In the case of the MCR, it has been taken over by SE Aviation at LFSP.
I have no input on the core question.
WilliamF wrote:
Very true. If you are paying €30-45 an hour to an independent mech to help you, it doesn’t matter whether you are working on a TB20 or a RV7
My feeling is that with an inspector you have a partnership – you want a safe aircraft and he wants you to have a safe aircraft so your interests and his interests should align. But the CofA system is designed for a more confrontational environment where you may have e.g. a flying school or similar GA business and your job is at least partly to protect pilots and passengers from unscrupulous operators.
In practice this clearly sometimes breaks down – e.g. you have an owner who is incompetent with a spanner, and won’t be told. Or you have someone who doesn’t really care about their own safety (which is fine until they come to take passengers or sell the aircraft). But there are still savings to be made in terms of minor adjustments such as fitting a new radio or other concessions which may occasionally make big savings.
I think the other major saving is that if you choose well, you should never see your kit-built or plans-built aircraft scrapped for want of a minor part. e.g. I sourced some springs for the landing gear of my Turbulent for £50 each. Had it been a CofA aircraft from a defunct manufacturer and there was no data to support the remanufacture and recertification of the part, they may have cost a little more.
Peter wrote:
that unless a homebuilt has some specially desirable property
That’s the only reason really. They are either fast (and look fast), aerobatic, bush-planes or just very different and exotic (canards etc). RVs are in a special category due to the broad performance (the 4, 6, 7, 8 and 14). For certified airplanes you have the choice between Cessna and Cirrus, or a 30-40 year old vintage something. Only the Cirrus is fast, but few can afford it, and the Cessnas have charm and performance like a 1980 Toyota Camry 
There probably/maybe has been a tendency in recent years of people purchasing ready built homebuilt only because they cannot afford a Cirrus (for instance). I don’t know how satisfied they are with an RV, except maybe the 10? They aren’t seeking the aerobatics or short field performance, and if they also are allergic to spanners, well.
Peter wrote:
If you cannot do that (and many can’t) and can’t get somebody else to do it for you for free, you have made the wrong choice.
Very true. If you are paying €30-45 an hour to an independent mech to help you, it doesn’t matter whether you are working on a TB20 or a RV7. I much prefer working in pairs for company and to have four eye balls looking at everything checking it over. I think it’s a common sight when you see cowls off to see two people there. Hangarage is the same too for a homebuilt vs certified. If you want to use Avgas that’s also the same price. Same for a landing fee. For a private owner an N reg airplane, maybe with one partner to half the costs, takes some beating for cost effectiveness vs utility. However if the airplane you really want to fly only comes as a homebuilt and the numbers stack up, why not buy it….
A year or so ago I asked an RV builder how much he would want for a freshly built RV10. The answer was £250k… The context was simply that if one lost one’s medical, this is a good model to fly (UK VFR only, or abroad if you get a “proper pilot” in the RHS) on the NPPL + medical self declaration. And I know from “the background” that there is a LOT of pilots who lose their medicals.
One has to remember that unless a homebuilt has some specially desirable property, the main advantage over a CofA type is that you save money by doing your own maintenance. If you cannot do that (and many can’t) and can’t get somebody else to do it for you for free, you have made the wrong choice.
Someone who knows what to look for can establish within minutes if any plane is a likely “walk away”. I can do that on a TB20… It is only if those boxes are ticked that a proper prebuy is required.
If you start looking at ready built homebuilts, you see a huge variation in the build quality.
I certainly have noticed that the prices of wooden single seaters have dropped a lot recently as well. Perhaps there’s a general decline in the homebuilt market at the moment.
kwlf wrote:
Interested to hear about the RVs as I’ve just been watching the market recently.
When I saw that RV8 on Afors being put out for sealed bids I knew the market looked very frothy. You nearly needed a secret handshake to buy an RV a year ago. They traded in days on owners forums never getting to the market. I bet if you wanted to buy an RV today you could find one. My hunch is it’s brexit related thinking has slowed down the pace for them. Just a hunch. On the subject of RV’s people who know them, will know in about two minutes whether it’s a good one or not. They tend to be a binary thing I’m told. Which you wouldn’t get with say a similar era production airplane.
Interested to hear about the RVs as I’ve just been watching the market recently. RV4s/6s have been advertised around the 50-60K mark and 7s/8s at 80-100k. I heard of a newish RV7 which apparently went for 128K. Obviously what people advertise for will be more than most people will pay, and what people claim to have been paid may be more than they really were.
dublinpilot wrote:
Is it business as usual for the owners?
It always has been, and always will be. What’s easy to forget is that the builder/owner is the sole responsible for an experimental homebuilt to be airworthy, or simply in good condition. These “two weeks at the factory” aircraft completely undermines that fact. You can certainly build an aircraft in two weeks at the factory, but this changes nothing about the responsibility. The builder is still fully responsible for every single rivet and nut even though he has only done what he was told (whatever that may be within two weeks).
There is nothing wrong with this, but it makes the builder/owner helpless if the factory goes out of business. Still, no more so than for certified aircraft. Lots of people are able to make parts, and this is after all easier for non certified aircraft than for certified, at least in principle.
dublinpilot wrote:
sooner or later your aircraft becomes a pile of junk
So will everything if they are not maintained.
Jodels are wood-and-fabric, and plans are available for all of them. But modern composite aircraft may be different, if the kit included prebuilt parts.
The Europa now comes with wings partly built. He original one had foam cores. I don’t know if a wing could be replaced if the manufacturer disappeared. A very unlikely problem for Europa owners, and maybe Liberty wings would fit.
