The pros and cons of defecting to Group G.

[NT5224]

Hi folks

 

if the moderator  thinks this thread should be moved into the other Group G discussion, no worries. 
 

I’m the owner of a VH reg aircraft, flying from my own home airfield. The Lycoming Rebel has MTOW of 760kg which means it’s eligible for Group G.

 

Why should I be tempted to defect to Group G? What’s in it for me?

 

Is CASA looking to divest itself of light aircraft operations completely in future? Is this the thin end of a wedge?  What about aircraft rated for multiple passengers? 
 

I’m  trying to get a clear view of the pros and cons of switching, and would be particularly interested to hear from other GA pilots in a similar position. 

Now that RAAUS has confirmed Group G rego will be numbers not VH  letters I’m concerned about being relegated to second class citizen status by other traffic…😂

 

Cheers  

 

Alan 

 

[Thruster88]

My RV6a would be eligible for group G but I will not be changing because, it will cost more, I would have to repaint the rego and the paint is very beautiful now, I need to retain my casa license to fly the mighty Musketeer. 

 

Maintenance does not change.  

The only reason to change would be if one cannot get a class 2 medical.   

[facthunter]

Be prudent and wait and see. ALL this was promised years ago and I lost a packet believing them. It was CASA's IDEA for the weight to be 762 kgs. What does that tell you.?  Nev

[NT5224]

3 minutes ago, Thruster88 said:

My RV6a would be eligible for group G but I will not be changing because, it will cost more, I would have to repaint the rego and the paint is very beautiful now, I need to retain my casa license to fly the mighty Musketeer. 

 

Maintenance does not change.  

The only reason to change would be if one cannot get a class 2 medical.   

Good point! 
 

So Group G is for the sick and the weary…

 

They  should call it Group W. 
 

Alan 

[facthunter]

Don't encourage anyone . People are dumped into "convenient" categories far too much to try and discredit them already. JUST do to the Medical what progressive thinking places have done and move on. Do what RAAus was for in the first place.   Nev

[danny_galaga]

Not that you would want to be in this situation, but how will that affect accident investigation if you change your aircraft from GA to Group G?

[facthunter]

Marginally if anything, in my opinion.    Nev

[KRviator]

There'd be some downsides I can see - namely the loss flight above 10,000 and at night if you currently do that.

One possible bonus may be the RAAus $20M liability cover, which might offset the membership costs, depending how much your current insurance premiums are - which I can see going up next time for those of us with RV's!

[facthunter]

I thought accident investigation was the question.  Nev

[danny_galaga]

1 hour ago, facthunter said:

Marginally if anything, in my opinion.    Nev

What I mean is that if you have a VH registered aeronca champ it gets a full investigation in a crash via casa. If it was a 24 rego, nothing. Same plane.

[skippydiesel]

1 hour ago, KRviator said:

One possible bonus may be the RAAus $20M liability cover, which might offset the membership costs, depending how much your current insurance premiums are - which I can see going up next time for those of us with RV's!

A few weeks ago, I was talking a very experienced/long time pilot (GA/Experimental), on this very topic - he felt that RAA was more expensive than GA.

 

On exploring costs further, turns out he is quite correct for his circumstances . He has what he calls self insurance ie none. Hard to compete with that.

[facthunter]

They don't have to investigate either. Not all VH are investigated. Aerobatic planes especially and SOME RAAus are. The ferris wheel event. Nev

[coljones]

14 hours ago, skippydiesel said:

A few weeks ago, I was talking a very experienced/long time pilot (GA/Experimental), on this very topic - he felt that RAA was more expensive than GA.

 

On exploring costs further, turns out he is quite correct for his circumstances . He has what he calls self insurance ie none. Hard to compete with that.

A lot of politicians are very experienced/long but they still tend to make it up as they go along or forget to review their sketchy back of the envelope calcs

[turboplanner]

18 hours ago, KRviator said:

There'd be some downsides I can see - namely the loss flight above 10,000 and at night if you currently do that.

One possible bonus may be the RAAus $20M liability cover, which might offset the membership costs, depending how much your current insurance premiums are - which I can see going up next time for those of us with RV's!

What would you say that?

If you're talking about public liability, from my perspective RV pilots have a good reputation for responsibility

[BurnieM]

Lets see what happens with basic 5 medical.

 

They could end up being very similar.

[KRviator]

3 hours ago, turboplanner said:

What would you say that?

If you're talking about public liability, from my perspective RV pilots have a good reputation for responsibility

They do, but the point I was trying to make was if you change to RAAus, no matter what you fly, you have the benefit of the RAAus $20M liability insurance coverage, and so you can drop your own PL policy and save some $$ to offset the RAAus membership costs. I have full hull coverage so I don't know what a liability only policy would cost, but I would imagine it's more than a few hundred dollars, for $20M coverage.

[turboplanner]

54 minutes ago, KRviator said:

They do, but the point I was trying to make was if you change to RAAus, no matter what you fly, you have the benefit of the RAAus $20M liability insurance coverage, and so you can drop your own PL policy and save some $$ to offset the RAAus membership costs. I have full hull coverage so I don't know what a liability only policy would cost, but I would imagine it's more than a few hundred dollars, for $20M coverage.

Yes, it would be worthwile checking the clauses, what's included etc and costs beside each other.

[facthunter]

One thing we haven't covered is who does the Investigation? With RAA its the coroner  and the state Police who get involved. The Police CAN ask for assistance of RAAus. It concerns me that neither  the coroner or the Police in their normal day job are particularly across AVIATION Matters and it can be fairly complex and the remoteness of some occurrences is one such aspect.  Nev