
A plane so good it's still in production after 60 years - nairteashop
http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20170302-the-plane-so-good-its-still-in-production-after-60-years
======
phillc73
I'm surprised the article doesn't mention the Cessna 182, which also started
production in 1956 and is still rolling out of the factory new today.

While the article extols the virtue of the 172's engine, the fact is that the
vast majority of them are running very old designs with carburetors and on
Avgas. Avgas still contains lead. These old engines are hugely inefficient and
flown incorrectly prone to cracked cylinders. Newer models are fuel injected
and there are also a few diesel conversions.

All Cessna single engine aircraft now have to undergo supplementary
inspections (SIDS), at least in Australia and I think it is the same in the
US. I've seen first hand the horrendous amount of corrosion which can hide in
a 50 year old aeroplane and not be found until the wings are removed. These
SIDS inspections have the potential to ground much of the older 152/172/182
fleet and render what was a $25,000 asset practically worthless. It will be
uneconomical to repair in many cases.

The above has happened to me personally with a Cessna 182. In the end it was
sold for scrap with only the engine and avionics retaining any value. I've
also seen the costs of these inspections on a Cessna 210 exceed $20,000. It
needed a whole new main wing spar amongst other things.

The point I am making is that these very old single engine light aircraft need
very meticulous inspections now to ensure they are still safe to fly. I do
believe there are probably quite a few seriously at risk aeroplanes still
flying today, especially if they have been left outside in coastal areas for
any length of time.

I used to own a light aeroplane maintenance business.

~~~
ImTalking
Agreed. I got my PP license 40 years ago on a 172, then 4 years ago went thru
training again to renew but quit due to the condition of the planes (all
150's, 172's). I also quit because I realised (maybe because I'm older now),
that there is no place for a part-time pilot. Too dangerous. Either you fly
every day or don't fly at all because eventually something is going to happen,
especially considering the planes I was flying and if you fly 1-2 times a
month you are ill-equipped to handle any emergency situation.

~~~
JohnJamesRambo
You made a very mature decision. I wish more people were honest with
themselves like you.

------
sunflowerfly
I have flown one, and while good, it is not "that good". What happened is the
FAA rules are so stringent to create a new aircraft, that the subsequent cost
was so high, that few new small plane designs make ROI sense. This has created
a case where the strict rules in the name of safety have actually caused a
reduction in safety. This plane was originally designed on slide rules. Today
we could create more optimized designs in almost every metric, including
safety, but no company can afford to do so. The FAA is supposed to change
these rules soon.

~~~
nether
> Today we could create more optimized designs in almost every metric,
> including safety, but no company can afford to do so.

Really? The Cirrus SR20, SR22 don't count? Haven't they been outselling the
172 for several years now?

~~~
mikeash
I'm not sure the Cirruses would make very good trainers. If nothing else, I
think you'd want something where the spin recovery procedure is something
better than "pull the big red handle and call your insurance company."

~~~
bronco21016
There's only one certificate in the FAA line up that requires actually
spinning an aircraft. In that sense the Cirrus makes a perfectly acceptable
trainer.

See www.wmich.edu/aviation

~~~
mikeash
I'm not thinking of deliberate spins, but rather that it seems like students
might spin by accident from time to time, and it would be good if that didn't
automatically total the aircraft.

~~~
bronco21016
I've obviously never attempted to intentionally spin a Cirrus but in my
experience and in talking with many other instructors in the aircraft it's
nearly impossible to get the aircraft to enter a spin. The stall
characteristics of the split chord wing make it difficult to even fully stall
the aircraft.

------
FabHK
The article mentions the longest non-stop flight briefly - that was quite a
story: the two guys flew for 2 months non-stop.

Here [1] are some pictures, incl. of the refuelling. Below some tidbits I
found interesting or amusing:

\- after take-off, they did a low pass to let a chase car paint white stripes
on the tires, so that they could not cheat undetected (by landing somewhere
and taking a break).

\- they refuelled about twice a day

> “I once asked John’s widow if they handed down the waste during refueling
> runs. She said, ‘No. That’s why it’s so green around Blythe.’ ”

> Some time after the flight, Cook was asked by a reporter if he would ever
> try to replicate the stunt, to which he replied: “Next time I feel in the
> mood to fly endurance, I’m going to lock myself in a garbage can with the
> vacuum cleaner running, and have Bob serve me T-bone steaks chopped up in a
> thermos bottle. That is, until my psychiatrist opens for business in the
> morning.”

[1] [https://disciplesofflight.com/flight-
endurance/](https://disciplesofflight.com/flight-endurance/)

