Ada Elle

Supported by the GP is a higher standard, as is the need to meet a DVLA Commercial standard to carry passengers. The RAAus medical standard is 'I think I am safe to drive a car, so I'll sign this'.

wasn't advocating it for the current classes, but more for the new 550-1200kg class - the FatLSAs, Primary Category, and traditional GA aircraft. simpler than the current VH system, but not as deregulated as the RAA 19- class.

To each their own. Not if CASA administered it. I'm thinking of something along the lines of the UK NPPL and Permit to Fly. so instead of the current system of 600kg and below, and GA, move to a system of 472kg and below, 475-1200kg, and 1200kg+, with the latter two administered by CASA but with a much less restrictive bureaucracy for the middle group. other countries have done it, why can't we? tbh, I don't see why the LSA portion of RAA needs a separate licensing and membership scheme to GA licensing. What's the difference between a VH registered PiperSport and a RAA registered PiperSport, to the pilot? at an aircraft owners, maintenance and registration level there's a difference, sure.

Performance calculations, weight and balance. It's not about content/syllabus, but about standards. I don't remember much about stall/spin, for example, in the BAK - although it's in the syllabus, the aerodynamics of it isn't particularly well examined.

I'm obviously not communicating properly. I'm not denigrating anybody's training. I have the same training as you - and my RPL is still in the mail, not in my hand yet. I do think, however, that the minimum requirements for RAA instructors is too lax. I know that most people will be SIs and will have far more than the minimums - but why allow the barely competent to get through? My question is, if someone can't pass the PPL theory, should they be instructing? If they do instruct, how do you know that what they are teaching isn't the blind leading the blind?

I haven't actually advocated for either keeping the existing limits as they are, nor for 1500kg merely pointing out that others have and that the arguments for safety or equivalence etc don't really hold water. There's a vast difference between rag and tube, and LSA. There's not a lot of difference between LSA and VLA, at an airframe level (except potentially for certification). If I had my druthers, my solution would be to: - move LSAs, VLAs, and the bottom end of GA into a single 'recreational' class - allow owner maintenance along the Canadian lines - have a drivers license medical along UK lines (commercial drivers license standard) - upgrade instructor ratings to have at least PPL theory, unusual attitude recovery, and allow CPL GA instructors to instruct like in the US (without a formal Part 141 organisation, for example) - have similar airworthiness standards to VH experimental for 19- Really, what are the downsides of GA? - maintenance - medical If there was a compromise on maintenance and medical, but with an upgrade on training and airworthiness testing, who would not want to fly GA-lite rather than ultralights?

Does the UK PPL(M) not require a higher medical standard than the RAAus standard? (also, I thought the word inevitable would be taken as the joke that it was, given that the stats suggest that fewer than 50% of engines will fail before overhaul.)

What safety features can realistically be retrofitted? Is a J230C, with one POB, any safer at 700kg than at 600kg? 1. The extra weight means that you need a larger paddock for the inevitable engine failure forced landing 2. If you are approaching at say 60kt for a short runway landing, the higher stall speed turning final would lead to a higher risk of stall/spin; or the higher approach speed means you may overrun the runway.

I've never been near a 95.10 machine, let alone flown one, owned one, or built one, so I'm happy to be corrected about any part of 95.10. However, 95.10 or 95.25 is what most of the public thinks of when they hear 'ultralights'. I've only ever flown with one RAA non-senior instructor, and he said that he was finding some parts of the PPL theory difficult. You may disagree about the amount of regulation; but my position is that someone who finds the PPL theory too difficult to pass doesn't really have a place in explaining aerodynamics, or stall/spin, etc, to a new student. The impost on a new instructor having to do the PPL theory is minimal - there are plenty of pilots who have done it! Loading charts aren't covered in the RAA BAK exam, so how does a basic instructor prove that she understands it? If we're going to train to the GA syllabus (and claim that our training is equivalent), then our instructors should have passed the theory for the GA syllabus. This is doubly true if we want 1500kg (which, IMHO, is a mistake).

None of that is relevant. I'm not talking about SIs or CFIs. I know that SIs need to pass the PPL theory exam. I'm talking about base grade instructors, who need to have 75 hours PIC, no extra theory passes other than the basic NAV and radio, and are allowed to take students from ab initio to pre-solo. I too went from an LSA55 to eventually a Piper Warrior (with many planes in between). I know that the piper is easier to fly. None of this is pertinent to the discussion. Is the argument that the PPL theory is too hard for a new instructor trainee? or that it is too expensive? You don't pay people the respect of reading what they write before you slam into them.

