A Call to Arms from Richard VanGrunsven

On Sat, 8 Mar 2008 10:18:02 +0000 (UTC), Bertie the Bunyip wrote:

Actually, jst to keep the record straight, you CAN buy an X-AB
airplane. But the biulder can not build and register another of the
same kind.

That puts him in unfair competition with the certified manufacturers
who went to the expense and trouble to certify their airplanes.

Appreciate the comment. If certification has value, why does this put
him in unfair competition?

Because it cost many millions to certify an airplane. It doesn;'t cost
anything to kit a homebuilt. We're not just talking about RVs here. There
are some major crooks and nutjobs out there selling dreams. Peopkle have
died in them. Now, if you want to build one of these yourself, and you can
build anything you want, BTW, the FAA really only looks to see if it was
put together properly, then off you go and more power to you. That's
experimenting. But to try and sell some of these things as capable
airplanes would be criminal. I think some of the kitplanes around are
crimes against nature as it is, but there ya go..

OK, so the FAA allows these planes under the guise of "experimental" they
certify planes and then there are experimental planes that are as good or
better than the certified planes (not talking engines whose
"certifications" are all over the place).

Is that about right?

If so, 1) where do you find the output which points to "good" kit/plan
planes and 2) what good is the FAA doing (other than restricting the good
builds for market related purposes)?

The RVs could probably be certified pretty easily. A couple of air forces
are even using them as trainers and there have been thousands built, so a
lot of th eR&D is already done.


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