76Srat

Great article, Don. I echo the expectation that it'll take regulatory agency help in softening a few of the key sticking points on certification processes, etc., especially those related to the sheer expense directly related to getting new powerplants to market that can be drop-in replacements for legacy piston-powered airplanes. The reason why those are so expensive is because of the obvious: the OEMs return on investment. As to why the factory OH route is so expensive is a mystery to me because legacy certified powerplants were monetised decades ago by the OEMs. I think its merely a marketplace commodity factor and nothing else, which will not be sustained long-term. It'll take agency and private industry partnerships to make anything sustainable happen (much like we now see taking shape nicely on the avionics side). Until then, we should be planning on spaces in the mausoleum of legacy piston airplane boneyards . . .

All good stuff here, guys. I've said it before and I'll keep saying it: Is this reality? Yes, it is the new reality. Therefore, are we still going to be staring at the top of our boots in the next 20 year timeframe and lamenting the extinction of our legacy piston fleet? And I'm including all legacy pistons in that assumption, not just our beloved Mooneys. Unless there is a drastic and universal change in equipment being available to the legacy piston fleet, it will no longer exist as we know and love it. Period. I argue that we should stop expecting the factory/field OH market to somehow come back to earth and show us a welcome "correction" as to what all of that costs. What has never been controversial or refutable is how one owner chooses to undertake such a project. As we've all discussed above in this very topic, each owner/operator is different than the next. Some might choose to overhaul/replace literally everything from the firewall-forward. Others choose to do such on an as-needed or for-cause basis. Its Ford vs Chevy at that point and that's been the prerogative since airplanes went to maintenance for the very first time ever. That will never change. What does need to change, and I argue what must change, is what we expect to happen if we stay the course and simple expect the certified piston engine marketplace to somehow all of a sudden be transformed into something we think we can all live with. Bluntly, it won't. Without new technology on the power plant side for the certified legacy piston fleet, this is a race to the bottom with only one possible result: extinction. There is no help from the newly-certified crowd (read: Cirrus et al), nor is there any help from the regulatory agencies themselves (FAA/EASA et al). Instead of lamenting and wishing for short-term solutions (which are anything but "short-term" in their pursuit) such as UL100 or other band-aid so-called solutions for existing piston power plants, we should be lobbying for and arguing in favor of replacement power plants themselves (small turbines/diesel-derivatives, etc.). This may sound like crazy talk and will be crazy-expensive, but it truly is the only way out of this mire and mess, if we truly want to save our legacy piston fleets. Where would the piston fleet be if there were no investment or tech which replaced our beloved steamguages a few decades ago? Look at what Dynon and Garmin have done for that? Could and should there be the same type of focus for the powerplant side? I argue not only should there be; there must be. Otherwise, our legacy pistons will be seen by our grandchildren in the occassional static display museums, which will be few and far between. I'll pop some popcorn and now watch the wailing and gnashing of teeth over this thought . . .

Correct that military aircraft weren't issued civilian registrations, though many civilian aircraft were used militarily (L-birds being the easiest to mention). And to clarify my earlier statement, the CAA would issue successive numbers to each manufacturer, so for example Taylorcraft would have its allotted numbers, as would Cessna/Beech/Piper, etc. So your C140 being a couple of numbers away from your neighbor's likely would have rolled out of Wichita one or two ships away from his. Either way, the earliest of registration numbers (N numbers, for the US) were successive and not vanity or custom like we can do today.

