Stupid $5 Registration

Goofy

Goofy

Line Up and Wait
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Nov 19, 2011
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Goofy
Just went through this dumb process again. You folks must have considered what's going to happen when somebody in government figures out it costs ten times that for the program and processing....then it should get exciting!
 
Really, bitching about $5 every three years? How much do you pay every year for your car registration?
 
Some of us warned when this started: that they knew none of us would complain about the $5....but just wait for a few cycles til everyone has forgotten the battle against this and up goes the rate.
 
They need to check registrations about every 10 years. More frequently is just a waste of time. Every 3 years is more administrative security theater crap.
 
kyleb said:
They need to check registrations about every 10 years. More frequently is just a waste of time. Every 3 years is more administrative security theater crap.
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Why do they “need” to check them at all? It’s our butts if we fly without it, so what’s the point?

So they can have better statistics for PR stuff? Who honestly other than a bureaucrat writing reports for another bureaucrat, or an alphabet soup org writing an editorial, cares?

Registration != Being flown. So it’s fairly useless other than to keep a good address to mail crap to the owner.
 
Useless overly complicated pain in the arse IMO

I'd also wager they are keeping the records of everyone's payment methods, just giving them more info they don't need at out expense
 
denverpilot said:
Why do they “need” to check them at all? It’s our butts if we fly without it, so what’s the point?
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I have no problem with a 10 year "sign of life" on an airplane. But it wouldn't break my heart if they did away with the requirement entirely.

That said, there are some benefits - Knowing the fleet size and makeup. Freeing up "dead" n-numbers. To make passing AD and SB information a little easier and faster. I'm sure there are more, but realistically, the primary purpose is probably to feed the bureaucracy and provide another 50 jobs to keep up with the flood of re-registrations.
 
kyleb said:
I have no problem with a 10 year "sign of life" on an airplane. But it wouldn't break my heart if they did away with the requirement entirely.

That said, there are some benefits - Knowing the fleet size and makeup. Freeing up "dead" n-numbers. To make passing AD and SB information a little easier and faster. I'm sure there are more, but realistically, the primary purpose is probably to feed the bureaucracy and provide another 50 jobs to keep up with the flood of re-registrations.
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How does this free up dead N numbers?
 
James331 said:
How does this free up dead N numbers?
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If you dont re-register, the number goes into a pool of available numbers. Anyone with $10 and a mailbox can reserve the number for a future build project or a plane he has yet to buy.
 
weilke said:
If you dont re-register, the number goes into a pool of available numbers. Anyone with $10 and a mailbox can reserve the number for a future build project or a plane he has yet to buy.
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I wouldn’t really call that “freeing them up”. LOL.
 
weilke said:
Without the re-registration program, those numbers would not become available to new registrants.
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And then the new registrants sit on them for ten years while building an airplane? Heh. Did you miss that part. That’s not “freeing them up” it’s just moving the way they’re blocked from “dead ramp queen” to “vaporware by guy/gal who bought an RV tail kit and stopped there”. ;)

FAA is just more likely to get $5/3 years out of the latter than the former. :)
 
So, I too have paid my $5. I bought an airplane from a private sale. They cashed the check a week ago. How long does the change in ownership take to show up in the database?
 
weilke said:
If you dont re-register, the number goes into a pool of available numbers. Anyone with $10 and a mailbox can reserve the number for a future build project or a plane he has yet to buy.
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It's not like you can take the number one minute after midnight
 
denverpilot said:
I wouldn’t really call that “freeing them up”. LOL.
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A lot of numbers have been freed up. The reason the FAA started this was the number of registered aircraft did not make sense anymore. Hundreds if not thousands of aircraft were still registered even after being wrecked, scrapped, or abandoned. There was no check and balance to make owners deregister aircraft, it was more on an honor system with no penalty for failing to do so.
 
I thought it had more to do with appearances. Ie maybe it was Homeland Security to the FAA, "you don't keep track of your aircraft any better than that??" As if keeping track better was going to prevent a terrorist act.
 
denverpilot said:
And then the new registrants sit on them for ten years while building an airplane? Heh. Did you miss that part. That’s not “freeing them up” it’s just moving the way they’re blocked from “dead ramp queen” to “vaporware by guy/gal who bought an RV tail kit and stopped there”. ;)
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Some of us finish our RVs in a couple of years. The cobweb-shrouded, opaque-windowed ramp hag melting into its tie-down spot on flat tires will likely never fly again; the Van's builder has a solid shot at completing the build and having a flying aircraft. The Van's "Hobbs meter" is approaching 10,000 finished aircraft, and that's only folks who've voluntarily submitted a first flight entry.
 
midwestpa24 said:
A lot of numbers have been freed up. The reason the FAA started this was the number of registered aircraft did not make sense anymore. Hundreds if not thousands of aircraft were still registered even after being wrecked, scrapped, or abandoned. There was no check and balance to make owners deregister aircraft, it was more on an honor system with no penalty for failing to do so.
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I know a great “check and balance” to never have to worry about it ever again... don’t bother registering airplanes. Haha.

