The Fighter Collection's Paperwork Woes...

[lmritger]

First off, thanks to all (especially Jim B) who've shed light on this issue. Being a complete and total n00b at understanding all this bureaucratic crap, I was intrigued that the only two TFC aircraft allowed to fly were the Sea Fury and Mustang, because they had US registrations.

Now, this might be the most obvious thing in the world, but couldn't the TFC simply set up a separate operation here in the US, register their aircraft here, and keep them in England under that sort of arrangement? Obviously there'd be significant costs involved in getting the A/C here to be inspected by the FAA and receive their US airworthiness certificates, but it would have to be less of a headache than dealing with the hidebound UK aviation authority.

Is that even feasible, or am I simply talking out of my hat?

Lynn

PS: I'm totally stealing "ADD Theater" for use later...

[Jim Beasley]

I think you can only have one aircraft based out of the country at a time. Someone?

First off, thanks to all (especially Jim B) who've shed light on this issue. Being a complete and total n00b at understanding all this bureaucratic crap, I was intrigued that the only two TFC aircraft allowed to fly were the Sea Fury and Mustang, because they had US registrations.

Now, this might be the most obvious thing in the world, but couldn't the TFC simply set up a separate operation here in the US, register their aircraft here, and keep them in England under that sort of arrangement? Obviously there'd be significant costs involved in getting the A/C here to be inspected by the FAA and receive their US airworthiness certificates, but it would have to be less of a headache than dealing with the hidebound UK aviation authority.

Is that even feasible, or am I simply talking out of my hat?

Lynn

PS: I'm totally stealing "ADD Theater" for use later...

[retroaviation]

I think you can only have one aircraft based out of the country at a time. Someone?

Hmmm, I dunno. I realize it's not England, but Red Bull has at least two airplanes registered in the U.S., while they're based in Austria.

Interesting topic here.

Gary

[Baldeagle]

Obviously there'd be significant costs involved in getting the A/C here to be inspected by the FAA and receive their US airworthiness certificates, but it would have to be less of a headache than dealing with the hidebound UK aviation authority.

Is that even feasible, or am I simply talking out of my hat?

Lynn

I don't think the aircraft would have to be brought to the US to be inspected, I believe they can be inspected anywhere in the world by an FAA approved civilian DAR Designated Airworthiness Rep who can issue an AW certificate. Anyone know for sure?




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[mustanglover]

Obviously there'd be significant costs involved in getting the A/C here to be inspected by the FAA and receive their US airworthiness certificates, but it would have to be less of a headache than dealing with the hidebound UK aviation authority.

Is that even feasible, or am I simply talking out of my hat?

Lynn

I don't think the aircraft would have to be brought to the US to be inspected, I believe they can be inspected anywhere in the world by an FAA approved civilian DAR Designated Airworthiness Rep who can issue an AW certificate. Anyone know for sure?




-

A DAR would not have to perform routine inspections. There are FAA Approved Repair Stations in Europe just as there are EASA approved repair Stations here in the states.

[retroaviation]

Nelson Ezell just goes to Austria to perform the annual inspections on Red Bull's P-38, B-25, etc., So I would imagine that just having an IA do it is all that is required. I dunno.

Gary

[Matt Gunsch]

It does not have to be a repair station that does the work, anyone with a A&P, or a IA can do it, even if the plane is in Europe.

To get a airworthiness cert would require a DAR to inspect and issue a cert, and depending on the plane, it would require a maint program that is overseen by a IA, again, all of this can be done while the plane is in Europe.

If the plane is a experimental, and does not require a maint program, any A&P can inspect and maintain the plane, anywhere it is.

The Brits are going overboard with part tracabilty, there have been large amounts of parts destroyed because the paperwork was not complete back to the maker of the part. We could face the same thing here. The FAA is getting all excited about tracabilty of parts, and in thier opinion, any part that was made under a MIL-Spec order, for use on a military plane, cannot be used on a type certificated aircraft.
There is 1 plane that has a Standard Airworthiness cert that has never had any parts made for it under a civilian production certificate, and all the parts are MIL-Spec surplus, and in the eyes of the FAA, cannot be used until they are inspected to verify that they meet the design specs for materials, and manufacturing, The only exception is if you removed a part from a plane that had flown under a type certificate, and then used it, the part now has tracabilty.

Oh the one plane that is using unapproved parts, is the T-6/SNJ. So anyone who installs surplus parts, that were in sealed NAA boxes, is using unapproved parts, unless you have the original drawings of that part to compare it to, then you are approving the part.

