60 Minutes 4/17

aluckyguess wrote:
If there was enough volume they could build the plane for less than
50k. It
would replace all the old Piper, Cessna and Beech 2 and 4 seat
aircraft.
They sell new cars for way less and there looks to be more work in a
new car
than a small plane.

If the moon were made of green cheese, astronauts wouldn't need
Cheez Whiz. Simply put, there is not a market for the amount of new
planes you envision. New cars models are sold in the hundreds of
thousands per year. At that volume, manufacturers can afford to buy
robots to automate most of the work. Common parts can be interchanged
and bought very cheaply in large quantities. At GA volumes, planes
still have to be built by hand, much the way they've always been built.
That's where the cost of a plane skyrockets. I've visited the new
Cessna plant. It looks more like a huge hanger with hundreds of
homebuilders than an actual factory.

As far as there being more work involved building a new car than a
plane, all I can say is that you've obviously never built a plane
before.

I think if they could sell 1000 a month you could build it for under
50k or
close to it. The only thing I don't know is what the insurance would
cost.
I know if Lycoming had a quote come in for 12000 IO 360 engines the
price
would drop quite a bit.

Even at 1000 a month, you still can't come close to the economies of
scale that are common to the auto industry. Therefore, you shouldn't
realistically expect the price to come close either.

John Galban=====N4BQ (PA28-180)