CASA 292/14 - Conditions and direction about Jabiru engines

[facthunter]

I think they do perform well. The 230. easily 120 knots real cruise. A six cylinder motor is smooth too A sorted one will get you across Australia. Is there an easier airframe to look after? Don't think so.

 

Having said that I would probably prefer the Brumby high wing as a T/W. I would reckon it would be a bit slower and a bit less payload , and a bit more expensive, but I could be wrong. Nev

 

 

[dazza 38]

Brumby high wing for sale at Boonah , as new 13 hrs TT and $120,000cheers gareth

Its sold

 

 

[dlegg]

Was that the flying school one?

 

 

[Bruce Tuncks]

This weekend I flew over 1200km with my 500 hour Jabiru 2200 engine, a fair bit at low level looking for feral animals. The engine just purred as always, as it has for the past 14 years. And yes I tweaked the cooling, but the engines have all the tweaks I did built in these days.

 

At Bordertown I was told by a guy (who has obviously kept himself informed) that my engine would fail soon.

 

I'm old enough to remember how Australia was in panic after WW2 because the country couldn't build an engine, let alone an aero one. So the government orchestrated Holden cars and then others, to make us more self-reliant.

 

Now the government is doing the opposite. How can they justify this ? Maybe they want everybody to be on Newstart.

 

...Bruce

 

 

[Keenaviator]

This weekend I flew over 1200km with my 500 hour Jabiru 2200 engine, a fair bit at low level looking for feral animals. The engine just purred as always, as it has for the past 14 years. And yes I tweaked the cooling, but the engines have all the tweaks I did built in these days. At Bordertown I was told by a guy (who has obviously kept himself informed) that my engine would fail soon.

 

I'm old enough to remember how Australia was in panic after WW2 because the country couldn't build an engine, let alone an aero one. So the government orchestrated Holden cars and then others, to make us more self-reliant.

 

Now the government is doing the opposite. How can they justify this ? Maybe they want everybody to be on Newstart.

 

...Bruce

Your 2200 must be a similar vintage to mine Bruce. I too have tweaked the cooling, both air and oil. So far CHT has not exceeded 140c nor the oil 95c. Last Wednesday I did about 650 km in a day and it too purred like a kitten.

 

 

[fly_tornado]

Now the government is doing the opposite. How can they justify this ? Maybe they want everybody to be on Newstart....Bruce

Its the liberal party, they are killing off as many unionized workforces that they can find.

 

 

[turboplanner]

I'm old enough to remember how Australia was in panic after WW2 because the country couldn't build an engine, let alone an aero one. So the government orchestrated Holden cars and then others, to make us more self-reliant.Now the government is doing the opposite. How can they justify this ? Maybe they want everybody to be on Newstart.

...Bruce

The Australian government reacted to demands from the general public for cheaper overseas cars.

 

Gough Whitlam started it with the wishful thought that Australians should get off their backside and compete on the world market.

 

Senator Button set it on a course beyond any return with the Button Plan.

 

The problem with their line of thinking was that the Australian annual car volume was about a morning's work for any of the European, American or Japanese manufacturers, with similar critical mass issues for many other industries.

 

The woollen goods industries went first, lowering the incomes of sheep producers to near break even.

 

Food industries crashed.

 

The automotive industry took a long time to die, mainly because successive governments realised the horrible mistake which had been made, and tried to pump money into the industries, but this only made things worse. For example Holden had reached a point of building about 500 cars a day in Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne and Adelaide, providing benefits for thousands of families in those cities, but in the continuing effort to get competitive with the overseas manufacturers, shut down the old plants and built a single computer aided manufacturing line at Elizabeth in South Australia.

 

Even that has finally succumbed.

 

So yes, it was the government, but two governments several decades ago which produced the result you see now.

 

 

[fly_tornado]

yeah but the libs want to break every unionized workforce first, then remake the Australian economy in Cambodia's free market revolution.

 

 

[turboplanner]

I just corrected your last loony left statement FT, but I can't entertain myself all day with each new fantasy as it unfolds.

 

 

[gandalph]

This could be fun.....

 

 

[Old Koreelah]

...

Senator Button set it on a course beyond any return with the Button Plan.