~~~
fokinsean
That's absolutely insane. Never heard of that before. I would surely go mad
being in an airplane for that long.

------
tadruj
They are still producing them because it's cheap due to "grandfathering" laws.

"grandfathering" means if you'd design an airplane like 172 today they
wouldn't meet the safety standards and you wouldn't be able to produce them,
but since they were designed back in the days, if they don't change the
design, they can still produce them.

[http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2014/06/14/unfit-f...](http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2014/06/14/unfit-
for-flight-part-3/10533813/)

I fly 172 regularly. It's a safe plane, but you have to know quite a bit about
engine and how it works to be really safe up in the sky. I had engine failure
on take-off with extremely well maintained plane. Starting the engine is a
pain in the ass for most civilians who don't understand 4 stroke engines.

Cessna 172 uses about 10 gallons of fuel per hour. That's quite a lot. I think
in 2017 there's better options out there.

~~~
NelsonMinar
Part of the grandfathering has to do with liability law:
[http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2013/02/odd-case-
liabi...](http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2013/02/odd-case-liability-
and-small-airplanes)

Small plane / general aviation design is a complete mess. Even the fancy new
172SPs are still using engines with 1950s manual spark plug timing.

~~~
sokoloff
Fixed spark timing is not that big an engineering deficit for an engine that
runs at a fairly constant power setting.

Road-going cars need variable spark timing because they are called upon to
efficiently make wildly varying amounts of power. (Idle, cruise, accelerate
are all part of the normal drive cycle.) Airplane engines, many racecars, and
other similar applications that need to produce fixed, high power for
prolonged periods of time often use fixed timing mechanisms.

------
csours
In the last 60 years, automobile engines have improved many times: for
instance, the 4.4 liter 8 cylinder engine powering the 1954 Pontiac
Chieftain[1] produced as much horsepower and torque as the 1.4 liter turbo in
my 2013 Chevy Sonic[2] - and it's not even a particularly good or modern
engine. (Disclaimer: I work for GM, I'm using these models because I'm
familiar with them)

Has the engine in the 172 been improved in that time period? The article says
it has not, but I can't imagine using 60 year old tech like that.

I understand that it is "proven" tech, but that would be like saying that
punch-cards are "proven" tech nowadays.

1\.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pontiac_Chieftain#First_Genera...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pontiac_Chieftain#First_Generation_.281949.E2.80.931954.29)

2\.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GM_Family_0_engine#Generation_...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GM_Family_0_engine#Generation_III)

~~~
dzeanah
> Has the engine in the 172 been improved in that time period? The article
> says it has not, but I can't imagine using 60 year old tech like that.

It's not the exact same engine, but it's the same technology - an air cooled
360 cubic inch horizontally opposed 4 cylinder engine. Magnetos provide spark,
and as far as I'm aware the fuel injection is mechanical.

"Modern" piston engines used in aviation are essentially 1950's technology.
They're surprisingly reliable for what they are, but innovation isn't really
happening in the piston world.

There was an interesting upgrade being worked on by a couple of guys in
Florida. It turns out that the engines in these planes have an expected
lifespan of 2,000 hours or so, and can't use gas with ethanol in it, and
replacement engines can cost in excess of $20,000; these guys worked on a way
to drop in a $5,000 Chevy Corvette engine and greatly increase fuel economy,
reduce noise, reduce vibration, and supposedly increase reliability. When they
asked the FAA to sign off on it as a replacement they were told that without
redundant spark plugs/spark sources it wouldn't be approved. This makes sense
when magnetos are expected to be rebuilt every 500 hours, but it killed the
Corvette engine replacement idea.

Regulation slows innovation. General Aviation proves it IMO.

