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Kind of needs a caveat: ... for engines not designed to safely operate with other fuels. I.e. it's not that we need Avgas 100LL to make piston-engined planes po

by detaro 5y ago

Kind of needs a caveat: ... for engines not designed to safely operate with other fuels. I.e. it's not that we need Avgas 100LL to make piston-engined planes possible, we just have a lot of plane engines around that need it. (and one can argue that industry has sat on the problem a bit, because why change as long as 100LL is readily available. (and making 100% compatible fuel replacements indeed appears to be difficult, as far as I know there is only one that has any kind of permits for one plane type, and that also has somewhat nasty additives - so changing the engines is the thing to do)

NordSteve 5y ago
Last summer GAMA received a supplemental type certificate for a 100LL replacement, called G100UL. The STC covers certain Lycoming O-320, O-360, and IO-360 piston engines, which are commonly used in light aircraft. https://www.aopa.org/news-and-media/all-news/2021/july/27/gami-receives-unleaded-avgas-stc https://www.aopa.org/news-and-media/all-news/2021/july/27/ga...
- jzawodn 5y ago
  s/GAMA/GAMI/
citizenpaul 5y ago
Its almost entirely small hobby planes 2-4 passenger. Almost none of those planes have any real reason to still exist. Its basically rich or upper middle people that don't care they are literally poisoning people while they tool around with their hobby.
- jaywalk 5y ago
  >Almost none of those planes have any real reason to still exist. I hope someone comes along and shits on your hobby, too. It has no real reason to exist, who cares that it provides you enjoyment?
  - wbsss4412 5y ago
    Thank you. I myself enjoy hunting humans, as they are the most dangerous of game. Yet I am constantly accosted at my dinner parties, it’s truly intolerable. I don’t see where these people get the nerve to act so holier than thou. We all have our vices. (/s, obviously)
  - andrepd 5y ago
    My gardening hobby does not involve poisoning my neighbour's children. Might be a tad different, pal.
- throckmortra 5y ago
  How is avgas poisoning people?
  - throwaway946513 5y ago
    via the leaded gasoline it uses. Same as how leaded gasoline in cars poisoned people. Same premise, different vehicle.
    - throckmortra 5y ago
      From the exhaust or skin contact?
      - citizenpaul 5y ago
        Both. Though I am not sure but I think you have to ingest it but having it invisibly sprayed all over your skin makes that very much likely.
- jimmyswimmy 5y ago
  You're not entirely wrong. Aviation is a hobby that is difficult to engage in if you don't have money. But flying those same planes is exactly where your commercial pilots are trained. It takes 1500 flight hours (certainly this number is wrong but too lazy to look up the current ATP minimum) to be eligible for the license to fly passengers on commercial airlines. A substation portion of those hours are as paid instructors.
  - citizenpaul 5y ago
    Interesting. So basically the large airlines are skirting the poisoning issue by essentially passing it off to tiny training companies? Kind of like how we "recycle" our electronics by shipping them to a poor country.
- Thetawaves 5y ago
  Small single engine planes == hobby? No. The vast majority of the hours flown in these planes are for commercial purposes. If you are going to focus your ire anywhere - it should be on these money making enterprises that don't (have to) upgrade their infrastructure.
- anonfornoreason 5y ago
  The negative externalities of your passions, your work, your hobbies, your personal life are currently poisoning thousands of people. You are currently typing on a computer built with rare earth elements mined in poor countries with slave labor. You probably eat shrimp on occasion, literally harvested by people forced into literal slavery, trapped on a boat. You likely enjoy looking at and thinking about crypto, which is currently mined with massive amounts of compute powered by coal plants, which emit far more toxic byproducts than any amount of general aviation. No one is a saint. Regulating away all the hobbies out there to minimize the impact would probably result in some sort of violent revolution, if it could even be done.
  - citizenpaul 5y ago
    I get your point and mostly agree. However you would struggle heavily to find even one thing that 99.999% of people do that remotely compares to literally flying in the air spraying lead poison over hundreds of miles and thousands or tens of thousands of people, animals, plants that are in your way. Its like saying lets just make all bombs nuclear cause they kill people either way. One of these things is much, much worse and can be addressed but of course will not 100% solve the problem.
jandrese 5y ago
The blame lies at least partially on Lycoming, who developed a nice engine in the 60s and then apparently fired their R&D department. This is a little unfair, but only very little. The engines are primitive by modern standards because the company is wildly conservative in their design philosophy. The engines are quite reliable if run within their design envelope and maintained according to the manual, but it requires considerably more maintenance per operation hour than a modern car engine and most modern car engines are even more reliable when properly maintained.
- MaxBarraclough 5y ago
  Some Lycoming engines run fine on the right unleaded fuel. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avgas#UL94_(formerly_94UL) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avgas#UL94_(formerly_94UL)