 

The problem with their line of thinking was that the Australian annual car volume was about a morning's work for any of the European, American or Japanese manufacturers, with similar critical mass issues for many other industries...

All true Turbs, but I'm tired of hearing that horey old excuse about our small local market.

Sweden, with less than half our population (and NOT part of the EU) built two successful indigenous car brands; their armaments industry manufactured their own weapons systems, fighter planes, subs... and still had money left over for a high living standard.

 

 

[turboplanner]

All true Turbs, but I'm tired of hearing that horey old excuse about our small local market.Sweden, with less than half our population (and NOT part of the EU) built two successful indigenous car brands; their armaments industry manufactured their own weapons systems, fighter planes, subs... and still had money left over for a high living standard.

I haven't studied their economy, but I do know that Saab Scania went broke.

 

 

[Old Koreelah]

I haven't studied their economy, but I do know that Saab Scania went broke.

...but survived longer than many other car builders.

 

 

[gandalph]

but I do know that Saab Scania went broke.

As did Chrysler, Ford, General Motors, Fiat, BMC, Jaguar, Rolls Royce (car division) etc. etc. etc... Could the problem be more one of business management than scale of production?

Getting a bit off topic here - that's unusual!

 

 

[Jaba-who]

I haven't studied their economy, but I do know that Saab Scania went broke.

And their economies have been broke for decades but were kept afloat by incredible high tax rates till now the taxable population is dwindling and they are now heading toward broke as well.

And in the 1980s and 1990s their top marginal tax rate was 98% Yep 98 percent!!! So many of their high earners and willing workers left.

 

It was that sort of rubbish that kept the countries going till they ran out of people who will/can work.

 

 

[Oscar]

And precisely where is this political tribal warfare - entertaining though it may be to watch people parade their political prejudices - taking us in relation to the issues facing recreational-class aviation in Australia?

 

A rough estimate of the impact on employment suggests that the production of Jabiru aircraft and engines provides direct employment for in excess of 60 people in the Bundaberg region alone. Then add the FTF's, the L2s etc whose main income derives from the operation of Jabirus.

 

We never had a viable 'indigenous' motor vehicle manufacturer, unless you count Lightburn, Buckle Motors and Bolwell. None of those were exporters. References to the automobile sector are simply invalid (not to mention ingenuous) in relation to our aviation 'industry' - such as it is/was.

 

Jabiru is the most successful - by an exponential amount - of Australian aircraft manufacturers, and the ONLY Australian true aero-engine manufacturer. Jabiru is a world-recognised and highly-respected airframe manufacturer and the manufacturer of the second most populous engines in ultralight aviation after Rotax. Is anybody so simple that they don't notice that the two recent major competitors - UL Power and D-motor - engines have bolt-in mount spacing for Jabiru engine mounts?

 

When Rod Stiff and Phil Ainsworth embarked on their enterprise to create an Australian aircraft manufacturing company, they decided on a business model that has withstood the vagaries of changing circumstances. Their abiding principles were: that the product had to be commercially viable (we call it 'price-point' nowadays; when Rod and Phil started up as Jabiru, it probably had no definition other than a feeling of what the market could bear) and that it had to be as reasonably safe as possible.

 

By both counts, it is impossible to fault Rod and Phil's vision. The Jab. airframe is world-recognised as extremely safe - both in terms of its aerodynamic performance and its structural integrity. That story should be embellished with reference to two extremely competent (and world-recognised) engineers that Rod and Phil bought in as consultants; however that is detail.

 

Jab. airframes are manufactured in what is essentially a 'cottage industry' scenario made possible by the basic design philosophy: simple, relatively 'low-tech', undemanding of high-spec processes/equipment, yet capable of sustaining QC to the required standard for the product. That is why Jab airframes are cheap to repair - and extremely repairable (at very reasonable cost), to boot. Probably the most directly comparable aircraft to utilise such a manufacturing philosophy was the DH Mosquito.