Just have each pilot sign in with ATC using their SSN. That’ll work out very well, I think. :)

SoCal RV Flyer said:
Some of us finish our RVs in a couple of years. The cobweb-shrouded, opaque-windowed ramp hag melting into its tie-down spot on flat tires will likely never fly again; the Van's builder has a solid shot at completing the build and having a flying aircraft. The Van's "Hobbs meter" is approaching 10,000 finished aircraft, and that's only folks who've voluntarily submitted a first flight entry.
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LOL... I sense, butthurt. :) See above.

If it ain’t flying it doesn’t need an N Number yet. :)

My commentary was simply in response to the whole “freeing them up” being argued by using the case of TYING one up for something that isn’t flying being kinda intellectually dishonest. :)

I don’t care. Register twenty N Numbers if you like. Doesn’t really bother me.

Actually that sounds like fun. Register like twenty N Numbers and then if you ever have an accident in your real airplane the press will say, “The owner has twenty registered airplanes...” that night on the news. :) :) :)
 
Question. If a plane loses it's registration number, for instance a hangar queen whose owner fails to register, to activate the plane again, will it require not only a new registration number AND a new airworthiness inspection, as well as the usual condition inspection?
 
Goofy said:
Just went through this dumb process again. You folks must have considered what's going to happen when somebody in government figures out it costs ten times that for the program and processing....then it should get exciting!
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When the registration requirement was updated to be every three years; I recall the price being set to cover the predicted FAA costs.
No idea on the veracity of the claim at the time.
Lock box processing to record, process a payment and mark against an invoice; often runs between 3-5 bucks. I would guess the FAA is about on target.

Tim
 
tinerj said:
Question. If a plane loses it's registration number, for instance a hangar queen whose owner fails to register, to activate the plane again, will it require not only a new registration number AND a new airworthiness inspection, as well as the usual condition inspection?
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Condition inspection applies to experimental only.
Annual inspection applies to certified aircraft.
In both cases, you would need to re-register the plane and perform the appropriate inspection. If the registration changed N number, you would have to at least repaint that portion.

Tim
 
Would a new airworthiness certificate be required?

What I'm thinking is the airworthiness certificate has the old N number on it so a new one would be required.
 
NoHeat said:
I missed something. What are you registering?
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I guess they're talking about registering your plane with its N number. We've owned three airplanes and I forgot all about that part. Guess I didn't miss the $5 much amongst all the $2000 O and M bills.
 
midwestpa24 said:
A lot of numbers have been freed up. The reason the FAA started this was the number of registered aircraft did not make sense anymore. Hundreds if not thousands of aircraft were still registered even after being wrecked, scrapped, or abandoned. There was no check and balance to make owners deregister aircraft, it was more on an honor system with no penalty for failing to do so.
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Well, lots of registrations have been cancelled. I won't say a lot of N-numbers have been freed up. A lot from the first batch are still within the purge date.
 
flyingron said:
Well, lots of registrations have been cancelled. I won't say a lot of N-numbers have been freed up. A lot from the first batch are still within the purge date.
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Here's a plot of the number of aircraft de-registered each year from the year 2000.
dereg.jpg

Each year, there are also planes previously-deregistered that appear again, with the same N-Number. I haven't done a detailed analysis of this, but in 2015, there were about 100 homebuilts that were restored to the main list.

During the massive number of deregistrations from 2010 to 2013, over 20% of the homebuilt fleet was removed from the rolls.

Ron Wanttaja
 
I sent in my change of ownership paperwork several months ago, transfering the plane from my dad to me, the check was processed a month ago, and still nothing on the FAA site. A friend said it was 4 months for his transfer of ownership to finally show up.
 
Glenn D said:
A friend said it was 4 months for his transfer of ownership to finally show up.
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Sounds about right. I sent my paperwork in sometime in February and ended up with a new registration cert in July or so.
Hey, it's the government. And adding the whole 3-year re-registration requirement only increased their workload and queues for registration. :)
 
Glenn D said:
I sent in my change of ownership paperwork several months ago, transfering the plane from my dad to me, the check was processed a month ago, and still nothing on the FAA site. A friend said it was 4 months for his transfer of ownership to finally show up.
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I sent in my paperwork during a sequester. Fortunately, as my pink slip expiration was approaching, they sent me an extension without me having to ask. My paper card showed up before the extension expired.
 
SoCal RV Flyer said:
I think you sense someone who disagrees with you. :) LOL.
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That tying up a number for something that isn’t flying, isn’t getting numbers back, it’s just swapping one form of hoarding for another? Not much to disagree about there, it’s fact.

Like I said, don’t care. Knock yourself out. Register twenty things that don’t fly. There never was any shortage of numbers...

The rest of it is just for statistical games. Maybe we can all renew them every month? Maybe every day? Wouldn’t want some government stats person to have to work with non-up-to-date numbers. Might keep them from... hmm... working with non-up-to-date numbers. LOL.
 
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