3 ms·

Serious question from someone who knows very little about planes. Do they seriously still have new carbuereuted planes? I can understand if it's a Cessna from

Serious question from someone who knows very little about planes. Do they seriously still have new carbuereuted planes? I can understand if it's a Cessna from the 50's, 60's, 70's, but I'm surprised they haven't been converted to EFI just from an efficiency and reliability stand point. Does that have to do with all the certification required for aircraft? (ie, if you change the engine, the aircraft has to go through another inspection by the FAA or whomever?)

Merad 10y ago
The problem in general aviation is the cost. As the article mentions, even a simple Cessna purchased new costs as much as a house. The result is that there are a LOT of planes flying that date back to the 1940s, 50s and 60s.
sokoloff 10y ago
Most of the injection systems on piston aircraft are mechanical injection, not EFI, for reliability reasons. EFI with closed-loop lambda control for street cars makes sense because of the widely varied load that a street car has to do and the need to keep the mixture in a close range to keep the catalytic convertor working well under these varied conditions. An airplane engine has a far more steady-state load condition. As a result, fixed ignition timing and mechanical fuel injection with manual mixture control is "good enough" and very simple/reliable. Likewise for carbs and carb heat on the O- engines. It works and works very well. There is a process for modifying certified aircraft. STC (Supplemental Type Certificate) is the primary means for changing engine configuration. It's some amount of work, but isn't prohibitive. (I have STC'd modifications on every airplane I've ever owned. It's not that big of a deal, if your modification has sound engineering basis.) Converting from a carb to fuel injection is possible, but many of those conversions involve installing a fuel header tank that the airframe didn't originally have. Sometimes this changes the fuel system for the worse (eliminating the "both" tank setting) and/or puts a header tank in a place to spray pressurized fuel into the cabin in the event of a forced landing. I looked into converting my 182 to an IO-550 (from an O-470) and that was unappealing to me. Instead, I upgraded to an O-520 (still carb'd, but larger displacement).
dingaling 10y ago
> Do they seriously still have new carbuereuted planes? Yes, and for example you can choose your new-from-the-factory Robinson R44 helicopter with either carb ( Raven I ) or injection ( II ). The former has slightly lower fuel consumption and longer engine life, the latter better performance.

Merad 10y ago

The problem in general aviation is the cost. As the article mentions, even a simple Cessna purchased new costs as much as a house. The result is that there are a LOT of planes flying that date back to the 1940s, 50s and 60s.

sokoloff 10y ago

Most of the injection systems on piston aircraft are mechanical injection, not EFI, for reliability reasons. EFI with closed-loop lambda control for street cars makes sense because of the widely varied load that a street car has to do and the need to keep the mixture in a close range to keep the catalytic convertor working well under these varied conditions. An airplane engine has a far more steady-state load condition. As a result, fixed ignition timing and mechanical fuel injection with manual mixture control is "good enough" and very simple/reliable. Likewise for carbs and carb heat on the O- engines. It works and works very well. There is a process for modifying certified aircraft. STC (Supplemental Type Certificate) is the primary means for changing engine configuration. It's some amount of work, but isn't prohibitive. (I have STC'd modifications on every airplane I've ever owned. It's not that big of a deal, if your modification has sound engineering basis.) Converting from a carb to fuel injection is possible, but many of those conversions involve installing a fuel header tank that the airframe didn't originally have. Sometimes this changes the fuel system for the worse (eliminating the "both" tank setting) and/or puts a header tank in a place to spray pressurized fuel into the cabin in the event of a forced landing. I looked into converting my 182 to an IO-550 (from an O-470) and that was unappealing to me. Instead, I upgraded to an O-520 (still carb'd, but larger displacement).

dingaling 10y ago

> Do they seriously still have new carbuereuted planes? Yes, and for example you can choose your new-from-the-factory Robinson R44 helicopter with either carb ( Raven I ) or injection ( II ). The former has slightly lower fuel consumption and longer engine life, the latter better performance.