "about 300 kilometers east of Beijing." Site construction
began
one
month ago, and it will be twice the size of Diamond's Austrian
facility -
and capable of employing 1,700 employees and building 600 aircraft a
year.
Eventually, all propeller-driven Diamond aircraft will be built at the
Chinese plant, starting with DA40s. The first DA40 will roll out the
so-called "Aviation City" factory doors by year-end."

Good Lord help us all! I suppose they will be made with China steel.
That
is the softest, inconsistent crap have ever seen, let alone all the other
made in China crap.
--
Jim in NC

Get used to it, China is the up and coming manufacturing world power.
They
will do what Japan did in the '60s and '70s at a scale that will make what
Japan did look like childs play.

the 20th Century was the century of the US, the 21st will be that of China.
Get used to it.

"George Patterson" wrote in message
news:Gmdae.2503$RD.1312@trndny02...
Morgans wrote:

How many years will it be until China's quality comes up, like Japan
finally
did?

About -15.

The question is, how long will it take for Americans to aquire enough
information about Chinese manufacturers to make informed decisions about
their products? The Chinese don't seem to have made any effort to brand
their products.

Why should they. Go to china and see for yourself whets happening there. The
cars on the roads are all western brands made in China, mainly in Shanghai
with the support of the western car companies, Ford, GM, VW etc.
They are soaking up the technology as they have just done with Rover.
The rate of progress is geometric not linear.

With their currency pegged to the dollar they are doing OK and with foreign
reserves conservatively valued at $600bn its easy to see why they do not
want to float the RMB.

Currently the are the second biggest consumer of gasoline and they have not
started yet, they use about a third of all the worlds concrete and about a
quarter of all the worlds steel.

and they can only get better and better and anyone who knows the Chinese,
will know they have a work ethic miles stronger than anything in the west.

and they despise the Japanese.

On Sat, 23 Apr 2005 18:42:53 +0100, Chris wrote:


More to the point will be how quickly GA in China will overtake Ga in the US


this will be a completely different GA then: flying presonal jets with high
tech equipment, not 20 or more years old spam cans with antique equipment.

#m
--
http://www.hotze.priv.at/album/aviation/caution.jpg

"Matt Barrow" wrote in message
...

"Morgans" wrote in message
...

"Dylan Smith" wrote in message
...
In article , Morgans wrote:
Good Lord help us all! I suppose they will be made with China
steel.
That
is the softest, inconsistent crap have ever seen, let alone all the
other
made in China crap.

Unlikely - Diamond's planes are made of plastic!


OHMYGOD!! They'll sneak it through the metal detectors!! :~)

I know you are kidding, but I am sure there are some VERY important
steel
parts in the "plastic" airplane, too. ;-)

The relief tubes?


--
Matt
---------------------
Matthew W. Barrow
Site-Fill Homes, LLC.
Montrose, CO

This just in..........Chrysler (or whatever name they are going by now days)
is openly discussing moving some manufacturing to China.