Revised IGC-approvals for some types of legacy recorder

On Wed, 19 Nov 2003 04:24:46 GMT, Marc Ramsey wrote:




There is no written policy at this moment, as the category is less than
a year old, and it's not clear whether any other manufacturers will make
use of it. The whole point is to keep it fairly flexible, so those who
can't or won't go for all flights approval have another category to work
with.

Great. What you mean is that any manufacturer could be screwed around
by the GFAC as there is no publicly stated, openly available policy.
It has happened before.

"jump starting the market" in that way as you put it would most
likely contravene the Trade Practices Act (1974) in Australia and land
you with a large fine. Ask the freight companies who were fined after
the ACCC(Australian Consumer and Competition Commission) used an
electronic barograph to prove that goods being sent by "airfreight"
were in fact going by truck between Brisbane- Sydney- Melbourne.

I have no idea what you are talking about.

Writing a specification around one manufacturer's product, approving
that product and others from the same manufacturer and then changing
the rules for new entrants into the market to make it more difficult
and expensive for them while still leaving the old rules for the
original manufacturer's products would be not only considered
unethical in Australia but most likely illegal. The ACCC does have
teeth and uses them regularly.


Mike Borgelt

Hi,
let me try to add my 2cents to this thread. We should not see proposed
modification as downgrade of approval level for particular flight recorder
but rather as an increase of security measure for particular type of flights
(e.g. world records). And some of approved flight recorders do not meet
these requirements.

Seeyou
Erazem

"Mike Borgelt" wrote...
Great. What you mean is that any manufacturer could be screwed around
by the GFAC as there is no publicly stated, openly available policy.
It has happened before.

Clearly, the requirements will be somewhere in the continuum between
Diamond-level and all flights approval. What isn't clear (in my opinion,
anyway) is exactly where those requirements should ultimately be positioned.
Discussions with those seeking to gain approval in this category is one way
this positioning could be determined.

Writing a specification around one manufacturer's product, approving
that product and others from the same manufacturer and then changing
the rules for new entrants into the market to make it more difficult
and expensive for them while still leaving the old rules for the
original manufacturer's products would be not only considered
unethical in Australia but most likely illegal. The ACCC does have
teeth and uses them regularly.

I see flight recorders from 5 different manufacturers which received all
flights approval under the original specification. All of those recorders
will be reduced to badge/diploma approval as of 1 January 2004 (with one
possible exception, which is under review). All manufacturers who submitted
new models after the change were required to have them meet the new
requirements for full approval, including those who had older models
approved under the old requirements. The recorders approved since the
requirement change are, almost universally, lower in price than those that
were approved under the earlier requirements. I still fail to see your
point.

Marc