Marc and Michael flew up to an airshow in Arlington, Washington, a couple of weeks ago and Michael took a bunch of photos. They also flew over to Orcas Island, which put them there a couple of days before Anne & I got there.
I have always liked flying, and have often thought about getting a license, but for some reason I have never gotten any farther than taking a couple of introductory lessons. Sometimes I wonder why that is. I suspect it is because I am just plain cheap.
There is also the undercurrent of danger: small planes kill as many rock stars as drugs do.
And then there is a philosophical difference between the way planes and cars are built.
For instance, there are the consequences of having a mechanical failure. If there is a mechanical malfunction in your car (the engine quits or a wheel falls off, for instance), you will come to a stop short of your destination. If a similar malfunction occurs in your airplane (the engine quits or a wing falls off) <begin sarcasm> WE ARE ALL GOING TO DIE! <end sarcasm>
This is kind of weird because most small planes flying today are built from designs that are 50 years old, and many of them are that old themselves. None of the modern technology that we find in our cars has made it into small aircraft, except in perhaps a handful of homebuilts.
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5 comments:
Not true.
Glass instrument panels, GPS, composite construction, transponders, ELTs, laminar wings, wing tips to reduce induced drag, fly-by-wire are all to be found on modern (composite) planes.
Ole Phat Stu (CFI)
Electronics doesn't have anything to do with the airplane actually flying. I am not sure fly-by-wire is a good thing. And, okay, composite construction had made some inroads. But when's the last time someone got an engine certified for use in a small plane? 1800? 1900?
Hi Charles
http://www.snowgoer.com/output.cfm?id=1955521
http://www.ultralightflyer.com/EAA_airventure_2005/yamaha-genesis_extreme.html
Plenty of normal petrol and supercharged diesel flying as well
I knew people were using all kinds of engines in small planes, but I hadn't heard about this one before. Maybe we should just not bother with the FAA anymore? Oh, wait, the FAA wouldn't have any jurisdiction in Africa, would they?
What's wrong with 50 year old technology? You, of all people, should know, little that is new is better. The good thing about 50 year old technology is that it's completely understood. 50 years of anecdotal evidence suggests that the failure modes of existing aircraft designs are soft. MTBF is well characterized. The biggest kill in shall planes is running out of gas. The second is "controlled flight into terrain" ie. hitting a rock inside a cloud. Mechanical failure is well down the list.
Marc
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