Search Results for : flight design ct

Back from a busy, weather-challenging (for photography) trip to the Bahamas, I stopped by to visit Dan Johnson and his soul mate Randee at their Spruce Creek air park digs near Daytona Beach, Florida. If you haven’t had the pleasure, visit Spruce Creek sometime to see how cool an air park can be. Hundreds and hundreds of homes, condos, hangars and “planeports,” even on-site business and a restaurant make this a wonderful aviation destination. It’s my fourth visit over the years and always a pleasure … as it is to visit with Dan and Randee.
This time I got to meet Dan’s partner-in-aviation Brian Boucher, a long time, big-jet professional pilot and one of four owners of the new Flight Design CTLSi I flew for Plane & Pilot magazine up in CT at Tom Peghiny’s US HQ just before it left for Spruce Creek. The opportunity came up for Dan to join the partnership and the numbers made sense, so now the Johnsons are part owners of that lovely fuel-injected CTLSi.

This year’s LSA bash in Sebring which starts next Thursday, 17 January and runs through the weekend looks to be far and away the best ever. Jana Filip and crew have been working hard all year to make this a top professional event.
Lots of new things in addition to the usual comfy, cozy gathering that’s LSA-only include a twilight airshow (can you spell Patty Wagstaff?), Seaplane Pilot’s Association Seaplane Base at Lake Jackson, Model Airplane Contest, a fully restored American Airlines DC-3 on display, and…oh yeah…tons of top LSA demos for you to get up close and personal with. Here’s some hot points:
• 80+ inside exhibitors; • 80+ outside exhibitors • 20,000+ attendance expected • keynote speeches by Randy Babbitt (former FAA head) and Patty Wagstaff • lots of new product rollouts including at least a couple LSA I’ve heard about through the grapevine. • …and the 3rd annual Bahamas flyout for four days of island fun, mon.

* REVISED June 21: Missing text at end replaced. * *** Some big news developing recently regarding the European Aviation Safety Agency’s (EASA) certification of the first three light sport aircraft in its new category designed to legitimize ASTM-certified LSA. *** The new category is called EASA CS-LSA. We’ve talked about it before, see below, but this is a significant step forward and here are some of the highlights. *** The three planes are names we’re all familiar with: the Flight Design CTLS-ELA, Czech Sport Aircraft PS-28 Cruiser (which is known here as the Sportruiser and was, for a year, the Piper Sport), and Evektor’s SportStar RTC (stands for Restricted Type Certificate). The Cruiser was the first to be awarded the cert, with the CTLS-ELA coming right after. Both were heralded at the recent Aero convention in Europe, while the SportStar was announced a few days ago.

Time to wrap up this week’s discussion with John Lampson, CFII and veteran Flight Design CTLS instructor. *** Our topic: How and why are LSA different than GA airplanes and what transition challenges do they present for experienced GA pilots?”LSA really perform,” says John. “When you add power in the CT, it wants to just leap off the ground. That’s not true of most heavier GA airplanes.” *** “As I said earlier, GA experience shouldn’t hold pilots back in an LSA. But I’ve noticed they’re often surprised at the lighter, more dramatic, responsive feel of LSA, especially when they make the exact same control inputs that they’re used to for a GA airplane.” *** “New pilots on the other hand, with no prior flying experience, have no preconceptions. I can teach them from the ground up. They don’t have to combat and unlearn those old habits first.” *** Does that mean baby blue students get with the program quicker?

My good pal John Lampson, the 6,000 hour CFII who took me through my Sport Pilot training a few years back now, continues the good fight to put well-trained, safe Light Sport Aircraft pilots in the air.John’s a CFII, so he teaches for all the GA ratings, but he’s getting a lot of students putting in LSA time on the Flight Design CTLS that’s on leaseback out of Premier Flight Center in Hartford, CT. *** John’s done well over 1,000 hours of training by now in the CT so I thought he’d be a great source of regular tips on learning to fly, or transition to, light sport flight. We got to chatting on which topic to kick off this training discussion with and before long settled on something we’d covered before and that I’ve written about in the past: how is flying an LSA different, especially for rated GA pilots used to heavier, less responsive aircraft, and what challenges does that present to the student?

|||| News travels fast these days: Just ask Herman Cain. New tech net scraper Gizmag just ran a blurb on the Pipistrel Alpha that I covered earlier. Gizmag’s focus is on Alpha’s low cost, which as they note is less than €60,000 (currently about $80,000). *** Now consider this: if the euro continues to go through its troubles and drops further against the dollar, imagine a quality SLSA, like the Alpha promises to be (it’s based on a years-proven design — the Vinus/Sinus — with hundreds now delivered), priced at, perhaps, $70,000. For all of us who’ve decried the high costs of LSA, might this be the price point/airplane that would help break the LSA sales logjam? |||| Dynon plans Hands-On SkyView Training at Sebring. Who among us hasn’t sat for the first time in a new LSA and felt brain overload when confronted with an unfamiliar EFIS display?

In this post there’s both good news and bad news. *** First up: blog reader Pete Zaitcev commented on my blog yesterday that the Front Range Airport (FTG) visit, on May 14, by the LSA Tour #3 will coincide with the Rocky Mountain LSA Expo. *** FTG is about 25 miles east of Denver at Watkins, CO. The event is sponsored by the Colorado Pilots Assoc. *** Looks like a fun time and a smart call for the Tour to plan a stop there. Thanks Pete!More good news:  Cessna Aircraft delivered 106 aircraft in the first quarter, up from 80 a year ago, and much of the increase comes from deliveries of the 19 Skycatchers. Cessna’s Bob Stangarone has told me the company expects to have delivered 150 by year’s end. *** The unhappy news concerns two LSA crashes. *** A PiperSport crash cost a young CFI his life in Florida.

I just finished a column that’s becoming an annual event: talking with Avemco Insurance‘s VP Mike Adams, who filled me in on the general picture for LSA accidents, claims and what it says about pilot’s flying habits and the market strength as well after two brutal years trying to grow a fledgling industry.That column will be out in the mag this spring. The short tell is: rates haven’t gone up…and they haven’t gone down. We’re in a general market stagnation where new pilots are replacing those who are dropping out. *** Pilot accidents are less frequent, especially experienced GA pilots, because Avemco’s 5-hour minimum transition requirement before they’ll write a policy for a new LSA owner is helping pilots get the touch they need to fly these aircraft well.  *** LSA are generally lighter in weight than the birds they’ve flown all their lives, and the initial experienced-pilot mindset tended to regard them as toys instead of a new type of aircraft that deserves respect.