Affordable Aviation

Part 103 continues to step from the shadow of Light-Sport Aircraft. We’ve had aviation’s simplest rule (worldwide!) for 27 years and with few exceptions, most of those years saw Part 103 producers laboring in near-obscurity. *** Now, however, a new flurry of activity has developed at the beautiful intersection of genuinely lightweight aircraft with electric […]

Keeping tabs on Cessna‘s electric C-172 project in collaboration with Bye Energy of Colorado, Bye just announced it will make a presentation at the annual NBAA (National Business Aviation Association) convention this that’s going on right now in Atlanta. *** Bye Energy as I’ve blogged in the past is working on electric and electric-hybrid propulsion […]

Garmin is a company that, like its contemporaries in the computer or smartphone industries, does not sit still for long. Innovations and upgrades happen swiftly. *** Over the years, Garmin has become a staple of Light-Sport Aircraft. Stick your head inside the cockpit of virtually any SLSA and you’ll probably see a Garmin 296, 396, […]

The Maverick flying car I’ve blogged about in the past has been all over the news lately for having trumped the competition by being the first to market with a viable land/sky vehicle (it’s ASTM certified SLSA #110), at a viable price ($84,000), and in a functional, and dare I say it, wildly fun way. […]

Tim Casey is just plain full of it. Garmin’s jovial, well-recognized manager of the instrument company’s aviation hand-held and LSA line of avionics products, is one knowledgeable character. In fact, he is so full of information that his one-hour seminar at the Midwest LSA Expo only scratched the surface of the seemingly limitless capabilities of […]

During my recent appearance on the Powered Sport Flying (Internet) Radio Show, I said I remained amazed that although the western U.S. has a large share of all pilots and airplanes in the country, no western airshow seems to have taken off the way Sun ‘n Fun or AirVenture has. True enough, no west-of-the-Mississippi event […]

I got an email today from Christopher “Doc” Bailey of Renegade Light Sport that the Falcon 2.0 just made its maiden flights with the brand new Lycoming IO-233-LSA engine. *** A video Doc linked to me gives the salient details. The Falcon LS was initially imported by T&T Aviation which sold the distributorship and inventory […]

October brought the first flight of the Lycoming O-233 in a Falcon Light-Sport Aircraft. This adds the famed Lycoming nameplate to a stable of LSA powerplant brands including Rotax, Jabiru, and Continental plus the CubCrafters CC340 engine. To these, we can now add the Lycoming O-233 LSA engine. *** “Our first flight flew well right […]

Those hardworking Sportair guys at North Little Rock Municipal Airport (KORK) in Arkansas are serving more notice that they intend to stay around for the long haul. *** The purveyor of fine LSA (Sting Sport, Sirius, iCub and SeaRey amphib) is now an official FAA-certificated Repair Station for the general aviation community as well. *** […]

Terrafugia has been getting tons of press and no wonder. The MIT brain trust developing the Transition is breaking new ground in numerous ways. While we await their sophisticated “roadable airplane,” a simpler flying car concept won its SLSA approval on September 28, 2010. Entering the SLSA List at #110… welcome I-tec Maverick. Like Transition, […]