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Super Cub EASA Maintenance (for an American used to the N register)

Peter wrote:

Sure, but that is the very topic here. Nobody doubts one can do X Y and Z within Norway.

OK, just can’t resist biting Please tell me. What prevents a person taking off anywhere in Norway with his RV and fly all over Scandinavia, France, Italy, Poland etc etc Even Russia and the US/Canada? VFR/N-VFR/IFR makes no difference. Read the question carefully. I said what prevents. I did not say what makes it different.

Another aspect here is flying from Norway to Croatia for instance is an awful long distance. It takes at least a couple of full days in a SEP. Why would I do that instead of sitting in the back of a 737, then rent an aircraft in Croatia and fly around with that? This is a rhetorical question, and IMO only one (rhetorical) answer makes sense, and the answer is not simply getting from A to B.

Those with the money and the need to fly around here all year do it with King Airs. A King Air would go to Croatia all right, but it’s not what they are used for. They are used to go around Scandinavia/Nordic and be able to land at shorter fields. A bit less money, and a helicopter is the best choice of aircraft, by far due to weather mostly. After that it’s more a matter of taste, wallet and your personal recreational “mission profile” as well as all sorts of practicalities

My point is that around here, your best choice of (recreational) aircraft to fly around in is an RV (there are others like Lancair, Glasair, CCs etc, but let’s think in generic terms). It’s fast, it’s cool, it’s easy and cheap to maintain, easy and cheap to repair, lots of them around, it can do short field, it can do IFR. It can do it all, even a loop and a roll. It can also be used to fly around in Europe and can be maintained anywhere. Nevertheless, it is only really usable for nice weather operations, pure recreational flying with no scheduled requirements. There really is no intermediate step up with any valuable benefits before entering into King Air land, but you could take a 90 degree and go helicopter. Sacrificing a bit short field and handling for more room, a Cirrus would do, but it also cost 3-5 times as much, and is a PITA to maintain this far from high population density Europe. But, if you have the money, why not? There’s no better certified SEP around, and certification also have it’s ups.

What is the best choice of aircraft when living in the UK, and the “mission profile” is to fly to the Mediterranean for nice dinners? Well I don’t care to bother contemplating the issue at all. It’s nothing I would ever do. It would never cross my mind. There’s nothing wrong with such a “mission profile” though. A guess it’s common in the UK? It’s just nothing I would ever consider doing, and so would extremely few around here.

What is the typical “mission profile” around here? It’s all sorts of local flying. It’s “bush flying” and acro (that’s what I do most if I’m not instructing). It’s flying along the coast for a multitude of purposes, because that’s where people live and lots of airports and places. It’s flying to fly-ins all over Scandinavia. Poland, Germany, the Baltic states. I would say that at least 99% of the flying is within Scandinavia/Nordic (possibly including the Baltic states and Northern Germany, Northern Poland). That’s an area of around 2000 k km. This is about the same area as Spain, France, Germany and Ukraine combined. The UK is what? 200 k km or something of that order, 1/10

Again, what is the aircraft of choice here? All kinds of aircraft, people get the strangest things. But the best bang for the buck is a homebuilt, typically RV. Going fast at a low cost, nothing beats a Lancair though, if you can live with the idiosyncrasies of that plane. A King Air would be cool. A PC-12 would be cool. If I had one of those, perhaps I would go to Croatia for dinner The thing is I don’t, and I never will. What I (and everyone else here) have, is tons of air space at our disposal, and we have the opportunity to use any plane we can afford using, be it an UL, a homebuilt or a certified. And we can use them with no restrictions whatsoever within the distances we would ever bother to travel with a SEP, any sort of SEP. In this environment an RV comes out on top, it’s simply an undeniable fact due to the reasons stated above.

I prefer to stick to reality, the reality that surrounds me in any “SEP distance” from where I am Please stop telling me what my reality is and isn’t. For the exact same reasons hombuilts are preferable in the US, they are preferable here. Preferable meaning they come out in top in an excel sheets, ticking off most boxes, which isn’t necessarily what makes you chose this or that airplane

The elephant is the circulation
ENVA ENOP ENMO, Norway

gallois wrote:

Is there an EASA UL category?

No. However, EASA defines which requirements that constitutes an UL (MTOM, stall speed, number of occupants etc). A C-172 can never be an UL, and the reason is the definition in Annex I.

The elephant is the circulation
ENVA ENOP ENMO, Norway

Is there an EASA UL category?. Here is the latest French guidance I found it is however 2019 but I’ve not seen any changes since.
Microlight2019_pdf

Last Edited by gallois at 18 Mar 08:02
France

Sure, but that is the very topic here

Not exactly. The topic is how to maintain a annex I but ICAO Piper Super Cub. And it is all explained above.

