Airplane Overload — Imagine a gymnasium, the full court kind where basketball is played. Imagine ten of them placed side by side. Big space, huh? Now imagine all of them filled to capacity with aircraft and airplane gear of every imaginable sort. Presto! You’ve got Aero Friedrichshafen. No wonder we go year after year (I think this was my tenth Aero and, for certain, I’m going again). In this wrap up post, I’ll provide a few more views of this truly excellent event. Good as my reporting hopefully is, however, true-blue aviation enthusiasts owe it to themselves to make the trip to the southern edge of Germany for this outstanding (nearly) all-indoor aviation extravaganza. I can find so many good reasons to like Aero, I’m sure you’d be pleased if you attend.
Final Facts and Videos — Aero Show Director Roland Bosch somehow made time in what must be an awesomely tight schedule to let us tape a video with him and his U.S.
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Pre-Opening Glimpses at Aero 2013 in Germany
Excitement Amid the Chaos — If you’ve been to any show the day before it opens, you know what I mean by “chaos.” With mere hours to go before the doors open to the public, it appears no hope exists to be ready in time. Weather in Europe — a lousy winter drags on inexorably, as it does in the northern U.S. — is preventing airplanes from arriving. Protective plastic still covers the carpets. Booth spaces, called “stands” in EuropeSpeak, are still being assembled. Everywhere you look, it seems a week’s worth of work remains but Aero opens tomorrow morning as I write this. Fear not. I’ve seen this act before. Somehow, it gets done and no one is the wiser. As the frenetic pace quickens to a climax, I uncovered a few delights worthy of passing on before Aero truly gets under way. Here we go!
Apple Event Magic? — Peter Funk (photo) may be the Steve Jobs of Aero.
50 Years with No Crashes…and 25 of them In A Quick!
It’s enough to be proud of flying a “real” airplane for 50 years without accident, incident, or citation for 50 years. But imagine if half of those years were flown in those crazy “death wish” machines: ultralights! Of course, those of us who’ve flown hang gliders, ultralights and other true bird experience aircraft know just how safe they are. Anything you fly requires skill but also flying it within its strengths and limitations – that’s the only fail-safe secret to safe flying.
Nobody knows that truth better than George Karamitis. He’s just received the FAA’s Wright Brothers Master Pilot Award, for half a century of impeccable flying in both GA airplanes and the all-time best selling ultralight, the Quicksilver. George started out like a lot of us did, gawking through the fence as a kid at his home airport, Oshkosh’s Wittman Field. The veteran aviation icon and airport namesake himself, Steve Wittman, gave wee Georgie a ride one day, which sure beat hanging out in the family bathroom at home, as he liked to do, sitting on the toilet seat lid and pretending to fly with a plunger for a joystick!
2012 LSA Market Shares — Cubs & Surprises
Our annual review of LSA Market Share brings our updated fleet chart and a second chart showing prior-year registrations. While sales of new SLSA remains below par, the market appears to be experiencing spotty but regular recovery from earlier low points. The first half the year foretold a better recovery but the last half of the year stalled somewhat. Regardless, based on traffic to this website, LSA interest is higher than ever. For January 2013, ByDanJohnson.com set all-time records in Unique Visitors and all other measuring criteria Thank you for your support!
2012 Market Share report — Nearby, we present our standard market share numbers. Our original chart remains consistent, illustrating the “installed base,” or “fleet size.” Because we know many of you seek recent-year information we are repeating the Calendar Year chart that debuted last year.
For the second year in a row Cessna lead in 2012 with an impressive 94 registrations though this is down 30% from 134 in 2011.
Sebring’s Airplane Rush; a Quick Post-Review
Preparing for Sebring, four days of the show, and a LSA flight over the ocean can fill your days to the brim … and all of that is truly excellent. January used to be a month of flying doldrums but since Sebring started nine years ago, the month has turned into one of the most active for light plane enthusiasts. ByDanJohnson.com reflects this with increased and growing traffic. January 2013 looks to set a new all-time record and that comes on the heels of a record 2012. Thanks for your loyal visits; we’re happy to be providing the news and videos you want.
Speaking of coverage, thanks a billion to James Lawrence, who provided daily updates along with his superb photos from Sebring while I was running around with other duties. The good news is we’ve already posted four videos and several more will follow, thanks to the excellent work by my partner-in-video, creator of the popular Ultralight News YouTube channel.
