Sport Pilot Talk

Hi everyone,

I'm interested in conducting a survey from the owners of various light sport aircraft in regards to the ease or difficulty (or if there's a fee) in getting a LOA (letter of authorization) from your manufacturer. This is for simple changes to say avionics, AOA or other hardware you might want to install or upgrade on your LSA. I'm not talking MAJOR changes to your aircraft just minor upgrades or different avionics per se.

I'm putting a spreadsheet together of the various manufacturers and will be speaking to many of them this week in Sebring. I'd like your input as to what you, the customer, experienced while requesting a LOA.

I dont need to know what the LOA was for or how the process works for your particular manufacturer, this is really irrelevant to my study.

I'm really interested in the following:

1. LSA manufacturer
2. Average wait time for LOA
3. Was there a fee? (yes, I've heard some charge a fee)
4. Does your manufacturer have an AEL? (approved equipment list where a LOA is not required)
5. Rate the scale of difficulty for your experience getting a LOA, 1-10, 1 being very easy and 10 being extremely difficult

You can post here or send me a private message if you like.

Thanks in advance for your input.

Shawn

Flight Design
Request have been received promptly
Yes there was a fee
No
1

Tecnam
Have only done one for a Tanis preheater install, but it was like pulling teeth.
Yes, there was a fee
Not sure
7

3Dreaming wrote:Flight Design
Request have been received promptly
Yes there was a fee
No
1

Tecnam
Have only done one for a Tanis preheater install, but it was like pulling teeth.
Yes, there was a fee
Not sure
7

Awesome, thank you for the input. This is exactly what I'm looking for.

Evektor SportStars (2 of them) over past decade
Half a dozen LoAs each
Just a few days wait
No charge until last year - recently, a modest fee.
Factory has been VERY responsive, cooperative, helpful

drseti wrote:Evektor SportStars (2 of them) over past decade
Half a dozen LoAs each
Just a few days wait
No charge until last year - recently, a modest fee.
Factory has been VERY responsive, cooperative, helpful

Thanks very much Paul, does Evektor have an approved equipment list for it's aircraft?

Shawn

Not that I've seen, Shawn.

drseti wrote:Not that I've seen, Shawn.

Thanks, I'll make a note of that in my spreadsheet.

I'm unaware the full details of the Tecnam LOA 3Dreaming mentioned above, but since Tecnam came to the USA on their own accord reasonable LOAs have been prompt and easily accessible.

If anyone has an issue with a Tecnam LOA please contact me at: 507-600-0003

Thanks!

Mark

Mark Gregor wrote:I'm unaware the full details of the Tecnam LOA 3Dreaming mentioned above, but since Tecnam came to the USA on their own accord reasonable LOAs have been prompt and easily accessible.

If anyone has an issue with a Tecnam LOA please contact me at: 507-600-0003

Thanks!

Mark

I can vouch for Mark. He got the ball rolling on the LOA I mentioned. If it hadn't been for him who knows how long it might have taken. As it was, it to 4 weeks to get an approval to install a Tanis pre heater.

Hey - just a suggestion.

To make it easier for the person giving responses, and to make it much easier for you analyze the data, put the survey into the free version of "Survey Monkey". A simple survey like this should fit right in - you get up to 10 questions on the free version.

You can get a web link that you can give to people to access. You can also have it run on a tablet, so if you want to do a survey "in person", you can simply record their answers on your tablet while they give you their answers.

https://www.surveymonkey.com/pricing/

I do this for a living. If you want some help or other "unsolicited advice" (LOL), lmk. THANKS!

WDD wrote:Hey - just a suggestion.

To make it easier for the person giving responses, and to make it much easier for you analyze the data, put the survey into the free version of "Survey Monkey". A simple survey like this should fit right in - you get up to 10 questions on the free version.

Thanks for the info, this could be useful in the future.

And thanks to everyone who replied here in the open forum and sent me private messages. I had a great response and collected a lot of data for my research.

Feel free to still respond if you haven't already.

Not sure how this fits the survey:

I once asked Legend Cub if they'd issue a LOA for a project AL-3 I was going to take on.

They said "We'll never issue a LOA for that. The only way that stays S-SLA is if we get it on our factory jig. We recommend you move it to E-LSA."

1. LSA manufacturer
Evektor (Sportstar Max)

2. Average wait time for LOA
Pretty quick once we settled on what we were doing.

3. Was there a fee? (yes, I've heard some charge a fee)
Yes 50 Euros!!

4. Does your manufacturer have an AEL? (approved equipment list where a LOA is not required)
Not that I know of. In fact, they were pretty happy to use whatever avionics I liked.

5. Rate the scale of difficulty for your experience getting a LOA, 1-10, 1 being very easy and 10 being extremely difficult
Easy - BUT - the LOA pretty much was a waste of time, in my opinion. It states that Evektor will not take any responsibility and will not guarantee anything. It was basically a letter stating "Thanks for letting us know" LOL!

jfleming wrote:1. LSA manufacturer
Evektor (Sportstar Max)

2. Average wait time for LOA
Pretty quick once we settled on what we were doing.

3. Was there a fee? (yes, I've heard some charge a fee)
Yes 50 Euros!!

4. Does your manufacturer have an AEL? (approved equipment list where a LOA is not required)
Not that I know of. In fact, they were pretty happy to use whatever avionics I liked.

5. Rate the scale of difficulty for your experience getting a LOA, 1-10, 1 being very easy and 10 being extremely difficult
Easy - BUT - the LOA pretty much was a waste of time, in my opinion. It states that Evektor will not take any responsibility and will not guarantee anything. It was basically a letter stating "Thanks for letting us know" LOL!

Thanks for the info jfleming. As far as the factory taking responsibility, I dont see why that would matter or why they should if YOU made the change. At least you were able to change what you wanted with their approval. That alone is worth a pot of gold.

My manufacturer, Czech Sport Aircraft, won't even issue a LOA, for anything. I started this small survey just before the Sebring show and have a list of 25 different LSA manufacturers that I've gathered or who were at the Sebring show and currently Czech Sport Aircraft is at the bottom of the list.

I was basically forced to go E-LSA to upgrade old and discontinued avionics in my 2007 SportCruiser. But dont feel bad for me, it was the best $400 I ever spent on my plane. I have made several changes and upgrades to improve the safety of my plane and lessen my workload as the pilot and couldn't be happier.

hook_dupin wrote:Not sure how this fits the survey:

I once asked Legend Cub if they'd issue a LOA for a project AL-3 I was going to take on.

They said "We'll never issue a LOA for that. The only way that stays S-SLA is if we get it on our factory jig. We recommend you move it to E-LSA."

If the plane needed to go into a jig then I fear that this "project" was a bit more than a simple change or avionics upgrade that one would need a LOA for.