What attributes do you think new MOSAIC compliant LSA aircraft should have to return General Aviation to 10,000 aircraft sales per year?

DJTorrente said:
Surely not a coincident that those are more loosely regulated. And E-AB numbers are climbing despite the headwind of the pilot/owner having to spend thousands of hours building it him/her-self.
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Not climbing that fast. Net increase over the last ~5 years is about 150 airplanes per year.
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Market isn't *that* good for used homebuilt airplanes, either. RVs get pretty good prices, but the rest really don't.

Ron Wanttaja
 
MRC01 said:
I agree with above sentiments that $300k is too expensive. I think we need simple inexpensive airplanes that use technology to become easier to fly. Things like glass panels, airconditioning and parachutes make it more expensive without adding much value.

1. Cruise airspeed at least 100 kts.
2. Two seats is enough, though 4 is nice
3. Fixed tricycle gear
4. Simple to operate single-lever engine that can run autogas, like Rotax
5. Minimum simple VFR only instruments
6. Fun to fly with good control harmony
7. Priced around $100k in 2023 dollars

To keep costs down: no glass panel, no autopilot, no A/C, no IFR, no parachute, etc.
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What about a 3-way partnership on a $300k aircraft? That fits your price criteria.

I also disagree about software and glass panel. Glass is cheap, esp. compared to gyros. The automation can bring the training hurdle down, if the FAA lets it.
 
DJTorrente said:
Surely not a coincident that those are more loosely regulated. And E-AB numbers are climbing despite the headwind of the pilot/owner having to spend thousands of hours building it him/her-self. Can you just imagine how popular the E-AB models would be if one could simply buy one and learn to fly it?
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But you can. There are many used E-AB for sale. Buyer beware, of course, but buying a used RV, for example, isn't that much different from buying a used Cessna... and you'll probably be getting a much more modern aircraft.
 
farmrjohn said:
Exactly. You can't park your new airplane on the street like a car/truck, and airports are closing rather than opening it seems. If there is no place to put a newly acquired plane that certainly puts a damper on the purchase decision and hence demand.
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Well get a home at an airpark...which is my dream one day.
 
Ed Haywood said:
It is cheaper but not always more practical. There is a zone between about 250 to 500 miles where GA is more time efficient unless both ends are at a hub.

Example: I live in Tampa, and have family in Savannah GA that I visit several times a year. There are no direct airline flights, so I have to change in Atlanta. Figure an hour to drive and park at the airport, an hour in security and boarding, 90 minute flight, 30 minutes on ground in Atlanta, and an hour flight to Savannah. Add it all up and the process takes about 5-6 hours.

It is a 2 hour flight in my Decathlon, which is not a particularly speedy airplane. It is a beautiful flight too, up the Florida coast, over the top of Jacksonville, and along the Georgia barrier islands.

For lots of people who live in more rural areas, especially in the midwest, going point to point via GA is way more effective than the airline hub and spoke model. Probably not an accident that much of the GA industry is in Kansas.
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Until the weather goes below VFR.

“Time to spare, go by air"
 
Yeah, $300K is a non-starter for most. Cut that in half and you may see some serious interest since most of the aircraft that currently meet the 150knot/4-seat/tri-gear format sell for roughly that in the used market. Commander 114/115, Cirri, Debonair, Mooney, et. al. seem to command $150K+ depending on options/condition/age. If you can manufacture enough volume to kick out $150K NEW aircraft, you'd see a pretty good pivot towards new purchases over used (which would likely depress the used market at the same time).
 
Can we please work on getting an simple 4 or 6 cylinder 145-150HP engine overhaul under 20K before we start working on this?

I have a '57 172 that needs an overhaul for reasons. The current debate with me and my co-owner is do we sell it off for parts or spend 33 grand to get an o-300 overhaul?
 
DJTorrente said:
Surely not a coincident that those are more loosely regulated. And E-AB numbers are climbing despite the headwind of the pilot/owner having to spend thousands of hours building it him/her-self. Can you just imagine how popular the E-AB models would be if one could simply buy one and learn to fly it?
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Current E-AB aircraft being completely built by the manufacturer to the new MOSAIC standards is exactly what I and many others are hoping for. What attributes and amenities we want these aircraft to have is the purpose of this thread.
 
DJTorrente said:
I think society as a whole has dreams of a personal traveling machine that can move them cross-country at 150 mph. The roadblock is the 6 months it takes to get to that first real flight; and the fact that one needs a specialized 2-year degree to work on it.
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The way I understand the LSA maintence rules are you must change the type certificate from S-LSA to E-LSA, which is only a paper filing, take the 16 hour maintenance course on your airplane, and then you can perform maintenance on your one aircraft.
 
