nor could he write a better piece of fiction---------Fritz do not
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----- Original Message -----
From: roger lambert
To: zenith601-list@matronics.com
Sent: Monday, November 16, 2009 8:33 AM
Subject: In a galaxy far, far away
A long, long time ago in a galaxy far, far away the aviation
authorities decided they needed to get a large number of older aircraft
out of the fleet and, at the same time, allow more people to fly in a
low, slow unregulated airspace. To that end they issued a set of
specifications and requested engineers to design aircraft to those
specifications. The engineers made several assumptions, i.e. the
builders would follow the plans, the pilots would operate the airplane
within the flight envelope, and the owners would properly maintain the
aircraft. The engineers designed the aircraft to the government specs
and released the plans and kits to the market. Unfortunately, the
engineers were wrong in their assumptions about some of the builders,
owners and pilots. Some builders,many of whom were not engineers and had
no building experience felt they knew"better" than the designer and made
"improvements" to the design or built poorly with hardware store tools
and equipment. Some owners did not maintain the aircraft according to
factory specifications. Some pilots "self checked" the modifications,
flew aerobatics and exceeded Va and Vne with reckless abandon. Crashes
insued. A group of builders then engaged in a campaign to force a
redesign of the airplane by an avalanche of complaints to the aviation
authorities. They demanded the airplane be made safe from "flutter".
Even after the theory of flutter was refuted, they continued with their
stream of complaints and many refused to believe any of the studies done
by professional engineers or even the aviation authorities were correct.
The aviation authorities, in order to stop this activity, engaged the
designers of the airplane to strengthen the airplane so the pilots would
have less opportunity to harm themselves by their excursions outside the
flight envelope in their self designed "improvements" to the airplane.
The designers, tired of going to crash sites, and tired of seeing how
poorly built, flown and maintained their aircraft were, designed
modifications that made the airplane far stronger than the original
specifications. Several interesting things happened, including, (1)The
complaining group claimed victory and patted themselves on the back as
having superior knowledge to the others. They forgot their claims of
design flaw were never shown as correct by any engineering study and
ignored every indication of the aviation authorities that operational
activities may have contributed to the crashes. As none of this group
actually had a flying airplane(most don't even have a pilot's license),
they suffered no real damage, and have further reason to put off ever
having to fly their airplane.(2) The designers, who may or may not
survive economically, are bombarded by demands they pay for these
"improvements" by owners so shortsighted they couldn't pass a flight
physical without wearing binoculars backwards, will now be able to
attribute every crash to builder/pilot error.(3) The factory built
airplanes will now have an additional bill for the "improvements" to an
airplane which is already upside down financially and may never recover
any commercial ability.(4) The rest, including those with hundreds of
hours on the airframe, who built appropriately and flew the airplane
within its flight envelope will also have to dissassemble their airplane
to incorporate the "improvements" or face potential problems with the
aviation authorities or the insurance companies, much less any attempted
resale of the airplane.
Steven Speilberg couldn't film one better than this.