~~~
FabHK
FWIW, I once had a faulty spark plug in one cylinder in a Cessna 172 in
Ondangwa, Namibia (and no, "burning it off" by running the engine lean on full
throttle didn't fix it). So, I flew back to maintenance in Windhoek on the
other spark plug, using IFR ("I follow roads") in case the other gave up
(which it didn't).

~~~
refurb
This comment reads like an intro for a very interesting book.

------
beloch
While it's "only" 52 years old, another plane still in production (albeit
under a new company) that's worthy of discussion is the de Havilland Canada
(now Viking) DHC-6 Twin Otter[1].

The Twin Otter isn't just nice to fly, cheap, or ubiquitous. It isn't just a
mainstay bush plane everywhere. It's still _the best_ plane in existence for
certain extreme requirements.

Many different planes can go deep into Antarctica during the summer, but when
somebody gets sick enough to warrant evacuation from Amundsen-Scott South Pole
Station in Antarctica in the middle of winter, as happened in 2016[2], the
DHC-6 is still the best plane for the job. In fact, two DHC-6's went because
the only plane capable of performing search and rescue for the first was
another DHC-6. There simply aren't other planes out there that can land on a
short, frozen runway in the dark of an Antarctic Winter when temperatures are
so cold that fuel turns into jelly[3].

Viking has been modernizing many aspects of the Twin Otter, but they're still
making Twin Otters. The Twin Otter is 52 years old and still does things no
other plane can.

[1][http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/kenn-borek-air-
south-p...](http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/kenn-borek-air-south-pole-
june-22-1.3646966)

[2][http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/kenn-borek-air-
south-p...](http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/kenn-borek-air-south-pole-
june-22-1.3646966)

[3][https://fearoflanding.com/misc/twin-otter-emergency-
winter-f...](https://fearoflanding.com/misc/twin-otter-emergency-winter-
flight-to-the-south-pole/)

------
batoure
I think this article is a little miss leading. I did most of my initial flight
training in a 172 I bought with a friend. We had it parked in Tucson near a
company that was building custom planes and blazing the trail in glass cockpit
design. After a couple years I had built friendships with a number of people
there and built the following picture of the industry:

Innovation in private aviation is so small that it's dead, this isn't because
someone owns the market but because FAA certification of new technologies is a
15 year not like 20 to 25 year process.

Why? You ask?

Starting in the 70s and into the early 80s there were a number of high profile
crashes of private planes. Think Woz, a number of these crashes were due to
pilot error, but a number of them became civil lawsuits where the operational
complexity of the aircraft was blamed. The FAA was called upon to develope
stricter standards which put many private aviation companies out of business.
Cessna survived but based on the high price of getting new tech certified
which lowers competition there is a way lower incentive for them to change the
design.

Many of the parts in the engine of my 172 were OE ford parts found on cars in
the 60s but the FAA certified stamp meant we would have to buy the 300 dollar
version.

TL;DR: the enduring success of the Cessna 150-180 is actually a tradgedy of
blocked innovation and not something to be proud of.

~~~
sokoloff
> Many of the parts in the engine of my 172 were OE ford parts found on cars
> in the 60s but the FAA certified stamp meant we would have to buy the 300
> dollar version.

Here's an interesting tidbit. The voltage regulator for the 14V 172 and 182
was literally made on a parts line that also supplied Ford. For quality
control reasons, Ford required statistical inspection of voltage regulators
destined for Ford. Cessna required 100% inspection. Because they were made on
the same line, a set number got the inspection, some of the inspected parts
got Cessna part numbers and FAA PMA stamps, and as a result, Ford was also
assured their voltage regulators were OK even though a smaller percentage of
those eventually sold by Ford were inspected.

~~~
batoure
I have heard similar stories, I have also often heard the rumor that its
really important to check out the ford parts in the engine of any Cessna you
are looking at buying because some mechanics will sneak in the vehicle OE
parts when working on their own restoration projects. Which can then get
expensive the next time you do 100 hour inspection with an above board
mechanic.

------
Animats
There are a lot of 1950s and 1960s aircraft designs still flying. That was
when smart people went into aircraft design, and it was the most productive
period in aircraft design history, as everything went jet-powered. The B-52,
the B-737, the B-747, the SR-71, and the Concorde are all from that period.
(So are a lot of duds, of interest only to aviation historians.)

Ben Rich, former head of the Lockheed Skunk Works, once remarked that he'd
worked on 30-some aircraft in his career, but today's engineer will be lucky
to work on one.

