mh wrote:
If you repeat GA’s death often enough, perhaps someone will believe it…Same with the alledged “overregulation”.
Maybe that is one of the reasons why the Chinese snap up more and more GA manufacturers. Confidence.
Investors in Europe and the US hear nothing but doom and gloom about GA, maybe the Chinese don’t see it like this (yet) and are the only ones still willing to invest in this area. Maybe they still do believe in the fairy tale of a big boom in China itself, but more realistically they might have seen some of the reasons why certified GA is on it’s deathbed in the US and Europe and hope to change that.
One of the factors which has gotten GA into the mess that it is has to do with much too high manufacturing and certification cost. While certification won’t change, manufacturing can be a LOT cheaper in China. So far, that has not happened but it might in the future. With their cost structure, they could actually produce airplanes cheaper, but I suppose the certification hurdles would rather increase in today’s “America first” climate which is not by any way limited to the US.
In any case, it is obvious that the Chinese have much more confidence in the future of GA than we do.
Mooney_Driver wrote:
One of the factors which has gotten GA into the mess that it is has to do with much too high manufacturing and certification cost.
You repeat that over and over again, but it isn’t what really happens. Or what you could bypass. Furthermore, money isn’t a problem of GA. Communication is. Our associations (AOPA, DAeC, LAA, EAA, OUV, DULV, etc.) do a shitty job to promote GA to the common pedestrian. It is almost a complete “pull”-Market. And yet, flight schools and clubs with a good communication are full of new students. Our small aeroclub flight school with two aircraft and four regular instructors train 7-8 students per year, basically without any advertising. Talking to the students, it always is a coincidence they have met someone who told them that GA is actually affordable and manageable. Many have a latent wish to fly, but never came across GA in the media.
GA isn’t dead by long. Certification isn’t the reason for a local low pilot population, it is mainly a reason for not decimating pilot population. And handmade stuff is always more expensive than stuff made in thousands by robots. And always will be.
It seems the Chinese are on a shopping spree. Now they have also bought the majority share in AB Volvo, who makes the Volvo trucks, which was previously “still” Swedish.