DFH65 said:
Can we please work on getting an simple 4 or 6 cylinder 145-150HP engine overhaul under 20K before we start working on this?

I have a '57 172 that needs an overhaul for reasons. The current debate with me and my co-owner is do we sell it off for parts or spend 33 grand to get an o-300 overhaul?
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For those prices, consider upgrading to an O-320 or O-360 engine. It wakes up and transforms that airplane.
 
DJTorrente said:
I think society as a whole has dreams of a personal traveling machine that can move them cross-country at 150 mph. The roadblock is the 6 months it takes to get to that first real flight; and the fact that one needs a specialized 2-year degree to work on it.
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I don’t think he ability to maintain one’s own airplane is ever going to be a deciding factor for the overwhelming majority.
 
MRC01 said:
Sure but it doesn't fit my availability and convenience criteria.
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yep. and for $100k I'd want to use it whenever and however I want...and leave the seat adjusted just how I like it ;)
DFH65 said:
Can we please work on getting an simple 4 or 6 cylinder 145-150HP engine overhaul under 20K before we start working on this?

I have a '57 172 that needs an overhaul for reasons. The current debate with me and my co-owner is do we sell it off for parts or spend 33 grand to get an o-300 overhaul?
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yeah, that is crazy. Even $20k is stupid when I think about it
 
Price is never going to come down significantly until volume goes way up, so it's a bit of a chicken-and-egg problem. Maybe some tech billionaire who happens to love aviation will take a couple percent of their net worth and invest in a start up to build this hypothetical GA plane for the masses? (Hey, it's a dream!) With tooling and automation to build at least 1,000 planes a year, you could cut the cost of a typical GA airplane in half. We just have to stop building these things by hand.

My other hobbyhorse with regard to GA is that there actually IS a huge un-tapped market for airplanes even at the current (crazy) prices. Over 9 million US households had an income over $250K last year. There are plenty of people who can afford to fly today but aren't doing it. They key is to demonstrate the value - for personal business, for travel, for adventure or just for fun. Yes there are barriers that need to be lowered: training time, complexity, expense, etc., but for many, if you show them the value, it will be worth it to overcome the obstacles.

And FYI, the Piper Pilot 100i ticks a lot of the boxes the OP asked for: $300K gets you an actually useful airplane with 180HP, 128KTS, full Garmin IFR glass panel with GFC500 autopilot. Sorry no A/C or chute. For that price it's configured with only 3 seats, but it's obviously a 4-seat airframe.

C.
 
TJB said:
The way I understand the LSA maintence rules are you must change the type certificate from S-LSA to E-LSA, which is only a paper filing, take the 16 hour maintenance course on your airplane, and then you can perform maintenance on your one aircraft.
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The 16 hour LSR-Inspection course allows you to perform the condition inspection on your personal E-LSA. No cert is needed to perform any maintenance just like E/AB. The 120 hr LSR-Maintenance course allows you to perform maintenance and inspections on any SLSA and the condition inspection on any ELSA, plus this experience can be used toward obtaining an FAA A&P certificate.
TJB said:
Current E-AB aircraft being completely built by the manufacturer to the new MOSAIC standards
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What will be interesting is if Van's and others start building more new LSAs for the mainstream US market how that will affect their product liability costs. This is one item the EU LSA manufacturers don't have to deal with at the same levels in their European markets.
 
MRC01 said:
For those prices, consider upgrading to an O-320 or O-360 engine. It wakes up and transforms that airplane.
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We did an O-360 upgrade in 2017 and it was 44K plus install. But I wouldn’t want to fly a 172 with less than 180 HP afterward.
 
DFH65 said:
Can we please work on getting an simple 4 or 6 cylinder 145-150HP engine overhaul under 20K before we start working on this?

I have a '57 172 that needs an overhaul for reasons. The current debate with me and my co-owner is do we sell it off for parts or spend 33 grand to get an o-300 overhaul?
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Well....this was just getting good and now you bring logic into this.... lol ;)
 
Never going to happen. The GA heyday was an anomaly because of WWII. Had that war not occurred and produced the number of pilots it did, GA would never had grown to what it became. Flying in relative terms has always been an expensive endeavor with significant barriers to entry (training, medicals, infrastructure, etc) which other expensive hobbies, like boats, aren’t encumbered with. IMO the GA community we see today is about what it would have been all along and a cheap aircraft isn’t going to solve that. For most of the population flying is simply a mode of transportation.
 
