Airplanes are complex instruments of flight. A delicate balance of art and performance, held in balance by a strict code that dictates what thou shall and shall not do. Newton’s law of universal gravitation dictates that “what goes up must come down.” I will expand on that theory somewhat with an addendum, “What goes up must be maintained.” Don’t believe me? Look it up for yourself, in Part 43. Now that we all agree you must fix your airplane, let’s find out how we can do that safely, efficiently, and economically.
Time to Upgrade
I recently wrote an article in FLYING in which I cited the average age of automobiles in the United States was 12.1 years in 2021. It may surprise you that the average age of general aviation aircraft is 30 years. A sizable portion of airplanes are more than 40 years old or older. Some are keen to keep an airplane stock just as if it rolled off the factory floor. Others make minor adjustments, replacing what is mechanically necessary while striving to maintain originality. Then a subset of the population presses the limits of what the feds allow and goes full custom, much like a flying Chip Foose.
