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Light Sport, Where’s it taking you? By Randy Schlitter |
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| The first week of Novembers opened with the AOPA Aviation Summit in Tampa Florida, and my trusty S-19 Venterra and I made the Kansas to Sunshine state dash. The weather was excellent for making miles. I had from zero to a little tailwind. | |||
| My first stop was Pine Bluff Arkansas. As I pulled up to the ramp there was a mint looking Ercoupe, I looked it over briefly and headed into the FBO. Outside on the bench was this petite elderly gentleman visiting with another older man. I thought how a nice day brings out the airplane lovers and how these guys must be enjoying all the activity, because at the other end of the field an RV fly-in was in progress. I paid for my gas and made a rest stop. When I got back to my plane that petite elderly fellow was doing a preflight on the Ercoupe. We talked a minute about the weather, he then revealed he had just flown from Houston where he bought the Ercoupe and would probably not make Detroit, his home base by nightfall. I nodded and agreed the winds were not in his favor and jumped in my plane and took off at the runway intersection, showing off to the RV crowd how spirited a 100 HP plane can be. As I put Pine Bluff behind me I thought about that Ercoupe pilot and how his plane and spirit of adventure neatly embody the reason light sport exists. I wish I would have talked with him more, feeling I needed more details, but after a while, I concluded just the right things were said, and the whole point of private aviation is making such things common, even if you're 80 years old. | |||
My next stop was Greenville Alabama. The wind was about 90 degrees to course most of this leg, but I landed 3.5 hours later with plenty of fuel. I know the operator of the FBO, and he always has a friendly smile, low priced fuel and a courtesy car. The day was getting lean on sunlight so I decided because of weather up ahead and the late hour to stay over. The fuel used at this and the last stop had the GPH still hovering under 4 gallons per hour. I was happy with the economy. |
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| The next day was a clear shot, and I had a bit of tailwind up high so I went non-stop from Greenville Alabama to Punta Gorda Florida. I flew over the top of Tampa at 11,500 looking for the heavies to poke through the scatted layer of cumulus-nimbus and only spotted a couple airliners making their way to higher flight levels. There was plenty of action below the clouds, as I monitored departure while crossing. | |||
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| I let down into Punta Gorda to a busy airport, it was a pretty day and the whole country seemed to be out flying. It was good to hear the chatter on 122.8 and other advisories channels. After a late afternoon lunch with my sister and family I launched towards Vero Beach, where I had several prearranged demo flights. | |||
| A few miles out Vero Beach tower cleared me to land, and on approach I spied a ramp covered with Piper aircraft that Flight Safety was using for training. This was a busy airport and over the next three days I would fall into the routine of demoing off a controlled airport with a not so friendly controller. This controller contrasted greatly to the patient and accommodating controllers they had working AOPA. I was a bit peeved at the Vero Beach Towers rough manners, but I concluded with a high flow of foreign student traffic, that almost anyone working in ATC would eventually become impatient. | |||
| After finishing up a few more demos on Wednesday morning I headed to Tampa. On the way I stopped at a grass strip that claimed to have a restaurant. After parking the plane next to some trees and a gazebo, I found a path that led to a Swiss Style Chalet, inside was a willing staff ready to serve up an outstanding lunch. The place was filled with antiques, and had the distinct flavor of the “Old World”, I felt extremely out of place when the Hostess asked about reservations. | |||
| The temporary tower was in play at Peter O Knight field, where the outdoor exhibits were being staged. After landing and waiting only 20 minutes for some planes to be placed, I had the plane secured and ready for the opening day. Kurt Senhert of Legend Cub was there and I shared a rental car with his crew, since we were all bunking at the same hotel. That night we attended the reception and had a chance to get the latest buzz, see old friends, and make a few new ones. The buzz seemed to be LSA is gaining ground among GA pilots. | |||