~~~
nether
I worked on six aircraft by my mid-20s, if you count internships. I'm 31 now.
Rich was more referring to sprawling military programs with legislative
delays. You can change programs within a company, or change companies.

Also, you're kidding yourself if you think any a/c from the '50s is flying
with all original parts. Like any machine, it can run indefinitely as long as
you replace components. At my first company out of college, we were updating
aircraft put into service in the '60s. We did new engineering to redesign
parts, for example replacing an assembly of three primary components with a
single CNC machined piece of aluminum. It just was not possible to fabricate
the geometry with tools of that era. The new assy was simpler and stronger.
Advances and upkeep like these are what keep old machines flying.

~~~
drawnwren
Not only would it be highly improbable, it would be highly illegal. The FAA
mandates inspections and part replacements/engine rebuilds at certain hour
intervals.

That said, here's a C130 that flew for 52 years:
[http://foxtrotalpha.jalopnik.com/usafs-
oldest-c-130-hercules...](http://foxtrotalpha.jalopnik.com/usafs-
oldest-c-130-hercules-iron-horse-has-been-sent-1689811797)

~~~
debergalis
Engine manufacturers typically specify a TBO -- Time Before Overhaul, which is
the number of hours in service an engine can run before it needs to be torn
down, inspected, and overhauled according to the manufacturer's procedure.

For the most part, commercial operators must adhere to these recommended
times, but aircraft operated under FAR Part 91 (roughly, those that aren't
used for commercial transportation) aren't required to follow the TBO
recommendation. You can run it as long as you want.

In practice, most operators do follow those guidelines. I've never heard of
any engine doing much more than 2x the TBO before requiring major overhaul.
And you'll often need various repairs to cylinders and engine accessories
along the way.

Interestingly, manufacturers also specify calendar time limits on TBO, but
private operators commonly ignore these. Lots of airplanes only fly 25 hours
or so a year.

------
clueless123
Wrong! The title should read : Regulations so strict, 60 years of advances in
technology can't make it to the market place.

To see what we are missing, Just take a look at experimental aviation which is
not as heavily regulated..

*I did most of my basic training on a 172 and I love them like I love a favorite old pair of shoes.

------
cyberferret
The Cessna 172/182 types are fine aircraft, but I really would have loved to
have seen some more innovation over the years.

When I was a student pilot, we did our first handful of familiarisation and
evaluation flights in a 172. The instrument panel looked like someone had cut
holes in an ironing board and stuck dials in it. The seats were no more than a
2 piece metal bench that someone had stuck thin cushions to, and the seatbelts
would have looked at home in a 1940's car.

Then we transitioned to the SOCATA TB-10 Tobago for the rest of our training.
It was like switching from a Russian built car to a Lamborghini. The
instrument panel was ergonomic, recessed for shade, and the engine instruments
were actually canted to face the pilot. We had Recaro racing seats in the
aircraft which made long navex's more bearable. Inertia reel seatbelts. Gull
wing doors that helped cool the aircraft quicker after sitting on a hot tarmac
all day. Throttle controls that looked like a jet fighter instead of pull
knobs.

The European design was simply leagues ahead, and made the flying experience
so much better. I am thinking a major reason for the longevity of the Cessna
training line is more to do with cost for budget conscious training schools,
rather than being a better aircraft than any other trainer.

~~~
debergalis
> I am thinking a major reason for the longevity of the Cessna training line
> is more to do with cost for budget conscious training schools, rather than
> being a better aircraft that any other trainer.

Yeah, budget and familiarity. I doubt Cessna is selling many 172s to anything
other than flight schools.

