On 2005-11-14 12:45:14 -0500, Evan Carew said:

Interesting posts. I wonder if you would agree with me that the
kit/small GA builders have wrung most of the fat out of the building
process

I'm not sure that's the case, because we're in the midst of several
real industrial revolutions -- materials, automation, organizational.
These add up to the possibility that we will see, someday soon,
airplanes assembled on a line-production rather than a bespoke basis.

If you've ever tried to fit a factory airframe part (that cost an arm
and a leg) to a Beech, you know what I mean.

and that any further gains are in incremental productivity / materials
handling procedures? If so, I wonder what you think could be realized
in savings over the current processes?

I know that everyone who's seen the Eclipse plant (including Dale
Klapmeier) has been agog.

The problem in the kit field is manifold:

1. Barriers to entry are almost nil. You can rivet up some tubes or cut
some foam, blow a couple grand on a booth at Oshkosh and you are a kit
manufactuer. And God help your customers. In fact, you can skip the
tubes or foam and just show up at OSH with a computer rendering or a
shiny model.

Even if you have a degree from a top AeroE program, certified aircraft
makers are not going to be interested in your design ideas. If you
start off in the kit market, no matter how flaky your idea, somebody
will try to buy it from you, if you can support yourself long enough.

2. For many, the kit airplane dream is built on a myth of vastly
lowered cost. Only if you ignore used aircraft, and value your labour
at a factor of zero.

3. Some companies try to drive the labor cost down towards zero by
doing work offshore. Van's does this, and Bearhawk frames are welded-up
in Mexico (which combines Third World wages with easy transportation to
US and Canadian first-world destinations). Do that, and you wind up
hoping that Mexico stays corrupt so that desperate Mexicans will work
for pennies on the dollar... there is no material reason prosperity
should stop hard at the Rio Grande, but it does; it's Mexican
government and elite policies that cause that. That's an unstable
situation that may last 50 or 100 years but won't last forever.

But the irreducible problem with lowering labor costs on the kit side
is that by law, you only get half of the benefit, because the ultimate
registrant must (under the law, must) do 51% of the work.

4. Many people in the kit field want to build, but my impression is
that more want to fly. Hence the popularity of "builder-assist"
programs, which are now getting a hairy eyeball from the FAA after
about a decade of abuses. One vendor rubbed the FAA's nose in his
disdain for the law, which is never really smart, and now a bunch of
people who were minding their own business and making for safe aircraft
and happy customers are at risk.

5. Many of the designers out there have a design bug or three that they
have to get out of the system, so they don't mind working for nothing
but job satisfaction. You can even build a small team of like-minded
volunteers. But you reach the point where this structure does not
scale... you run out of True Believers sooner rather than later.

To return to your question -- I do not think productivity in this
industry is anywhere near where it could be, but the economics haven't
been compelling enough to make anyone chase higher productivity, with
the couple of exceptions noted.

Sometimes people have mistaken getting wrapped around the axle of CAD,
for increasing productivity. Two projects that were going to
revolutionize the sport via CAD were the Prescott Pusher, and the
DreamWings Valkyrie. Worth a search through the back threads of this
group. I presume the CAD files of those two ghastly projects are still
sitting in somebody's closet... for the sake of pilots yet unborn I
pray that the guy's mother throws them out next time she cleans.

cheers

-=K=-

Rule #1: Don't hit anything big.