TJB said:
My suggestions for manufacturers of new MOSAIC compliant LSA aircraft to sale thousands a year are:
1. Cruise airspeed of at least 150 knots.
2. Cabin interior width at least 42 inches.
3. Four seats.
4. Fixed tricycle landing gear.
5. Full aircraft parachute.
6. Air Conditioning.
7. Full glass panel with two axis autopilot.
8. IFR compliant for IMC conditions.
9. Fun to fly with good control harmony.
10. Priced around $300,000 in 2023 US dollars.

With the new Rotax 916is engine this is attainable. I see new LSA aircraft under the current(old) rules listed new for under $300,000 with Garmin glass avionics and aircraft parachutes. I know the Rotax 916is cost more than a 912is and the current LSA aircraft do not have air conditioning but they were restricted to 1320 pounds gross weight. The new MOSAIC rules for LSA aircraft do not have any weight restriction, only a clean stall speed restriction of 54 knots.

Tell us what attributes you think new, MOSAIC compliant LSA aircraft should have with the new MOSAIC rules.
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My Bristell is 51" wide, I don't want to settle for 42"
AC is nice to have but not 100% required many GA that is a luxury item
Otherwise, I agree with all the above
 
Dave Anderson said:
AC is nice to have but not 100% required many GA that is a luxury item
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My wife would disagree with you.

The number of private pilots in the USA peaked around 1980. It had been slowly declining until the mid-2010s, and has been holding steady since. What GA provides is regional travel. If it's a short distance, take the car. Transcontinental, get on an airliner. 200-700 miles, GA is good, but how many people travel those distances regularly? And if you do want to travel by GA on a regular basis, what's the minimum level of commitment you have to make. If you have a 172 or PA-28, there's a lot of trips where the point to point time isn't any better than driving. Most recreational GA pilots fly because they want to, not for any practical reason.

If you could sell 10,000 new GA airplanes in a year, where would you hangar/tie them down? I suspect there's space at rural airports, but that's not where people who can afford to fly live.
 
DJTorrente said:
I think society as a whole has dreams of a personal traveling machine that can move them cross-country at 150 mph. The roadblock is the 6 months it takes to get to that first real flight; and the fact that one needs a specialized 2-year degree to work on it.
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God forbid everyone becomes a pilot. Next time you're driving, watch the other drivers and imagine the carnage if they were all flying.
 
TJB said:
10. Priced around $300,000 in 2023 US dollars.
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The number of people who can afford to spend 300k on a new airplane can be tracked by the individual. When your cross that with the number of people interested in flying, you get a number much lower than 10,000. I think even 100k is a stretch.

An average airplane needs to cost around the same as an average car.
 
The root problem is, the blush is off the aviation rose. After WWII, military pilots and GIs returned home en masse with a bug for aviation. Kids were excited by the new, advancing technology and glamour--jet plane development, the quest to break the sound barrier, etc. Airlines were a nascent industry. Commercial flying was glamorous, largely reserved by cost to those people seen in the movies and tabloids. It was something to aspire to.

Today, commercial flying is a ubiquitous, arduous enterprise. No glamour there, just disdain at getting shoehorned into smaller and smaller seats, surrounded by larger and larger people. It is to be endured, not enjoyed. Commercial flight is nothing more than another kind of bus trip. It's a rare kid/young adult who is fascinated by flying, and rarer still, one who has the patience and work ethic to earn a pilot's license. There are too many other more immediate distractions/hobbies/endeavors/avocations.

It's a cultural shift following the general demise of delayed gratification, self-reliance and self-actualization--a la Maslow.

It is hard to admit, but I believe within a generation or two, GA as we know it will no longer exist. We will devolve to the European model or worse, where private planes and private flights are reserved for the wealthy.
 
ateamer said:
We did an O-360 upgrade in 2017 and it was 44K plus install. But I wouldn’t want to fly a 172 with less than 180 HP afterward.
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I did one in 2018 and it cost about $43k all in, including installation and taxes.
 
Domenick said:
The root problem is, the blush is off the aviation rose. After WWII, military pilots and GIs returned home en masse with a bug for aviation.
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Many of those pilots returned with no interest at all in continuing to fly. The aircraft companies got ready for the coming boom and found themselves with way too many airplanes to sell, and many of them went broke. Airplanes were cheap, which was good for pilots but not for aircraft companies.

