a lot of people started asking why they can’t do the same. It was then the FAA leadership seemed to take notice and essentially shut down even the development of the exp kit as mentioned in air facts article. So, even though we had a certifiable solution for a myriad of legacy aircraft types, we didn’t have the $ to buy our way through the policy and upper leadership, even those who’s sole job was to bring innovation to GA. We were told other things through the grapevine such as Cessna (which essentially owns Lycoming) expressed their feelings to FAA about us and others that would surely follow, and they didn’t want their old aircraft continuing to fly longer or compete with new orders,,,again, just rumors.
Oh it's not rumors, I've been harping about this dynamic for more than a decade. People refuse to see it just because they don't have a Dolby 5.1 remastered FHD youtube video of the [
insert any GAMA signatory OEM here] CEO handing a $ spray painted potato sack of USD to the Administrator in the FAA parking lot, then cartoonishly llama-tilting his face right into the barrel of the camera and going "
I want you to snuff this effort. I..Really..mean..this."
And they let these people vote. Willful blindness. BL, it's not the bug ya pigeons, it's the feature!
Same thing they did with primary non-commercial within the part 23 re-write legis in '13. Snuffed. Hell, even the parts they kept they still stonewalled congress until '15... so much for rule of law... but I'm the scofflaw because hangar fairy potato *shrugs*. Same ish they're gonna do to the Second Coming these hopeless MOSAIC zealots have been praying for at least as long (11th hour comment extension by the usual suspects, right on cue). Snuffed.
The OEMs are the reason GA is captured.
Recreational people just need to get it through their heads that when they enter the fac-built space, they are unwitting remoras of the for-revenue players, period end of story. Fleet support, parts, labor, the whole bit. They like to perceive themselves as disconnected from airline pilot hiring dynamics because they made a recreational choice. Nothing could be further from the truth. It is in fact the case, the manner in which US aviation trains the majority of future FMS monitors (diluted wage primary lawnmower instruction, then simulator for the jet equipment until rollover landing accident *cough* I mean major airline hiring), is the reason why American rec GA has the relative largesse that other countries lack. But that's coming to an end.
It's not some quaint, grass root cultural tradition like the OSH fables like to portray it as. The american public don't GAS about recreational aviation, and are too self-interested to see a national interest in fostering it outside of said $220K (median, BLS) grey collar end-job.
BL, with the generational shift towards ab initio training and all simulator pilot training solutions, fac built light piston aviation will die. No amount of Cuban taxi cottage industry dynamics will be able to keep it accessible to the rank and file, at any price.
Lastly, the other poster is also correct. There isn't ostensibly a reason had this engine effort not touched on the captured space of flight school customer-base OEMs, the FAA would ever GAS about letting out-groupers sell V8 engines to experimental kits. To be clear, I think what you folks accomplished is more demonstrative of being friends of american aviation in my book, than the classist "it Is wUt iT iS" boomer-brained status quo peddling by the "
recession, what recession?" laptop class crowd. You got my utmost respect for that effort and commitment. I truly believe auto conversion may be the only way I'll ever be able to afford the kind of recreational aviation I want to do, in retirement income life. Your tech effort I'm sure will be part of that knowledge base so it wasn't in vain. Cheers mate.