~~~
btgeekboy
Your average flight school doesn't buy new 172s. Suckers with a lot of money
do. (A new 172 costs over $350k last I checked. One a few years old can go for
half.)

What flight schools do buy are the 172P, N and M, in that order. A low time
172P, being the last made before production stopped in the 1980s, commands a
premium.

------
jcutrell
My dad owns and maintains a 1962 Cessna 182.

For those keeping count, that's a 55-year-old bird. Flies like a dream. In
fact, we flew it last night. Recently put in a brand new engine. We'll be
upgrading avionics soon enough, too.

I got my pilot's license this year, and hope to continue the tradition of
flying my family in the plane.

Take care of stuff and it can last a long time.

------
tim333
>The 172 was based on an earlier Cessna design called the 150. This looked
very similar apart from the fact it was a “taildragger”

I think they've got their Cessnas in a muddle. The 140 was a taildragger. I
learnt to fly in a 150 which definitely had a wheel at the front.

~~~
a3n
Wikipedia lists the 172 as a variant of the 170, a tail dragger.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cessna_170](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cessna_170)

My first skydive (static line), and many after that, was from a 170.

~~~
paulmd
But I bet it wasn't as exciting as this one.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kQ6g_TcevCE](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kQ6g_TcevCE)

unedited/better video:
[https://youtu.be/7p6hqMnsLFY?t=81](https://youtu.be/7p6hqMnsLFY?t=81)

(As a pilot: that one was a super pisser, the upper Cessna flew into the lower
one and punctured the wing, rolling it over his engine, nothing the lower guy
could have done. Thankfully the lower guy was wearing his seat chute (required
on these kind of ops) and the upper guy (who _wasn 't_ wearing his required
seat chute) managed to survive)

------
geff82
The 172 simply has some advantages even after all those years. First, it is
known everywhere (also its quirks, which makes is safer). Second, the high
wing makes it perfect for the young pilot to fly. And third, it has space! I,
at 1.87 meter length, can sit comfortably in its back with some spare headroom
remaining. I can't tell this of many other aircraft in a similar segment.

------
TheSpiceIsLife
_One answer comes from the fact that the Cessna 172 is a high-wing monoplane –
meaning the wings sit high above the cockpit. This is very useful for student
pilots because it gives them a better view of the ground and makes the
aircraft much easier to land._

I had to think for a moment what a _monoplane_ is. It's not a biplane.

Anyway, the high-wing design also causes the plane to fly level with regard to
it's roll angle if you take your hands off the controls, due to the center of
gravity being below the wings.

~~~
danielvf
Low wing aircraft will do that too. It's a matter of dihedral - the upward
slope of the wings on most civilian aircraft.

~~~
skookumchuck
The dihedral works because a wing angled upwards produces less lift than one
parallel to the ground.

~~~
clon
This is a completely inaccurate statement. The lift produce by both wings
remains unchanged regardless of the roll angle. It is defined in terms of
relative airflow over the wings, being always perpendicular to the former.
Lift is NOT (usefully) defined relative to terra firma, a common
misconception.

So in the relative frame of the aircraft itself, the lift vector is unchanged
in terms of the machine itself. Rolling the aircraft rotates the lift vector,
causing a larger "sideways" component and reducing the "vertical" component.
For example, at 45 degrees bank the load factor is, in fact, 1.41, meaning
that the wings ought to produce 1.41 times the lift to maintain altitude.

So the real reason why a dihedral tends to "auto-correct" the bank angle is
that if you rotate the airplane into a bank without adding power then you
really are not going to maintain your altitude against gravitational
acceleration and are going to descend through the airmass. Now, given that
your airplane is now at a 45 degrees angle relative to the source of
gravitational attraction, the aircraft is going to see (from it's vantage
point) some"sideways" airflow over the wings. Imagine an airflow component
originating from the tip of the wing, towards the fuselage.

What now happens is that the "falling" wing is going to work much more
efficiently because a number of reasons, causing the aircraft to experience an
aerodynamically stabilizing force.

The easiest way to see is that if you imagine a V-shape object moving sideways
(let's imagine from right to left), the \ part of the V is going to deflect
airflow and produce some "sideways lift" while the / part will not exhibit
such a phenomena.

But in terms of the 172, it's high-wing configuration actually does not
require dihedral because the actual fuselage of the aircraft "shadows" the
high wing, making in naturally less efficient at producing lift, thereby again
correcting the bank angle.

Airplane designers attempt to balance this out so that the final design not
only is statically stable (correcting in the right direction) but also
dynamically stable (the oscillations should be self-limiting).

