Next month, in April 2013, the Light-Sport Aircraft industry celebrates an anniversary. It will be the eighth year since the first Special LSA approval was granted by an FAA Designated Airworthiness Representative in 2005. Evektor‘s Sportstar was first, followed hours later by the Flight Design CT and then an amazing outpouring of innovation now stretching to 131 SLSA models approved. That’s better than four brand new aircraft every quarter for 32 straight quarters; worldwide aviation’s never seen anything like it. Most of the early brand names in the industry were new, at least to Americans. Yet along the way, some famous aviation names joined the party.
We’ve seen entries from Piper, Cirrus, Cessna, Lycoming, Sensenich, and Wipaire Floats plus the major member organizations embraced Light-Sport in their own way. One multibillion dollar company to serve the sport and recreation community has been Garmin.
Archives for March 2013
Building a Quicksilver Wing — In “Fast Time”
I once saw Boeing employees racing around furiously to build an entire 747 in just seven minutes. Pretty amazing, huh? I’ll bet you didn’t know they were so efficient. OK, fine … spoil my fun by telling me that is baloney and simply a “Hollywood effect.” Yes, the truth is, all I refer to is a video watched by every visitor to the Washington State 747 assembly building (by the way, not far from the Arlington airshow every July and a most worthwhile visit). I thought the professionally produced video was terribly cool, as was a tour of Boeing’s astoundingly-enormous building … so immense that several 747s could be assembled at once in a clear-span structure.
So, how about the same idea down here in the world of airplane the rest of us can buy and fly … at least after we build the airplane? I was recently sent such a video from the new owners of Quicksilver Aeronautics.
Garmin’s Radios Add Technology to Cockpits
Technology and radios seem to be obvious partners, don’t they? In the old days of a few round dials to help a pilot operate his flying machine, the comm radio was perhaps the highest technology to enter the cockpit. Radios continued to improve over the years but much of the innovation was seen in the faceplate or occurred in transceiver functions. We did get digital readouts and flip-flop frequency change options, but otherwise radio have seemed rather static … frozen in time, while GPS, moving maps, EFISs, EMSs, PFDs, MFDs, and more swept past with wave after wave of innovation. Compared to Dynon’s SkyView or Garmin’s 796, radios were looking long in the tooth.
Thanks to recent announcements from top LSA radio supplier, Garmin, the radio product line is changing. The ubiquitous SL30 and SL40 that kept Sport Pilots talking to control towers have been favorite panel friends to many a Sport Pilot.
Towering Inferno
Update 3/22/13 … CHICAGO / Associated Press announced that the FAA put the final list of air traffic control tower closures at 149. The process of shutdown will start early in April. One key point: closures will not force the airports themselves to shut down, but all pilots will use unicom frequencies to communicate their position and intentions to other pilots in the vicinity. “We will work with the airports and the operators to ensure the procedures are in place to maintain the high level of safety at non-towered airports,” FAA Administrator Michael Huerta said in a statement.
In what could be a major impact on smaller regional airports such as Salinas Municipal in California, Lakeland Linder Regional in Florida (home of the Sun ‘n Fun show next month), and Wittman Regional in Wisconsin (home of Oshkosh Airventure), airlines have yet to say whether they will continue offering service to airports that lose tower staff.
Tecnam to Debut New Low-Wing LSA
Tecnam announced that it will reveal their “Astore” next generation Light Sport Aircraft at Aero Friedrichshafen 2013 in Germany on April 24th. “Astore is an all-new, two-seat, low-wing airplane that offers superlative performance,” wrote company officials. The Italian company celebrates its 65th year in 2013 and saw fit to name the new model accordingly. “What could be more fitting in this special anniversary year than for Professor Luigi Pascale, Tecnam’s legendary head of aircraft design, to name his new creation in honor of his first production aircraft, the P48 Astore.” Tecnam has a tradition of naming models for the year the design was introduced.
Tecnam said their new Astore “affords the pilot the smoothest and most pleasurable flight with innovations such as an Apple iPad® mini supplied with each aircraft as standard.” They’ll use a Levil G mini WiFi connection to supply information for the smaller Apple tablet so it can act as the Astore’s Primary Flight Display.
March 2013 LSA News Wrap
Several news items in our March 2013 LSA News Wrap and we’ll get to it … right after this: We’re thrilled to tell you that — for the second month in a row — ByDanJohnson.com achieved another record. Despite fewer days, February substantially exceeded January’s Unique Visitors, reaching another all-time traffic mark. Last year was amazing and 2013 is even better. THANKS so much for your regular visits and welcome to our new readers!
Sam LS Flies — Pilots love new developments, so aviation media outlets jumped all over the first flight of Thierry Zibi’s Sam LS. The retro-looking, all-metal Light-Sport candidate (it has not yet gone through the Special LSA process and will initially be sold as a kit) attracted plenty of attention at the Sebring Sport Aviation Expo where the company bought a premium position just inside the main gate. By Sun ‘n Fun in less than one month, Thierry will hit another benchmark as the aircraft flies for the public.
Wrangling An Air2Air Photo Shoot
My flyin’ pal, industry leader, and co-blogger Dan Johnson suggested recently that I throw some tips your way about how I put together and do air2air photography. Since I’ve done around 600 in my 30 year career, it’s not a topic I have to research, always good news. So for those of you interested in what it takes to pull off such an undertaking, here we go.
First big challenge: finding a decent photo ship. That’s tougher away from your home airport (mine was for many years Santa Paula Airport north of Los Angeles, and Long Beach Airport just south.) My birds of prey have included:
single-seat ultralights, flying with one hand and holding the camera with the other – that was lots of fun although I was constantly anxious about dropping the big old Nikon SLR camera I used back in the early ’80s.homebuilt gyrocopters and choppers (airframe vibration is a big challenge here: faster shutter speeds are important)Piper Saratoga/Cherokee 6, Beech Bonanza.