by detaro 5y ago

NordSteve 5y ago

Last summer GAMA received a supplemental type certificate for a 100LL replacement, called G100UL. The STC covers certain Lycoming O-320, O-360, and IO-360 piston engines, which are commonly used in light aircraft. https://www.aopa.org/news-and-media/all-news/2021/july/27/gami-receives-unleaded-avgas-stc https://www.aopa.org/news-and-media/all-news/2021/july/27/ga...

jzawodn 5y ago
s/GAMA/GAMI/

citizenpaul 5y ago

Its almost entirely small hobby planes 2-4 passenger. Almost none of those planes have any real reason to still exist. Its basically rich or upper middle people that don't care they are literally poisoning people while they tool around with their hobby.

jaywalk 5y ago
>Almost none of those planes have any real reason to still exist. I hope someone comes along and shits on your hobby, too. It has no real reason to exist, who cares that it provides you enjoyment?
- wbsss4412 5y ago
  Thank you. I myself enjoy hunting humans, as they are the most dangerous of game. Yet I am constantly accosted at my dinner parties, it’s truly intolerable. I don’t see where these people get the nerve to act so holier than thou. We all have our vices. (/s, obviously)
- andrepd 5y ago
  My gardening hobby does not involve poisoning my neighbour's children. Might be a tad different, pal.
throckmortra 5y ago
How is avgas poisoning people?
- throwaway946513 5y ago
  via the leaded gasoline it uses. Same as how leaded gasoline in cars poisoned people. Same premise, different vehicle.
  - throckmortra 5y ago
    From the exhaust or skin contact?
    - citizenpaul 5y ago
      Both. Though I am not sure but I think you have to ingest it but having it invisibly sprayed all over your skin makes that very much likely.
jimmyswimmy 5y ago
You're not entirely wrong. Aviation is a hobby that is difficult to engage in if you don't have money. But flying those same planes is exactly where your commercial pilots are trained. It takes 1500 flight hours (certainly this number is wrong but too lazy to look up the current ATP minimum) to be eligible for the license to fly passengers on commercial airlines. A substation portion of those hours are as paid instructors.
- citizenpaul 5y ago
  Interesting. So basically the large airlines are skirting the poisoning issue by essentially passing it off to tiny training companies? Kind of like how we "recycle" our electronics by shipping them to a poor country.
Thetawaves 5y ago
Small single engine planes == hobby? No. The vast majority of the hours flown in these planes are for commercial purposes. If you are going to focus your ire anywhere - it should be on these money making enterprises that don't (have to) upgrade their infrastructure.
anonfornoreason 5y ago
The negative externalities of your passions, your work, your hobbies, your personal life are currently poisoning thousands of people. You are currently typing on a computer built with rare earth elements mined in poor countries with slave labor. You probably eat shrimp on occasion, literally harvested by people forced into literal slavery, trapped on a boat. You likely enjoy looking at and thinking about crypto, which is currently mined with massive amounts of compute powered by coal plants, which emit far more toxic byproducts than any amount of general aviation. No one is a saint. Regulating away all the hobbies out there to minimize the impact would probably result in some sort of violent revolution, if it could even be done.
- citizenpaul 5y ago
  I get your point and mostly agree. However you would struggle heavily to find even one thing that 99.999% of people do that remotely compares to literally flying in the air spraying lead poison over hundreds of miles and thousands or tens of thousands of people, animals, plants that are in your way. Its like saying lets just make all bombs nuclear cause they kill people either way. One of these things is much, much worse and can be addressed but of course will not 100% solve the problem.

jandrese 5y ago

The blame lies at least partially on Lycoming, who developed a nice engine in the 60s and then apparently fired their R&D department. This is a little unfair, but only very little. The engines are primitive by modern standards because the company is wildly conservative in their design philosophy. The engines are quite reliable if run within their design envelope and maintained according to the manual, but it requires considerably more maintenance per operation hour than a modern car engine and most modern car engines are even more reliable when properly maintained.

MaxBarraclough 5y ago
Some Lycoming engines run fine on the right unleaded fuel. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avgas#UL94_(formerly_94UL) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avgas#UL94_(formerly_94UL)