~~~
skookumchuck
Yes, your explanation is much better than mine.

------
vanattab
Another great plane that has stood the test of time and is worth mentioning is
the B-52. Over 60 years old and still being used extensively. One particular
B-52 was piloted by a grandfather, father and finally son. What's more the
B-52's are scheduled to keep flying until at least 2045 making a total
lifecycle of 90 years!!

------
woodandsteel
I think part of the reason we don't see new designs is they wouldn't be that
much better. Often a technology advances rapidly, then hits a plateau where
future improvements are just modest.

Think of jet planes, where everything since the 707 has just been a
modification. That is why 50's and 60's planes like the b-52 and the a-10 are
still flying. Or space rockets, where we are still just duplicating
performance from the 60's (but with SpaceX we finally have something new).

Piston planes advanced very rapidly starting with the Wright brothers, but
then hit the plateau in the 50's, and the next step up, jets, is just too
expensive for most private pilots. Yes, it is possible to produce better small
piston planes, but the sales are too small to justify the needed investment.
Maybe electric planes will finally get us something new and better.

~~~
scott_karana
I think we'll need revolutionary batteries before we can have "revolutionary"
electric planes... ;-)

------
OliverJones
Airplaneheads often gripe that mass-media stories always glorify airframes and
ignore powerplants. This story deserves that gripe. The story is actually
about Cessna and Lycoming.

The Skyhawk airframe makes the machine easy to fly and land.

The Lycoming engine makes unplanned landings very rare.

Both are very important!

It really is an amazing airplane. In really cold weather in a 40 knot headwind
I've gotten negative groundspeed in stable flight.

It takes real work to stall the airframe, and it recovers immediately if you
let go of the controls.

------
jcutrell
I really wish this could get locked in:

[http://imgur.com/RlwJN2f](http://imgur.com/RlwJN2f)

------
ryanmarsh
How long till someone starts turning these into (relatively) cheap drones
bombers? This is a proven aircraft, add bomb bay doors and a rack and release
mechanism for 120mm mortar rounds. Instant 3rd world long range bomber,
perfect for the warlord with a dirt strip and a mechanic. Airpower for the
cost of ~10 technicals.

~~~
wbl
Already happened in Biafra. But AA guns like ZU-3 are around and will do the
job.

~~~
ryanmarsh
I immediately thought "just fly higher" and then I was like "wait we've done
this before...".

------
gordon_freeman
Another good piece on 172 here:
[http://www.flyingmag.com/aircraft/pistons/cessna-172-skyhawk...](http://www.flyingmag.com/aircraft/pistons/cessna-172-skyhawks-
reborn)

------
tyingq
Any idea what the longest serving aircraft is? I believe there are still a
small number of B52's in place, and they were rolled out in 1952. That's 65
years.

~~~
hollerith
there are prol a few C-47s built during WWII still carrying passengers in
3d-world countries.

all the B-52s still in service are B-52Hs and deliveries of the H didn't start
till 1961.

~~~
tyingq
Hmm, okay. The article doesn't seem to make any distinction on the various 172
submodels.

------
partycoder
flightgear (free/opensource flight simulator) has it.

To get it started, press the engine primer 3 times, put mixture all the way
in, throttle to 20% (+ throttle = 9, - throttle = 3), and turn the key twice
(type "}}"), start it (s key), remove the parking brake (shift+B key). Then
start increasing the throttle and when the airspeed indicator shows about 50
knots, go up by pressing the down key to take off.

Do not try in an actual plane.

