On Jan 30, 2017, at 2:40 PM, Richard Frawley <rjfraw...@gmail.com> wrote: > > why register it [an electric self-launcher] as a glider?
Because the GFA system only authorizes pilots trained by GFA to fly GFA-registered gliders that have been maintained under the GFA airworthiness system. So if you register it as a light aircraft, you can’t fly it until you make it airworthy to GA standards, and acquire (at least) an RPL. The GFA syllabus is not aligned with the RPL syllabus, so that means you have to pay a CASA school to be trained all over again to legally fly the aircraft that you would be able to fly if you were under the control of a GFA CFI as a member of a GFA club (typical cost for a GA RPL syllabus is about $7000, plus whatever you need to pay to get a cross-country endorsement). If you already have a pilot license and you’ve never encountered GFA before, you might be able to buy an electric self-launcher, register it GA, and fly it under an RPL. But only if it’s brand new. If it has previously been maintained under the GFA form-2 system, it won’t be airworthy to GA standards, and probably couldn’t be flown at all by anyone regardless of their license status. You’d have to pay a LAME a considerable amount of money to bring it under the GA maintenance umbrella and issue it with a GA maintenance release. And once you’ve done that, GFA pilots without CASA licenses wouldn’t be able to fly it anymore, so you’d have extreme difficulty ever selling it again afterwards. > Is there a choice? In practical terms: No. > its has over 200Klm battery range and it takes off from the ground, sounds > like a light aircraft to me Then only a tiny minority of GFA members (who have RPL or PPL CASA licenses) can fly it. That doesn’t sound like a particularly sustainable outcome for gliding, does it? It’s certainly not the kind of thing that half a dozen qualified glider pilots who aren’t club members are going to form a syndicate around. - mark _______________________________________________ Aus-soaring mailing list Aus-soaring@lists.base64.com.au http://lists.base64.com.au/listinfo/aus-soaring
