I was shocked when learning to fly how much GA tech was stuck in some weird pre-World War II era state. Everything seems so needlessly complicated. Even small aircraft cost so much that I couldn’t imagine a computer controlled system and fly by wire would be cost prohibitive. Even a new C172 is close to $400k at the low end, and anything you’d actually want to fly is much more. A few grand in electronics seems worth it and can probably easily save itself back quickly in added fuel economy and maintenance, not to mention any monetary value you might place on your safety.
But then I watched as the ADS-B mandate (or whatever you want to call it) came into effect and GA enthusiasts started tossing around concentration camp metaphors. So many of the people in the industry are very old and just don’t want anything to change.
Also shocking is how expensive everything is. It’s like new blockbuster prescription drugs, and perhaps for similar reasons (FAA testing is maybe very expensive?) but with no expiration date. At least in 25 years that new drug will be cheap, adding a simple GPS to your plane is still going to cost more than your Lexus.
It feels like the real problem in this industry is lack of competition. There’s a chicken and egg problem: planes are expensive because so few people buy them, but so few people buy them because they’re expensive.
Light sport aircraft were supposed to be the solution, but the difficulty of flying (which you’re addressing) seems to have precluded that.
All of which is to say: you’ve got a wide open field here and I hope you do well at it, aviation needs this.
> It feels like the real problem in this industry is lack of competition. There’s a chicken and egg problem: planes are expensive because so few people buy them, but so few people buy them because they’re expensive.
Lack of competition is not the root cause. It's all the regulations. Certifying a new GA airplane takes a lot of time, and costs a fortune. This translates to high development costs, and certification costs, and ALSO is a huge barrier to entry for new companies, and a significant barrier for existing companies to develop new modern designs.
I could potentially muster enough resources to design and build an ultralight aircraft (that does not need any certifications), but a type-certified aircraft even as simple as a Cessna 152? Forget about it.
You could argue whether those certifications are worth it for safety, e.g. by comparing Canada's much more generous ultralight aircraft max weight allowance compared to US, or looking at the change in accident rates in European countries that recently deregulated ultralight aircraft, but whether it's worth it or not, regulation is the single most impactful market force driving the cost of GA aircraft.
Lack of competition is also sometimes directly enforced by the government. For example, several countries mandate the use of FLARM, a proprietary collision avoidance system for light aircraft. Governments gave this company a monopoly without requiring their protocol to be made interoperable, open source, and dis-encumbered from patents.
I do believe that’s a factor (and mentioned it further down) but there are shockingly few companies that build planes.
The regulatory cost is amortized over the number of planes built. If people bought planes the way they buy cars, they’d cost far less. Hence the chicken/egg problem I mentioned.
One key difference I see between something like this and an ultralight is the danger to people on the ground. A few thousand pounds moving at up to 200mph or so (potentially 300+ after structural failure) is a lot of kinetic energy.
Definitely not "key". On the ground fatalities are very rare, perhaps 1%-2% of all general aviation fatalities [1].
One massive restriction on ultralight airplanes is that you can't carry passengers. Again, on paper, because of risk, but it ends up having some controversial effects. If you want to occasionally carry passengers, as many pilots do, you can't fly a cheap, simple, light, and slow ultralight aircraft. No, the regulations push you to fly a more expensive, complex, heavier, and faster one that is type-certified, but requires higher skill and currency (regularly recurring flight experience) to operate safely.
Given that pilot error is far and away the main cause of general aviation crashes, that push does not seem very wise, safety-wise, even disregarding the question of costs.
> A few thousand pounds moving at up to 200mph or so (potentially 300+ after structural failure) is a lot of kinetic energy.
Also, FTR, Cessna 152, a type-certified two seater, weights 1670 lbs gross, cruises at 120mph, and if it ever hits the ground wrong, it very likely won't be because it broke up in mid-air and plummeted at terminal velocity onto someone's house, but because the pilot stalled it at low altitude while turning from base to final, crashing onto airport property or an empty field nearby.
> One massive restriction on ultralight airplanes is that you can't carry passengers. Again, on paper, because of risk, but it ends up having some controversial effects. If you want to occasionally carry passengers, as many pilots do, you can't fly a cheap, simple, light, and slow ultralight aircraft.
Ineresting. I get a ride as a passenger in an ultralight two-seater. The pilot was a Vietnam vet. It was in Virginia, and we overflew part of the Great Dismal Swamp, which has alligators.
Nice! If it was a two seater, it does not legally qualify as an ultralight in the US, see FAR 103.1(a) [1]. Back in the day, some older ultralights were designed with a very wide seat ("loveseat"), that physically but not legally allowed the pilot to take a passenger. Not sure if that's the case here. If the aircraft actually had two distinct seats, one clearly intended for a passenger, then it may have been a homebuilt aircraft, registered in the "experimental" category (FAR 21.191). Just like ultralights, these also operate without a type certificate, but upon completion of the build, the builder needs to provide a bunch of logs / photos / etc. documenting the construction process for the FAA to approve the aircraft for flights. Because such aircraft are designed to be built/assembled mostly (51%) by regular people (not at the factory), they often look very basic, just like proper ultralights, but they can be heavier, faster, carry passengers, etc.