Maybe when ultralights were 95.10 machines with a max BEW of 300kg, but at an MTOW of 1500kg? Do you want RAA to still be the AUF, or do you want it to be GA-lite? Do you want stalls to be demonstrated by someone who potentially doesn't understand loading charts, how to calculate CoG, and how CoG affects stall/spin behaviour? You can't argue for watered down standards for ultralights and then claim that an RPC is equivalent to an RPL in training.

"Working fine". Obviously it's not, or we wouldn't be having this discussion.

Is the argument, essentially, that you want access to GA planes without having to go through GA training or have a GA medical? My argument was that the same plane, with higher MTOW, is not safer; it is in fact potentially less safe. A 350kg plane with 550kg MTOW is less likely to have a stall/spin incident than the same plane loaded to a 750kg MTOW. In what proportion of fuel exhaustion emergencies would a larger fuel load (and the same fuel management strategy) have prevented the accident?

How about RAAus requiring that its instructors do something more than the RAAus BAK (which is trivial to pass)? My logbook says that I passed the RAAus pre-solo, BAK, Air law, and NAV/MET exams on the same day, 14 days after my first TIF. Surely the standard should be at least PPL theory pass for instructor, and maybe CPL aerodynamics, nav, and met passes for SI. (consider that the greenest of GA Gr3s has a full set of CPL passes.)

Higher weight == higher stall speed (all other factors kept the same) == higher chance of stalling on the turn final == less safety due to stall/spin. You have no evidence that a higher weight would improve safety.

Yes. I've never come close to MTOW on the Alpha. I don't think there's any sane way to do so without being out of CoG - two 120kg POB would be getting chafing at the shoulders.

I heard on the grapevine that DAMEs get to tax deduct aviation expenses (including flying)....

Was there a point where I suggested we should ask to allow EASA CS-VLA planes into RA-Aus, where I said 'I don't know what VLA is, please explain it to me using the wikipedia page'? Am I that bad at communicating, or is this more of the mansplaining that happens in association with the rampant sexism around here?

You can claim that things are a certain way all you like, but that doesn't make it true: - The re-activation of membership medical declaration is different to the renewal medical declaration - When you join RA-Aus, or reactivate a lapsed membership, you don't _ever_ need a note from your doctor. My axe to grind is that the Ops manual is a schemozzle and it should be fixed long before further privileges are sought. At the very least, pilots should be obliged to fly within the conditions on their drivers license, if those are relevant to flying (such as visual correction). It appears that Issue 7 of the Ops manual was a rush job that wasn't proofread before release.

Just like people stop driving when they're not capable of driving safely. I didn't say that was the only reason. As it is, how many people actually know what the medical standard for holding a drivers license is? If you don't know what it is, how can you honestly declare that you meet that standard? (The declaration is not that you hold a drivers license, it is that you meet the standard.)

I know all these things! I am offended by the presumption that all pilots are men and all partners are women. That is what the existence of a 'ladies program' and 'henpecked pilot' suggests. The College of Surgeons, as conservative and traditional as they are, has a 'scientific program' and 'social program' at its annual meeting. There is a women's program, but it is a morning for discussion of women in surgery.

What certification/testing standard did they test the Sling to? I thought the Jab was tested in the Primary category (the 230C anyhow; the 230D is LSA). I don't have a copy of the LSA standards, and I don't know enough aerospace engineering to judge whether they would work at 750kg. All I have said is that prudence would dictate that we should copy someone else's standard for the time being rather than going it alone by being the first country to permit 750kg LSAs.

At the moment, the RA-Aus medical standard is weaker than that to drive a car, because you are not required to obey the conditions on your car license. (What stops a pilot with shortsightedness from not wearing corrective optics while flying legally?) The next question becomes, who is opposed to the institution of a GP medical, like the GFA one? That would be people who could not pass a GP medical, of whatever standard, or who do not want to pay for a GP medical (all $80). Finally, what standard should this GP medical be? At the very least it should be at least as restrictive as a private drivers license; I would advocate that it should be the commercial drivers license standard, on the basis that a light aircraft flying HS1 has the same potential for carnage as a truck driver in Circular Quay (consider total kinetic and potential energy of an RV6 at 1500ft). If you want to play the (wo)man and not the ball, go right ahead.

Which is the exact situation that they would be in if LSAs were redefined to 750kg. The manufacturer would still have to recertify them (self-certification) to 750kg. Do we have a 750kg LSA standard? Do we really want to create one and lead the world? Do you trust CASA not to create one like the RAMPC?

Do you like being an unreconstructed sexist (person...mod) watching the world pass you by? A "ladies program" at a fly-in that isn't an AWPA meeting or similar suggests that you want to shunt women off to the non pilots corner.