| Attendance was good, and I made some very good contacts, many of which had never heard of our firm. This was the exact reason for being there, because despite the many years of promoting our brand at very high profile airshows, I have always felt a large percentage of the GA crowd was missing out on both experimentals and LSA craft. RANS stood out because we were one of the few manufactures on display that offered both kits and ready to fly planes. This was interesting because there were a high number of GA pilots considering building, and the motivation was both saving cash and having the experience of building your own plane. That could only mean that despite not hearing about RANS, they were well aware of the innovation and excitement happening in the experimental part of light aviation. | |||
| During such shows I like to poll the people who come by the plane, and this time I learned a lot. Perhaps the biggest issue was how the middle of aviation is disappearing. This is the range of planes that are complex, high performance, and owner flown. This middle dries up because of cost to operate such planes is getting close to that of professionally flown business jets or large single engine turbo props. This actually shines bright on light sport, because as owners sell their planes or opt to go with jets, they still want to fly, and for many light sport planes are a viable option. There are now 100 models offered by 70 some companies, and among that selection we have 3 base models that span a wide mission range. It seems the world is taking light sport seriously, perhaps even more so than the USA, since the bulk of the companies are imported from outside our borders. | |||
| Speaking of Imports, another distinct opinion from my impromptu poll was a good number of US pilots like US made planes. This sparked the idea of making a bumper sticker that states “Not Made in China”. Cessna’s 162 was only a few yards away, and every time a visitor learned RANS was US born and built they would point that direction and claim they would never buy a China made plane, no matter who was promoting it. The sad truth is Cessna will still pull it off, despite the apparent disapproval about the 162’s origins. I just hope the QC is carefully watched, our experience with dealing with Taiwan has taught us never to relax our QC measures, even after everything seems to be running smoothly. | |||
| With light sport planes being capable alternatives to the usual GA fare a pilot needs to ask…where is light sport taking you? Light sport planes cover a wide range of mission profiles, from amphibian, bush, to cross country cruisers. In my case personally, a plane such as the S-19LS is excellent for cross-country, because of the impressive speed and range vs. operating cost. On my trip to Florida the numbers looked like this: | |||
| Distance………………………1550 miles Fuel Burn……………………..43 gallons Time…………………………..11 hours Average Speed……………….140.9 MPH Miles per Gallon…………………36 Gallons per Hours………………..3.9 Fuel Cost……………………. $214.5 (13.8 cents per mile) |
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| Planes like the S-6LS and S-7LS are excellent cost effective machines that well suited for STOL, backcountry, float, and local sight seeing missions. They are time proven designs, honed to a state of refinement by the interaction between our owners and factory. This may be the one advantage GA has missed out on, since part 23 certification restricts this freedom. The outcome is a number of good planes that span a wide range of needs, budgets and flying styles. The LSA category offers planes that are of little compromise, much in contrast to craft built under part 103, an LSA is a practical plane, with performance beyond many part 23 machines. | |||
| My return trip showed off the Venterras’ ability to handle high headwinds and still do great numbers (averaged in the 20 MPG range in the face of some 25 to 30 knots headwinds). A quick look at speed vs. benefit in actual timesavings shows significant time saved always means significant cost increase: | |||
| 180 MPH over 1550 miles = 8.61 hours X 8.0 GPH X $5.00 = $344 140 MPH over 1550 miles = 11.0 hours X 3.9 GPH X $5.00 =$214.50 |
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| Saving 2.4 hours could mean not spending the night somewhere, but this comes at the price of $129.50 in fuel. You have to also account for range, sometimes the faster plane has less endurance, which could translate into an extra 30 minutes on the ground. Being a little slower and half the fuel looks like a reasonable trade off, it is just a matter of what you are used too, and your patience! In my case I have flown twins cross country at 230 MPH, getting 4 MPG, so spending a bit more time flying and costing drastically less is in my book a blast! And let’s face it if you were to head out on a 1550-mile trip in the faster plane you may find yourself using the same number of days for various reasons. This slower pace is surprisingly productive, cost effective, and relaxing. | |||
| Again you have to ask where light sport is taking you. I wager in any case a good sport plane can take you there and be an aviation adventure worthy of a veteran pilot and a fantastic way to begin for the new pilot. | |||
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| S6ELS | |||
