Light Sport
By Richard L. Collins
July 2007
 If anyone thought that the creation of light-sport airplanes and pilot certificates would open the flood gates, it has not happened yet. There is activity, to be sure, but it is relatively modest. There may well be hotbeds of activity at selected locations around the country, but in the U.S.A.
but in the U.S.A. there is not a lot of production. Among domestic producers, 36 Zodiac LSAs were assembled last year, and as of this past February American Legend had built 88 of their LSA version of the Cub since they started production in July 2005. Cub Crafters, with 27 years in the Cub business, builds a Sport Cub; the airplane is rolling off the line at the rate of more than one a week.
A long list of LSAs have been imported, mostly from Europe, and there are plans to bring more airplanes from offshore. Still, I don’t think anybody feels the fleet of new-generation LSAs numbers over 1,000.
Why not more activity? For one thing, a prime selling point of the LSA is that you don’t have to have an FAA medical. (However, if you have flunked an FAA medical, you can’t fly under the Light Sport rules.) Many thought the no-medical thing would create a huge market. That has not developed because most people who can function normally can pass an FAA medical exam. And the things that preclude passing an FAA medical are things that most people wouldn’t want to take for an airplane ride without another functioning pilot on board.
Then there are the airplanes. After I wrote about LSAs over a year ago a reader wrote: “In his acerbic and wandering dismissal of light-sport aircraft he expresses Flying magazine’s prejudice against light, slow and simple airplanes.” That’s just not true. Every pilot who writes for Flying has one or more beloved light airplanes in his past. But we are realistic when we question the limited training required to fly these airplanes.
Other mail shed light on another side of the subject. In relation to an LSA he bought, a pilot said: “Everyone who flew it claimed it to be the hardest to fly they had ever experienced. One pilot, an examiner with 20,000 hours, refused to fly it.” He refused because he said the airplane did not have enough tail.
Light-sport airplanes are required to meet a standard and the process is more akin to a self-certification than anything else. They do have a maximum takeoff weight limit (1,320 pounds) and speed limits, but how “good” the airplane is has to be based on faith in the builder and seller. I would add that the Cubs are really modernized versions of that old favorite and the flying qualities would be completely Cub-like, if not better. The build quality would probably also be better.
With this background, I was intrigued when Bill Caudell, proprietor of nearby Frederick Aviation, told me he was interested in the Zodiac, an all-metal LSA that is assembled in Georgia. One of the airplane’s drawing cards is the fact that it is powered by a Continental O-200, an engine that has been widely used in other airplanes. (The Cubs use the same engine.) It has also been a kit airplane, with over 1,000 built, but the kit isn’t exactly like the manufactured airplane.
The Zodiac is a brother to the Alarus, a Part 23 certified airplane, designed by Chris Heintz, that has been known by other designations and that has found some success in the training market. Zenith and Zenair have been company and airplane names over the years.
Anyway, Bill’s interest and my curiosity found us airborne and headed for Eastman, Georgia, where the Zodiac is assembled using parts that are manufactured in Canada. The company in Eastman is AMD, for Aircraft Manufacturing and Development Company. They also assemble Alarus aircraft from Canadian-made components when there is demand there. The kit airplanes, still offered by
Zenith, come from Missouri.
AMD has 12 employees who work in a rather spacious hangar at the Heart of Georgia Regional Airport. They assemble, not build, airplanes and the day we were there a customer’s airplane was awaiting delivery, the big pieces for two other airplanes were being assembled and the prototype for the LSA Zodiac airplane was present along with a couple of Alarus airplanes. The current staffing can support a completion rate of 2.5 airplanes per month.
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