There's an interesting dynamic here--we (the industry today) are more okay with flying rickety airplanes from the 70s before flying something built with more modern engineering and production techniques.
> As I understand it the idea here is to expand the market and spread certification costs out over more planes.
exactly.
> There are not enough people interested in a personal airplane at any price to support the costs to bring a new one in the air.
our thesis is that this isn't true. we've seen glimpses of this in the past 10 years that haven't been successful, but have shown that there is a wave of people who would get into GA if it were safer and more affordable. our mission to make it so, and the Airhart Sling is just the first step
> There's an interesting dynamic here--we (the industry today) are more okay with flying rickety airplanes from the 70s before flying something built with more modern engineering and production techniques.
Any insights on why that is? My gut feeling is that it’s some combination of cost (there’s still a huge glut of old and cheap planes that basically work fine) and skepticism towards new, less proven models and technologies (i.e. the perception of Cirrus changed very slowly over a decade plus to where now the chute is generally accepted to be a good thing to have).
I think there's definitely a "tried and true" and "if it aint broke don't fix it" mentality. Combine that with the fear of trying something new in the face of the FAA and regulatory barrier, many will say it's better to just take the risk on older stuff than make something new and better
> As I understand it the idea here is to expand the market and spread certification costs out over more planes.
exactly.
> There are not enough people interested in a personal airplane at any price to support the costs to bring a new one in the air.
our thesis is that this isn't true. we've seen glimpses of this in the past 10 years that haven't been successful, but have shown that there is a wave of people who would get into GA if it were safer and more affordable. our mission to make it so, and the Airhart Sling is just the first step