Sebring Day Three Evening
The big Saturday came and went, bookended by winds, overcast and raindrops of the intermittent kind. No doubt many potential showgoers were deterred by the non-Florida-like weather.
LSA demo flights were conducted apace, although none of the three days of the show have shown the kind of flight activity of previous years because the weather just hasn’t been cooperative.
All in all, a difficult show to accept: so much great preparation from Jana Filip and crew, many LSA exhibitors battling through winter weather across the country just to arrive late, Patty Wagstaff doing two blockbuster performances, ditto Team AeroDynamix, which drew out a good crowd at dusk despite challenging weather that wasn’t horrible, just uncooperative, and sometimes you want to ask yourself if somebody up there likes to laugh when people plan an aviation meet.
In the hang gliding days, we called it “meet weather”. Call a competition, expect rain.
Final day tomorrow typically draws a smaller attendance at least on a Sunday morning, and a bunch of us are launching at show’s end for 4 days in the Bahamas as part of Mike Z’s annual island fly-out.
Pipistrel Benchmarks, News, Developments
Known for their several lucrative wins at the NASA Challenge events, Pipistrel also logged market successes in the USA and around the world during 2012. The manufacturer with a range from weight shift trikes to electric-powered gliders to Light-Sport Aircraft to their four-seat Panther in development has become a company to watch. At the end of the year, the Slovenian company with a production facility in Italy had plenty to discuss.
Most notably, the company built their 500th aircraft from the Sinus/Virus family. These sleek machines include the Sinus (“Seen-Us”) motorglider, the Virus (“Veer-Us”) lightplane and shorter-winged version called the Virus SW. The company proudly announced, “Together with the other models and the powered-hang gliders, this means we have made well over one thousand flying devices!” Aircraft number 500 buyer was Charles Dalglish from Australia. The aircraft was handed over to distributor Michael Coates whose organization includes U.S. sales.This year Coates recorded his 100th delivery.
iLSA & CTLSi — Much More than Fuel Injection
The first iLSA are flying in the USA. Springboarding from Apple’s famous iDevices, why not iLSA? This stands for “i” Light-Sport Aircraft, meaning they’re fuel injected, which today suggests Rotax’s new 912 iS engine. Tecnam has announced P2008s with the new powerplant. Pipistrel has iS models, too. Others will follow, although Remos indicated they are taking a wait-and-see approach to the new powerplant. All models remain available with the carbureted version of the 912s in 80 or 100 horsepower. (See this earlier article about the newest Rotax and this one with a video.)
Market leader Flight Design has iLSA arriving in all corners of the country under the slightly changed name of CTLSi. Flight Design USA president Tom Peghiny recently assembled a couple of these airplanes and logged several flights on them. He offered a series of comments on how his newest LSA is an improvement in last year’s model.
LSA Seaplane Invasion …Can It Happen?
What’s going on out in the marketplace? More than any time since the launch of Light-Sport Aircraft in 2004, I have not observed such a frenzy of activity for a particular niche, this time for LSA seaplanes. Next season, in 2013, we could see no less than nine entries; three brand new and that count does not include any LSA equipped with floats, possibly adding several more. Yet some major potholes appear in the runway… or perhaps that should be waves sloshing over the bow.
One entry is a return of a LSA seaplane previously seen in the USA as the Freedom S100 (SLSA List #44) yet can it reenter the market without a full FAA audit? See Update at end. A new agency directive with the catchy name 8130.2G CHG 1 may require a FAA visit to Spain but who knows when that might occur, given the likelihood of an FAA budget cut through the political process known as sequestration, part of the so-called “fiscal cliff” the mainstream media drones on about endlessly.
Light-Sport Aircraft… at Home and Abroad
My European associate and friend, Jan Fridrich, coined a phrase a few years ago: “Global LSA,” he said, meaning the ASTM standards set could be used in any country and thereby create a worldwide market for recreational aircraft. Already a few accept the standards and many are considering or are already using some variant. So, in this post, let’s review some international successes for LSA.
Tecnam is one of the most prolific of all LSA producers and not just because they have multiple approved models. Recently, they sold a pair of P2008s to New Zealand. Waikato Aero Club CEO Richard Small said, “The new planes have a number of advantages over traditional aircraft. Manufactured from modern materials [Tecnam] planes are more fuel efficient and quieter. They also have full electronic flight display screens. Our pilots are thoroughly enjoying the upgrade.”
Pipistrel has logged sales globally as well and booked four orders for their new Alpha Trainer into Russia.
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