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Your AERO 2018 highlights

Peter,

oh, Peter Mundy was there? I keep noticing how many people I did not meet despite they having been there….. But it was really good to put faces to names finally for a lot of them.

I was in the outside area several times to catch some sun and fresh air. The Panthera was there, same registration than years ago, Thu and Fri it was open and people from Pipistrel present, Saturday, it was covered up and seemingly abandoned. Lots of people pointed and wondered. It it left a horrible impression.

Flyingfish wrote:

I am sorry that we missed visiting you and the Swiss aviation interest group. What is it by the way?

It is a forum (ILS Flight Forum) and the association running it of which I am currently president. The forum exists for near 20 years now but I only got into the exec part 2 years ago. The association also does quite a lot of activities for the membership such as fly outs, fly ins (with up to 100 airplanes, yearly) and various trips and events. It is called the aviation interest group as the goal of the forum is to unite ALL aspects of aviation under one roof, from real world flyers to simmers to modellists e.t.c. We have not gotten there fully but it works quite nicely. It was amazing to see how many people came by our boot in A6 to say hi and telling us how they knew the forum, even though it is Swiss, lots of Germans are aware of the platform.

Flyingfish wrote:

Yes I agree, the “slottery” is such a pain in the neck that I have basically given up FLYING to EDNY.

Lots of people have apparently. I only saw the grass parking next to the exhibition halls and zeppelin hangar, usually it is packed with planes, this year all I saw was one Bonanza and the occasional UL all in all about 3 to 4 planes. I think most VFR people are not coming anymore. I talked to someone at the Aero about it and they are well aware of the fact but have no influence as the exhibition center is independent of the airport and they also quote DFS regulations and other stuff. That guy was clearly of the opinion that the way GA is treated there is a disgrace for the fact that this is an aviation event but they have to divert most VFR traffic (and UL´s and VLA´s makemore than 50% of the show!! to places as far away as Mengen and Leutkirch.

The Porta boot was mentioned a few times… maybe they thought there is no bad publicity as long as people talk about it…. Porta´s name was quite prominently mentioned all over the place, albeit in a shitstorm fashion openly while most folks simply chuckled and walked on. Funnily, the same who complained later on mentioned the pretty girls who were apparently at one stand at the VLA part (I did not really have time to see that as VLA and my own weight don´t go together my interest is limited).

I found the electric flying hall A7 quite interesting too, seeing what is going on there. There is a lot more going than I tought I have to admit.

Also some of the VLA Helicopters are very attractive.

In the sim boots, there were some really impressive FNTP devices as well as A320 cockpits available. At about 120k Euros they are not cheap but I know of some folks who decided to have one of those instead of a PPL and real world career. Looking at the slottery and other hassle it is easy to see why. I enjoyed flying one of them (polish brand) very much,the quality was great and it matched the full flight sims I have flown very well indeed. In simulation, this appears to be the one busines which is on a steep increase, building cockpits for home simulation as well as mockups for airline evaluation use.

LSZH(work) LSZF (GA base), Switzerland

Yes, Peter Mundy kept a low profile

One interesting thing I heard from a German pilot was that the German CAA is raiding large GA events and checking whether the homebuilts and ultralights which came from abroad have the required permits. This is the first time I have heard of any enforcement in this area. No idea if it is true.

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

@Bathman, with the senior guy of SMA we talked about different things. Roughly :

  • Continental bought Thielert remains, and continued the work with Chinese money. Diamond created Austro Engines from nothing, with the help of Mercedes. They wanted a sturdy engine so they designed a gearbox “in concrete” (his words) so heavy but durable. Now Diamond is Chinese too, but diferently (a Chinese billionaire who wants to be ready when GA soars in China).
  • Chinese aerospace industry : the COMAC C919 (A320 like) uses a lot of the B787 sub-systems. They make slow but steady progress with a lot of Western help. Their long haul plane is in preliminary design, choosing the main suppliers as of now (Western for most).
  • SMA has about 50 engines in service all over the world with no issues. They have a partnership with Soloy to developp STCs for all types that would be appropriate, among the 200-300hp range. They are about to test the 6-cylinder version, around 350hp.

With SONACA, we were interested if their plane would stay ouside all year (main requirement of our club).

  • They all answer yes, but you can feel they are not really designed this way. The aluminium skin is as thin as on a Tecnam (or maybe just slightly less), and there was a mark on the wing from a previous visitor who stepped outside of the walk area. Same for the gear, they say it is robust, but looks really thin.
  • They are really aiming flight schools, and some asked them to make an IFR trainer version. There are about to certify it for spins for upset recovery training (getting mandatory for ATPL ??)
  • They said they climbed up to FL150 once.