I see, so thus guy was probably licensed to carry passengers. Thanks.
The seating arrangement was pilot in the front, passenger behind. When my son (about 8) get off his ride and was asked if he enjoyed it, he said "I prefer planes with doors".
I’m fairly certain there’s little difference between being hit by a 2 ton car going at 100mph and a 4 ton aircraft going at 200mph. Either way you splatter.
The clear difference is that cars have a limited, well known and clearly visible area where they are dangerous, planes could land on your face while you are having a picnic at the middle of the park.
> It feels like the real problem in this industry is lack of competition. There’s a chicken and egg problem: planes are expensive because so few people buy them, but so few people buy them because they’re expensive.
100%. We're here to try to break that cycle.
We definitely think aviation needs this too and I'm excited to connect with all the people out there who agree!
I would only add that if people have an interest in aviation then gliding is a fun gateway, and relatively inexpensive. As a student it felt like a lot of money (an aerotow might cost 40-50 pounds), but a year subscription to my old airfield cost about 1.5 hours of powered instruction time, flying is cheap on top of that.
You get very good at understanding how an aircraft handles and I like the club aspect. It's really more of a sport than a utility activity, but a lot of glider pilots go on to get PPLs (and a lot of instructors and competition pilots are retired airline or military because they love it so much).
Aircraft cost is in the range of a luxury car, $400k would get you a top end racing glider. You can pick up used aircraft for much less.
Yes! As a PPL that recently picked up gliding, I hugely recommend it. It’s a proper sport with a super high skill ceiling, supportive clubs, and competitions/racing when you’re ready. In studying for the glider rating, you’ll cover quite a bit that’s also applicable to flying “power”.
Plus, the economics are great. I bought a glider earlier this year for about 15k. I recently flew 5 hours from a $50 aerotow to 2500ft on a weak day and had a blast fighting my way around the course I was trying to fly. That’s compared to the $170/hr my club Cessna rents for, and which is nowhere close in terms of joy-per-hour.
Airplanes are for transportation, gliders are for sport!
isn't gliding more dangerous that GA? I've been wanting to try it, but the idea of not having an engine if you really need one, scares the crap out of me. Would love to fly in a motorized glider
In some sense yes, you learn a lot about energy management and you are acutely aware that you have no engine. On the other hand you always have no engine, so you learn to fly and manage your situation accordingly. At the more expensive end of the spectrum, some racing gliders have "get me home" mini props.
When you train, you initially fly in the vicinity of your home airfield and the risk is pretty low unless you do something stupid. For cross country, you train to do field landings and those are common enough in competition season. Basically you learn how to land out in situations where you can't sustain flight. You also tend to not fly over places that would make it difficult (eg built up areas or controlled airspace). Landing is always a decision made with plenty of time to spare, flown as a normal traffic pattern and usually starting the final glide with a lot of height. Competition pilots get more... close to the wire, but single seat gliders just want to stay airborne.
I don't know the accident rate proportionally, but glider related fatalities are extremely rare. In GA if you truly lose your engine, you have fewer options and you have to think a lot faster. While gliding you do also fly with a parachute, though there is scepticism about how effective it would be for a low altitude ditch.
Lots of pilots don't bother with cross country and just mess around their local airspace - still great fun.
I feel that your third paragraph justifies the sentiment in the second? If left to their own devices, a functionary will add enough regulation to kill any fun activity, because they are not affected by the decisions they make.
Another example is the new 406 MHz ELTs; it's not clear how effective ELTs are at saving lives, despite their 'obvious' utility, but now the price is higher, they have batteries that require replacing and only expensive manufacturer-approved ones at that, it replaces a system that was working fine and offers no additional utility to the end-user who may be dead after it activates.
It is not even the above example that will bring down GA, it is the death by a thousand cuts, from NIMBYs moving next to ancient airports and shutting them down, to functionaries dragging their feet on lead-free fuels leading to an environmental crisis, to under-staffing of control towers so GA traffic is forcibly reduced, and so on. So the GA community, like with the gun control debate, has to take a give-an-inch, take-a-mile attitude towards regulation.
I'm curious about your comment about 406 MHz ELTs[1].
(I'm not a pilot, though I know a few.)
(First, a clarification, the old 121.5 MHz ELTs also require their manufacturer approved batteries to be replaced every few years in order to maintain their certification.)
(I also don't know the stats on whether ELTs are effective at saving lives or not. I can only assume they are though as anything that can speed the rescue of a lost or injured person greatly increases their chances of survival.)
My direct experience comes from the other side - finding people using ELTs (planes), PLBs (people), and EPIRBs (boats) - with a county Search and Rescue team in California. (To be fair, while we have a lot of rugged backcountry, we don't get a huge number of plane crashes in remote areas.)