By the way, the above information is straight from the horses mouth, or in the case of the FAA, the horses exhaust pipe, from the guy that was writing the unapproved parts program, as told to me directly at a IA renewal gathering.

[Firebird]

First off, thanks to all (especially Jim B) who've shed light on this issue. Being a complete and total n00b at understanding all this bureaucratic crap, I was intrigued that the only two TFC aircraft allowed to fly were the Sea Fury and Mustang, because they had US registrations.

Now, this might be the most obvious thing in the world, but couldn't the TFC simply set up a separate operation here in the US, register their aircraft here, and keep them in England under that sort of arrangement? Obviously there'd be significant costs involved in getting the A/C here to be inspected by the FAA and receive their US airworthiness certificates, but it would have to be less of a headache than dealing with the hidebound UK aviation authority.

Is that even feasible, or am I simply talking out of my hat?

I seem to recall others far more knowledgable on this that the CAA only permit a limited time flown in the UK on an N-reg before the a/c has to be UK regd and then falling under the CAA regs.
I can't remember how long this is, but I seem to recall it being measured in months and therefore renders this idea as unworkable for a permanent situation in the UK.......otherwise everyone would already be doing it

[Bruce]

Indeed - ex military aircraft may be operated in the UK for a short time under the auspices of the FAA, before they have to be either returned to where they came from (as with some of the aircraft that have been temporarily imported for Legends), Grounded (as in the case of the Vimy replica) or transferred to the British register.

I am unaware of any case where large numbers of parts for historic aircraft have been destroyed in the UK, other than during routine scrapping operations as they reached the end of their service life.

Parts traceability is important in the case of any part that has a designed service life - in the case of most of the WW2 aircraft, I dont think this is an issue (yet!!)


Bruce

[mustanglover]

It does not have to be a repair station that does the work, anyone with a A&P, or a IA can do it, even if the plane is in Europe.

While I agree with you on that an A&P can perform the inspection, there are not alot of FAA A&Ps running around Europe, just as there are not alot of EASA certified mechanics running around here in the states.

The CAA in the UK becomes even worse as they are technically under EASA rules for certification, but they also have their own rules for certification and operation.

I deal with the UK, French and other European states on an almost daily basis concerning aircraft certification and operation and it is not fun figuring out what they want today, tomorrow and next week.

[Rossco]

Ok in general engineering terms if you substitute a part it has to be built to a standard.That is engineered by qualified engineers and built by qualified tradesman using material specified by those engineers to accepted drawings.They are signed off by qualified licenced aircraft engineers who tick off the right boxes to say the part is correct.
With new build parts they have to be built to the exactly same specs as per original or if not the original material you go better in strength in todays standards.If the original drawings don,t exist or specs you can use an original part and reverse engineer.If that doesn,t exist you must go back to basics....
Use an engineer,draw it up,test it,modify it then test it again.With todays software like Solidworks,ProEngineer and Catia parts can be designed by engineers and within the digital world dynamic and static loads can be applied.They can go into assemblies and tested digitally by said engineers before a ruler is set on the sheetmetal.
I wonder what Mr Mitchell or Mr Messerschmitt would say,or the guys at Boeing or Airbus.

[JDK]

Indeed - ex military aircraft may be operated in the UK for a short time under the auspices of the FAA,...

IIRC, certain British organisations had their aircraft on the US register but British based before this 'loophole' was closed off by the CAA some time ago.

Stephen Grey's aircraft, before and in the earliest days of TFC, were originally Swiss based, and certain UK warbird owners and organisations have certain paperwork registered offshore - such as on the Channel Islands for other - I expect financial - reasons.

However the CAA, as Bruce's pointed out are keen to stop this anomaly. Fair enough if the alternative certification is of a lower standard regarding safety, however there is no evidence that this is actually the criteria used - it appears to be not an examination of this, just the 'follow our rules or leave'.

As I said before, it appears to me that the CAA, for whatever reasons have successfully driven restoration projects overseas, removed the possibility of seeing certain types operate in the UK for anything more than limited periods and thus are ensuring that UK earnings from the UK workers in the warbird and vintage aero industry are going overseas.

While the NZ DH business is strong on it's own merits, some of the drive is that the aircraft can be restored and operated there - and it's just "too hard" (direct quote from a DH operator) to do so in the UK.

While Rich hasd rightly stated that the Permit system is the nearest equivalent to limited or experimental, it is not, as is clear and Rich stated - equal criteria - and it is based on a different set of assumptions.