The real golden age may have been the late 1930s, when the first light planes like Cubs and Aeroncas became widely available, and were even sold on a scale like large car dealers. Read Wolfgang Langeweische's "Lightplane Flying", published in 1939, about that brief optimistic era just before war came and changed everything.
 
Lets not forget that buying the plane is only the entry into the club. The yearly maintenance, fuel, hangar costs is really where a lot of that money goes.
Someone just said they had hangars available at Ocala OCF for about 1k/mo.
 
DJTorrente said:
... I also disagree about software and glass panel. Glass is cheap, esp. compared to gyros. The automation can bring the training hurdle down, if the FAA lets it.
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It depends on the glass. Something like uAvionix AV-30s, sure. They are simple, stand-alone, inexpensive, reliable, no GPS. And it entirely obviates the need for the vac system. This serves the goal of simple, inexpensive and reliable. Yet more complex glass panels GPS certified for IFR adds significant complexity and cost, with no real benefit to VFR flying.
 
MRC01 said:
It depends on the glass. Something like uAvionix AV-30s, sure. They are simple, stand-alone, inexpensive, reliable, no GPS. And it entirely obviates the need for the vac system. This serves the goal of simple, inexpensive and reliable. Yet more complex glass panels GPS certified for IFR adds significant complexity and cost, with no real benefit to VFR flying.
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I disagree. If you want more people to want planes, they need reasons to buy planes that cars don't already provide. People need to tase the 'magic carpet' flavor that only aircraft can provide. As to cost, glass is much cheaper than gyros are. GPS is more accurate than VORs. Not to mention the benefits of "LVL" and "AUTO LAND" buttons, especially to a non-pilot passenger in the case of an incapacitated pilot.

The tallest hurdles that I see are regulatory. If it was just a patent on avionics software -- that expires after 20 years. A PMA certificate that the FAA won't issue? Regulatory barriers that keep us flying behind 70-year old engine designs that feature permanent magnet ignition and the last use of lead in fuel?
 
Dave Anderson said:
My Bristell is 51" wide, I don't want to settle for 42"
AC is nice to have but not 100% required many GA that is a luxury item
Otherwise, I agree with all the above
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AC only costs $25,000 in a new build aircraft. I know people who retrofitted old houses with central A/C for less. The same technology in any automobile is a $250 bill. One can argue whether its worth it's weight, but that doesn't justify the cost.
 
Domenick said:
The root problem is, the blush is off the aviation rose. After WWII, military pilots and GIs returned home en masse with a bug for aviation. Kids were excited by the new, advancing technology and glamour
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E-VTOL has the potential to change that. Not my kind of flying, but I'm not a kid.

Drones are revolutionizing warfare as we speak. Similar role in Ukraine as aircraft played in WWI, which led to a huge explosion in R&D. At some point all that tech spills into civilian markets. Add that to massive investments in EV battery tech for the auto markets. Only a matter of time before quad copter ride sharing becomes reality. Kids love that stuff.
 
Ed Haywood said:
Drones are revolutionizing warfare as we speak. Similar role in Ukraine as aircraft played in WWI, which led to a huge explosion in R&D. At some point all that tech spills into civilian markets
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But Ukraine is using existing commercially available hobby drones, not cutting edge military hardware.
 
DJTorrente said:
The tallest hurdles that I see are regulatory.
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So what regulatory hurdle are you referencing that did not prevent the new, clean sheet design Beechcraft Denali from being certified under Part 23 complete with a new Part 33 engine up front? Same with the clean sheet Cessna 408? Or the Tecnam and Diamond series of certified aircraft? Etc., Etc..

Or perhaps the OEMs only spend the time and money on aircraft with a viable sales market? My guess, its hard to justify such an expenditure on a 30,000-40,000 aircraft market where less than 10% of those owners would buy a new aircraft?

As to those hurdles, they are at their lowest levels ever, especially Part 23. Yet only few people take advantage of this. Then again why don't Van's and other E/AB OEMs design and sell a more desirable aircraft like an E/AB Bonanza or Mooney which would require no regulatory hurdles at all?
 
Bell206 said:
As to those hurdles, they are at their lowest levels ever, especially Part 23. Yet only few people take advantage of this. Then again why don't Van's and other E/AB OEMs design and sell a more desirable aircraft like an E/AB Bonanza or Mooney which would require no regulatory hurdles at all?
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It costs millions to get a new airplane through part 23 certification.

If Van's sold a Bonanza clone kit, it would still cost more to build new than a good used Bonanza.
 
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