The elephant is the circulation
ENVA ENOP ENMO, Norway

Very few military aircraft are in accordance with ICAO, very few “state aircraft” also

Indeed, which is why these types need a Govt-level special permission to fly internationally. You could not just jump into a Norwegian F16, stick some extra tanks under it, file a flight plan ENVA-LDSB at FL450, and pop down there to have some nice fish You might not get shot down but there will prob100 be a top level diplomatic protest.

whether other authorities recognize a non ICAO CofA is another matter altogether. They might, they might not.

Indeed They won’t, except under the existing framework (much discussed).

How other countries handles this is not all that interesting to me

Sure, but that is the very topic here. Nobody doubts one can do X Y and Z within Norway.

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

Airborne_Again wrote:

There are ICAO standards for airworthiness. An aircraft has to meet those requirements to get a CofA

It certainly does not. A CofA is what it is. A paper saying the aircraft is airworthy after some standard or regulation. Very few military aircraft are in accordance with ICAO, very few “state aircraft” also. There are lots of standards for airworthiness. ICAO is one. EASA has several that are not according to ICAO.

Now, whether other authorities recognize a non ICAO CofA is another matter altogether. They might, they might not.

All “non EASA” aircraft receives a CofA. It can then be classified as:

  • Normal : according to ICAO, this Cub for instance
  • Experimental : It could or could not be according to ICAO technically speaking, but being in the Experimental class it simply means (per def) it is not verified that the aircraft fulfill the requirements in the Normal class. Former military aircraft would end up here together with homebuilts. However, the airworthiness is unquestionable.
  • Special : It could be a normal classed aircraft with large non type specific modifications (I think). EASA also has this class I think, but I’m not sure it’s called “special” or something else. Also here the airworthiness is unquestionable.

An UL on the other hand, is not classified as any of the above. It receives it’s airworthiness by a combination of operational restrictions/regulations and the usual EASA UL weight limit etc and a minimal technical standard.

Anyway, a “permit to fly” is not something any Norwegian aircraft would get unless it does not fulfill normal requirements for airworthiness whatever they might be. Instead some temporarily measures are taken, either operational or technical.

How other countries handles this is not all that interesting to me. What’s interesting to most Norwegian pilots is they can buy themselves an RV. They can install IFR instruments and fly IFR if they so chooses, which many do. The aircraft is maintained as any other aircraft, from last summer according to Part-ML. As long as Part-ML is followed, it can be maintained (signed) anywhere in the world by a technician. It has always been like this, and Part-ML does not change this. If you have built it, you can do everything yourself.

The elephant is the circulation
ENVA ENOP ENMO, Norway

Airborne_Again wrote:

So some aircraft never get a “proper” CofA. That’s generally the case for non-certified aircraft such as homebuilts, ultralights, ex-military types.

Did you mean Restricted CofA? That is what EASA is planning to issue as a part of Part 21-light reorg for two-seaters – it does not require a TC.

EGTR

Yes. I don’t think the Norwegian CAA actually issues a CofA for say a Norwegian registered RV or a Lancair, etc, which is in compliance with ICAO Part 23 or whatever it is called.

But there are some types which drop into a useful hole in between the floorboards. And I mean legally, and not just because “nobody checks” which is actually true (apart from reports posted here of checks in Germany at large GA conventions)

This is why we had the thread linked here. These types are potentially valuable because, being “non EASA aircraft” they benefit from concessions such as this massive one pointed out by @Jacko (which is priceless to somebody who has £££ but doesn’t have a Euro Class 2 medical, and is IMHO largely responsible for inflating RV prices in Europe to stratospheric levels), while being unaffected by the various airspace restrictions on non-certs such as this and this.

It is a bit like the holy grail in business: generate cash without generating a taxable profit

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

LeSving wrote:

There is something called permit to fly, but that can only be used temporarily, and not as an exception for airworthiness. Every aircraft must be airworthy, and kept airworthy.

Well… There are ICAO standards for airworthiness. An aircraft has to meet those requirements to get a CofA. But if the national authority feels that the aircraft can still be operated safely (taking into account the operating conditions and possible restrictions), it can issue some other certificate which is typically called a “Permit to Fly”. I understand that the Norwegian authority calls it a “Special CofA”.

So some aircraft never get a “proper” CofA. That’s generally the case for non-certified aircraft such as homebuilts, ultralights, ex-military types.

ESKC (Uppsala/Sundbro), Sweden

LeSving wrote:

The laws regulating a Norwegian aircraft are valid world wide. There is no separate IFR privilege

That is a golden piece of paper for home-builts or kit-builts if the paper says CoFA without restriction to Norway airspace, all other countries would naturally accept it as such !

Last Edited by Ibra at 17 Mar 13:29
Paris/Essex, France/UK, United Kingdom
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