There's no good reason the UK can't have a experimental or limited category created (it was done in Australia, also currently undertaking an experimental process with Australian Warbirds working with CASA - the Aussie CAA /FAA equivalent) - except pigs flying is simply more likely.

Regards,

[JDK]

...if not the original material you go better in strength in todays standards.If the original drawings don,t exist or specs you can use an original part and reverse engineer.If that doesn,t exist you must go back to basics...

Hence Jim's mention of the use of ceconite versus (I presume) madapolam. There's a sound principle being applied in ignorance.

I wonder what Mr Mitchell or Mr Messerschmitt would say...

"There's a war on?"

[51fixer]

Ok in general engineering terms if you substitute a part it has to be built to a standard.That is engineered by qualified engineers and built by qualified tradesman using material specified by those engineers to accepted drawings.They are signed off by qualified licenced aircraft engineers who tick off the right boxes to say the part is correct.
With new build parts they have to be built to the exactly same specs as per original or if not the original material you go better in strength in todays standards.If the original drawings don,t exist or specs you can use an original part and reverse engineer.If that doesn,t exist you must go back to basics....
Use an engineer,draw it up,test it,modify it then test it again.With todays software like Solidworks,ProEngineer and Catia parts can be designed by engineers and within the digital world dynamic and static loads can be applied.They can go into assemblies and tested digitally by said engineers before a ruler is set on the sheetmetal.
I wonder what Mr Mitchell or Mr Messerschmitt would say,or the guys at Boeing or Airbus.

As an A & P I can order up a piece of Alum of the same type and hardness as the original and make a new skin. I can rivet it on with the same type of fasteners or the modern day equivalents, I then make the logbook entries. This is what I would do in simple terms if I needed to replace a piece of skin on our Spitfire. I can Read the book and do the work.
The TFC has to write ops specs for how this same repair would be done and get them approved by the CAA. They will have to list the exact fasteners type size, type and mfg. They will have to spec the Alum alloy the same way. This would be submitted to the CAA which would argue over things and require you to make changes. You then submit the revisions and further argue over changes. Finally the ops spec for that skin replacement gets approved some months after originally submitted. Now you can actually do the work.
They seem to treat the Permit to Fly A/c no different than if a factory was building an Airliner and then the Airline was maintaining it.
Rich

[Jim Beasley]

Compound this with needing to wait 6 or more weeks for the CAA to schedule its next inspection (I'm not kidding about this either) and you can see why it takes so long to get anything done. The spar and ceconite thing on my 18 went on for way more than 6 months before I got fed up and put it in a box. It was ready to fly in May; Legends came and went with no movement, and we decided to ship it in November. I got it on Thanksgiving and we flew her -- after putting together, due inspection by the FAA, registration and certification -- on December 20. I even flew her today and she is beginning to like us.

IMHO something is amiss in the Empire and it rhymes with CAA.

Ok in general engineering terms if you substitute a part it has to be built to a standard.That is engineered by qualified engineers and built by qualified tradesman using material specified by those engineers to accepted drawings.They are signed off by qualified licenced aircraft engineers who tick off the right boxes to say the part is correct.
With new build parts they have to be built to the exactly same specs as per original or if not the original material you go better in strength in todays standards.If the original drawings don,t exist or specs you can use an original part and reverse engineer.If that doesn,t exist you must go back to basics....
Use an engineer,draw it up,test it,modify it then test it again.With todays software like Solidworks,ProEngineer and Catia parts can be designed by engineers and within the digital world dynamic and static loads can be applied.They can go into assemblies and tested digitally by said engineers before a ruler is set on the sheetmetal.
I wonder what Mr Mitchell or Mr Messerschmitt would say,or the guys at Boeing or Airbus.

As an A & P I can order up a piece of Alum of the same type and hardness as the original and make a new skin. I can rivet it on with the same type of fasteners or the modern day equivalents, I then make the logbook entries. This is what I would do in simple terms if I needed to replace a piece of skin on our Spitfire. I can Read the book and do the work.
The TFC has to write ops specs for how this same repair would be done and get them approved by the CAA. They will have to list the exact fasteners type size, type and mfg. They will have to spec the Alum alloy the same way. This would be submitted to the CAA which would argue over things and require you to make changes. You then submit the revisions and further argue over changes. Finally the ops spec for that skin replacement gets approved some months after originally submitted. Now you can actually do the work.
They seem to treat the Permit to Fly A/c no different than if a factory was building an Airliner and then the Airline was maintaining it.
Rich