 

Anybody want to postulate how many of Jabiru's subbies are/were Union members? Bidding starts at 0%

 

Jabiru airframes are low-tech products, reliable by design and suitable for the real manufacturing and operating environment. If you have a rough landing, maybe ding a wing l/e on a fence-post - it can usually be repaired by your local L2. Hell, fin replacements from overturns used to be done by Rod Stiff flying out to you, done on the beach, you fly it back home.. At a pinch, you can replace a Jab. fin using a hacksaw, a file, a piece of string for alignment purposes and some 'glass and resin. Try THAT with a c/f European plastic fantastic.

 

By comparison, the engine manufacturing carried out by CAMit is done in a high-tech factory that produces components equivalent to the best anywhere the world. Yet BOTH the airframe and the engines are produced basically by skilled tradespeople: there are no HR divisions, no PR units. Just people doing their jobs, skillfully and with care, pride and loyalty to both their employer and the end consumer. I've spent time in the CAMit factory, and unless they have done the same, I frankly won't entertain adverse comment from anybody who is relying on second-hand scuttlebutt for their opinions.

 

Reciting dogma derived from second-hand rumor spouted by disaffected persons who heard 'from someone', is not a basis for the communication of genuine information, it is the basis for a witch-hunt. See also: the Witch Trial in 'Monty Python and the Holy Grail'. Far too many electrons have been needlessly slaughtered on this site by those who have been turned into newts, but got better. Some, evidently, have not yet rehabilitated.

 

As for the overall picture of public safety from ANY Jabiru accident: at least as many people are reported to have died on the south-East Coast of Australia THIS WEEKEND from accidents in small fishing boats, as has happened in the entire history of Jabiru in this country. Jabiru accidents have produced precisely ZERO injuries or deaths to the 'general - (i.e. non-involved) public.

 

The 'which political party is/was worse in government' argument is a ludicrous diversion from the current question of the reasonableness, appropriateness and indeed effectiveness of the CASA action. That action is a real stab-in-the-heart to recreational aviation, generated by motives that have nothing to do with a reasonable response to a perceived problem.

 

In the simplest of terms (that have precisely zero influence from the personal agendas of those who have persistently attacked Jabiru): more recreational aviators die each year from bad pilot decisions, than from Jabiru engine failures.

 

 

If actually reducing fatalities/injuries from recreational aviation activity is the objective, then there are higher-priority targets than Jabiru engines. The question has to be asked is: are those who focus on Jabiru engine performance in the name of safety genuine, or are they beating their own drum?

 

 

[Jaba-who]

Oscar,

 

Well said.

 

 

[Derby]

Yes well said

 

 

[Roscoe]

Very well articulated Oscar!

 

 

[king_daniels]

Question quote Jabiru issues CASA: Two CASA staff who were involved in Jabiru limitations have resigned -

 

Does anyone know about this?

 

 

[facthunter]

Have you any details? It is a common way of fixing a mistake, or appearing to. Might be good news for Jabiru affected people. Nev

 

 

[Jaba-who]

I got an email ( with minutes of meeting ) from jabiru regarding the most recent meeting with CASA. Unfortunately it was a go nowhere meeting or at least set of minutes. Agreement to maintain good dialogue etc. No substance about whether the the instrument would be allowed to die or to be repeated etc.

 

I guess you could read between the lines and say if it was going to be repeated they might let it be known earlier so that there might be less complaint when it does. If it is going to be let die then they might hope to just quietly let it fade away and hope no one starts talking to lawyers.

 

But who knows.

 

 

[fly_tornado]

Question quote Jabiru issues CASA: Two CASA staff who were involved in Jabiru limitations have resigned -Does anyone know about this?

where the staff members named?

 

 

[jetjr]

Whilst quoting rumors

 

I heard that there was some CASA process coming to "document" each Jabiru engine, permitting some kind of fault tracking and identification when there is a problem.

 

Id assume limitations would be lifted once every SB, etc etc was implemented and recorded.

 

It was mentioned they would be "grounded" until compliant but that seems excessive considering only limited currently.

 

Just a story but from someone with good contacts

 

It does make some sense as a key finding is neither Jabiru nor many owners are aware of what parts, developments are in their engines. Even status of SB is poorly recorded. Let alone source or batches of parts within an engine.

 

 

[jetjr]

Might be good news for Jabiru affected people. Nev

If correct its good news to everyone in aviation - there are penalties for making poor decisions which impact heavily on industry.

Might make them think twice before trying the same on someone else.