Other infos I got from AERO :

  • the only big app for Android is Garmin Pilot
  • Foreflight Europe looks pretty good, and will cost around 100€ per year with public, non-Jepp data. Sounds fair. Their auto-routing engine is from AviationCloud, a Danish company they bought. They wanted to show me an example, but it didn’t find a Eurocontrol valid route for the city pair I asked
  • Trig still works on their NAVCOM. Their words are “not too many months”. I can’t say if it’s true or not. Apparently, a number of people asked the same question before me.
  • Skydemon is working on more IFR stuff as Timothy wrote here before. But they are not yet to the point of creating Eurocontrol routes. I asked them how many they are on staff, they guy said “4” !! Amazing they do all this !
  • A senior guy at Uavionix (the guys that do UAT in the UK) told me the Dutch CAA has shown some interest in their trial. Wait and see. He showed me the ground transmitter, it is smaller than a TV antenna and must be very cheap.
  • Met a company that makes automatic weather stations. They mainly work for major airports but he told me that a certified station that creates a METAR and broadcast AWOS on VHF cost around 50K€. I don’t understand why we don’t have more in Europe.

About the slot system and airport procedures, it was my first time so can’t compare with before but I have a totally different impression than others above.

  • We landed VFR at about 8:40am on Friday, a bit early from our slot. Radio was busy but not intense. A few planes mades orbits before we came in but it was only for 3-4 minutes. When at Oscar VRP, we were told to follow an aircraft to the runway, which we did. On the runway, TWR told us to vacate via the grass TWY to the north apron where a marshaller lead us to a spot. The apron was already very busy. An AVGAS truck asked us if we needed any (said no) and a van took us to the the show. We were there right a 9am for the opening.
  • When we left the show at 6:30pm on Friday, we just needed to show one pilot license and ID. Then waited for the bus for 10 minutes which dropped us at the grass apron. Then the apron was almost empty. We could see the line of airplanes waiting in line on the south side (hard surface) of the airport. We preflighted, started up, did our runup on the taxiway (nobody else behind us). Then taxied to holding point. We were only asked which VRP we wanted to depart so I asked the soreline, which was approved. Waited another 30 seconds and we got rolling at 7:10pm !! That’s it !
  • As a conclusion, the traffic level is far from Oshkosh’s, but we had a very enjoyable experience. Maybe the fact of parking on the North side (which we didn’t ask) made things easier and quicker. I would definitely recommend any pilot going there just for the ATC and procedures experience, even a young one if you can take an experienced buddy with you.
Last Edited by Jujupilote at 22 Apr 11:07
LFOU, France

Thank you.

So 50 SMA engines fitted in god knows how many years. I don’t care what anyone says there must be something wrong with it because on paper its a real winner.

as for Sonaca well I hope that’s not the case as it certainly won’t be a C152 replacement

And as for Trig’s NAV/COM well that’s been vapour ware for at least 2 years. With one rumour going around that its been ready for ages but they are not selling it yet as they have a huge number of TY96’s in stock that they need to move on first.

Bathman wrote:

So 50 SMA engines fitted in god knows how many years. I don’t care what anyone says there must be something wrong with it because on paper its a real winner.

In fact there was more than that but some converted back to AVGAS when they reached TBO
Fun fact : the guy told us SMA engines can not shock-cool, so some paradropping C182 descend after the drop like Pilatus PC6 and land before the jumpers

My opinion is that it works well but the economic case is not good unless AVGAS is really expensive in you area. But I’m partial, I’m French like SMA

LFOU, France

Thanks for the detailed report, Jujupilote.

We have numerous threads on diesels… my view is that if they can make one which is mounting and dimensionally compatible with an IO540 (or some smaller ones) and costs about what an IO540 costs, say $70k, they will sell loads, and until then they will sell approximately none. But they just don’t seem to “get it”, always coming up with costings showing €x saved on 500hrs/year, but who is flying that much, and those who are have already bought a DA40 or a DA42 which nowadays is a good reliable aircraft which is ideal for that sort of mission profile (FTO). There seems to be a good stream of investors though, who don’t ask the right questions

I wonder who decides whether to park you on hard, or grass?

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

Our experience was OK but slottery a bit silly. We booked a slot for 1400 local. We departed UK with an interim slot at Troyes. We ran slightly early on departure, flight was a bit quicker and customs and fuel quick too. We filed a flight plan that would have landed us 45 mins early against our slot. I had a phone call from a French number telling me we had a slot delay of 1 hour. I shut down the engine and went back into Troyes restaurant. What a pain.

On departure we were VFR but chatted with some irate brits in an SR22 who were departing IFR. They had been delayed 3 hours departing. We went straight off.

EGKL, United Kingdom

Those slots, Carl, were VFR or IFR and at Troyes or Friedrichshafen?

French slots sound like industrial action in France. But that doesn’t normally generate VFR slots because the striking ATC cause Eurocontrol to issue CTOTs (the maximum pain method – most effective because it grounds departures) but Eurocontrol is not concerned with VFR flights.

Does Troyes need arrival slots?

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

Thank you all for posting this information – it is a very interesting read as I was not able to go.

Please keep it coming

Anything (interesting / viable / short term) about the electric aircraft ?

Joris.

EBTN, EBST, Belgium
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