I will strongly argue that - aside from price - the new 406 ELTs are far superior.
For those of you who don't know, all ELTs transmit a special signal[2] on 121.5 MHz which can be picked up with radio direction finding equipment[3].
Here's how a search works with the old ELTs - a plane crashes and sets off the beacon. The signal is hopefully heard by another airplane in the area who happens to be monitoring 121.5, by a ground-based monitoring station within range, or by a SARSAT[4][5] satellite when it makes a pass overhead every 90 minutes. Any of those can only detect the presence of a signal and its relative strength. So, now, once the info goes up the chain and back down the chain to the locally responsible agency, a search is initiated. Other info will be used as well - radar tracks disappearing, ADS-B data, etc. - but from the ELT side, teams will head to high points in the area with their RDF equipment and take multiple bearings on the signal which are triangulated to focus the search area. Once they make access to the area, the RDF equipment is used to further refine the location. If available, Civil Air Patrol and other airborne assets are also tasked with locating the plane via ELT signal as well as visually. This is fine and good and all works quite well. It is slow though. It takes time for the signal to be noticed and it takes time for the signal to be triangulated.
The new ELTs also transmit a digital packet on 406 MHz which includes a bunch of data including a serial number and the beacon's coordinates.
So, now searching for a plane with a new ELT now goes like this - a plane crashes and sets off the beacon. It starts sending out a digital burst every 50 seconds or so which is picked up by a satellite or ground-based receiving station. Satellite data goes to the Air Force Rescue Coordination Center[6] which then validates the information and passes it - including the coordinates - to the locally responsible agencies to initiate a rescue. (As an aside, since the signal incudes the serial number which has been registered to the owner, they will know details of the aircraft and can attempt to contact the owner to possibly confirm it was an accidental activation, or gather other information.) Now that the local agencies have the coordinates, they can make direct access to the location and effect a rescue in a much more timely and less resource-intensive way.
In one notable crash - of an experienced bush pilot - I was involved with, it were primarily found when they were reported as late in returning from a flight and the wreckage was identified as the large black spot on the side of a mountain directly inline with their last few ADS-B[7] (and Spidertracks[8]) transmissions. (I don't recall if the ELT signal was used or if the transmitter was destroyed in the fire.)
My point (which probably ends up taking away from my main point of death-by-a-thousand-cuts) of ELTs being marginally useful is based on an article in one of the flying mags I read earlier this year, I forget which magazine unfortunately, that performed an analysis of aircraft accidents with the goal of analyzing ELT usefulness. For an ELT to be useful, that is in order for it to accelerate the rescue of survivors in the case of an accident, it needs to be the type of accident that is survivable and in which the ELT survives and is heard by a rescue agency. But, also the type of crash that incapacitates the passengers so they cannot activate emergency services by other means, or that emergency services are not already activated by for example a mayday call or missed flightplan, or by a ground witness (so, it must be away from a populated area).
ELTs may also help locate aircraft where there are no survivors but then it could be argued that the usefulness is not pertinent to the pilot. Also, the crash has to be the type that kills the occupants but allows the ELT to survive.
It turns out the numbers are sketchy because the FAA does not always (and not often, if I remember from the article) track ELT activation or whether the ELT aided in the recovery of the aircraft or survivors, and so it's hard to come to a conclusion on ELT usefulness based on statistics.
But it's the kind of thing that aircraft owners have to worry about, even if they fly alone in densely populated areas and file a flight plan, that makes aviation cumbersome due to regulations. I have an ELT, and I buy the damn batteries. I'm also not sure I would fly without one. But it does feel overbearing to have it as a requirement.
> I was shocked when learning to fly how much GA tech was stuck in some weird pre-World War II era state.
This is accurate. Between regulations and insurability, pilots have the choice of newer, less expensive, and more innovative experimental aircraft that are expensive to insure, or FAA-approved aircraft that were not even state of the art in 1952. It's so bad that most people are flying refurbished 1970s model planes because the new ones are identical except for the electronics and upholstery.
But then I watched as the ADS-B mandate (or whatever you want to call it) came into effect and GA enthusiasts started tossing around concentration camp metaphors. So many of the people in the industry are very old and just don’t want anything to change.
Also shocking is how expensive everything is. It’s like new blockbuster prescription drugs, and perhaps for similar reasons (FAA testing is maybe very expensive?) but with no expiration date. At least in 25 years that new drug will be cheap, adding a simple GPS to your plane is still going to cost more than your Lexus.
It feels like the real problem in this industry is lack of competition. There’s a chicken and egg problem: planes are expensive because so few people buy them, but so few people buy them because they’re expensive.
Light sport aircraft were supposed to be the solution, but the difficulty of flying (which you’re addressing) seems to have precluded that.
All of which is to say: you’ve got a wide open field here and I hope you do well at it, aviation needs this.