Also curious to see how the Registry will be able to reconcile this with its own regulations governing the requirements of the registration of Aircraft generally (49 USC 44101 et seq; and 14 CFR 47 and 49). In classic form, one reg requires that the FAA provide for methods of keeping your information private, but doesn't say how or where that information is otherwise supposed to be accessible, as required by the very regs that establish the Registry in the first place. You may not think this makes a hill of beans difference and that privacy is the key component here. It isn't and it makes a helluva a hill of beans difference. The very reason for Registry records in the first place is (was) to equip the enforcement agencies with the ability to find out who owns an airplane operated in US airspace***. Circa 1999, our friends at the Aeronautical Center Counsel's office in OKC issued a letter (just a letter, not a "ruling" or "regulation", but a guidance "letter" to all Registry examiners) requiring that "physical addresses be included in all 8050-1 forms filed with the Registry". How's that sit with you? Why should we have to comply with that? Nowhere in the then-regs did it require that your physical address be included in your documents filed in OKC anytime you wished to register your ownership of an aircraft once you bought it. FAA Registry documents examiners began immediately rejecting ownership and registration documents filed that didn't comply with that unpublished requirement. Perhaps some of us on here experienced this joy, which also caused some of us to operate unknowingly in violation of Registration requirements if such flights occurred beyond the 90 day "temporary" (pink copy) registration carried on board without having had the final registration card issued in the interim. Anyway, when queried about this craziness, the answer was twofold: "the FAA has been instructed by DOT and Treasury and Dept of State to require the physical location of where each US registered aircraft is to be based" and second, "the FAA has an interest in maintaining safe flight operations of all aircraft operated in US airspace". What??? Seriously, those were the answers. In reality, when pushed further on the topic and at multiple seminars following this silly unpublished change in the regs, ACC finally admitted it was so drug trafficking could be tracked more accurately and then it became a firm requirement once the disaster that was 9/11 happened. Thus, we've been required to show a physical address ever since. So guess what this triggered? Yes, you guess correctly: my aircraft is "physically located" at my hangar and I don't receive mail or notices at my hangar, because, well, my hangar doesn't have a f*cking address. The FAA hadn't thought of that. Remember the most recent debacle about requiring the "re-registration" of the triennial registration requirements? All of that was birthed by the ignorance of the FAA's own regulations about providing a proper address for registration purposes. The "physical location" of the aircraft requirement caused the removal of thousands of actual mailing addresses for FAA notices and manufacturer notices to reach the aircraft-owning pilot community. It's taken decades since to resolve. All of this to say that you may not think that what goes on at the FAA Civil Aircraft Registry affects you nearly as often as what goes on at Aeromedical, but it does. I argue it likely affects us more because the Registry records are one of the easiest ways to commit fraud using aircraft records. They're all there to see, as you wish. All of your financial data found in your loan documents on that fancy Mooney you just bought are in those FAA Registry records. Hopefully you used a proper aircraft title company in OKC and a proper aircraft lender who knows what not to include in those filings, but if you didn't, your info is there for all to see and the bad guys to exploit. Finally, think about this: next time you do a pre-buy and make an offer on a plane to purchase and you run a title search (which you should, always), how does availing oneself of these new privacy regs hurt your due diligence on important matters such as who owns the aircraft and, more importantly, who holds a valid encumbrance against that collateral? This reg is so vague and useless by its language and text that it will yet again open Pandora's box on more craziness that was never intended. Think that you'll always be able to review the records on a plane you're looking at, like we all could in the old days? Maybe and likely not, going forward. Welcome to FAA Registry Operations in the new age . . . ***Fun fact: ever wonder about those really old tail numbers you see in those really old photos, or perhaps even on the tail of some classic aircraft today, e.g. "N31178" on the tail of a 1940 Piper J-3? In the pre-DOT/pre-Civil Aircraft Registry days, circa 1958 and prior, the manufacturers assigned successive N numbers to the aircraft rolling out of their factories, which generally coincided with when that particular aircraft was registered with the Dept of War (the predecessor of our friendly, modern FAA Registry). Aside from a few exceptions through the decades, next time you're strolling the vintage ramp at Airventure, which everyone should do every year, you can safely assume that those airplanes bearing those old numbers were the "x" aircraft ever built in the US. So in 1940, N31178 (a 1940 J-3) was presumably the thirty-one thousandth and change airplane ever manufactured in the US. Seeing that there are now ~600,000+ US registered aircraft operating daily and airworthy currently (with legion more than that manufactured throughout history), I've always thought its rather cool to see an old aircraft with an old NC tail number.

This is perfect--what a great bit of advice. Thanks for supplying this and sharing your process. I still think it sucks that we have to establish multiple online accounts with the FAA (using different interfaces and even different vendors supplying the services to the FAA), just to apply for a medical or inquire/establish something with the Registry. CAMI and Civil Aircraft Registry buildings are merely a few yards away from each other in OKC. Why they don't use the same online portal will forever baffle me.

Only thing missing there, @EricJ would have been the Brady Bunch on their exciting vacation to the Grand Canyon or Uncle Jesse and Old No. 7 . . .

This I do know: donuts (and several boxes of them, and don't forget to add the apple fritters) work really well for the FBO line guys and those Little Caesars hot-n-ready $6.00 pizzas work great in the shop working on your airplane. These two small, relatively inexpensive gestures go a long way toward keeping everyone on the same wavelength. We're all human and we all make mistakes, all the time. Anyone not willing to admit this or agree with this won't be getting donuts or pizzas from me anytime soon.

^^^+1000 for @Parker_Woodruff and his attention to customer service and timely responses, etc. Just wrote a renewal with Parker yesterday and already referred a longtime pilot buddy to him who didn't know any better. Way to go, Parker.

I know, I know. I cringed right after I posted that. I was (stupidly) trying to think like an installer and forgot its as simple as designating which is which. My bad for overlooking a simplicity amidst what is usually Medusa's headdress of compliance BS.

Indeed yours is an interesting perspective, but what the ruling actually clarifies isn't the leaded versus unleaded avgas issue--it was a clear and unequivocal ruling that agencies (in this case, a county) cannot unduly deprive rightful access to something federally mandated otherwise. It just so happens that this case involves 100LL and 100UL of various types (such as they are). Unfortunately, all of aviation is on a downhill slide on this issue and literally every other issue taken up by those opposed to anyone exercising their freedom to fly. If we're truly supportive of GA overall, and I believe all of us on here are, then we need to come together and let the market bear out what should or shouldn't be available. To do anything less than that is to remain unwilling subjects to bureaucrats who truly do not have GA's best interests in mind. In fact, they have the opposite in mind: absolute abolishment. If all we do is sit back and expect to turn our heads and cough when told, then we shouldn't even expect a soft, gentle hand when asked to do so.

Interesting theory, PC. I'd be curious, however, to see how many annuals would get that wiring setup squawked by an IA for not being "i/a/w certification", etc. I could see several not signing off on that setup unless there's an approved published alternative in the installation process. Just thinking out loud here . . .

@mhoffman Just lurking to see if you have an update on this? Has to have been maddening for something like this in-flight, compounded by the fact that the remedy is replacing the gear motor. We'd love to hear how your quest to replace that went/is going. Hopefully getting one reasonably is a bit easier than milking the truth out of a politician . . .

I hear you, Mr. Cone. My take on his diatribe is less about all GA pilots being wrong about it, and more about being wrong about overlooking establishing habits that focus on maneuvering speed versus religiously and rotely (is that a word?) going for glide speed in engine-out situations, instead of perhaps better options that give you more airspeed options (such as the aforementioned maneuvering speed instead of best-glide). Quick side story: My son is going through his PPL training now as a 16 year old and has been doing so since age 15 at my buddy's local 141 and he won't even be able to take his check ride until this summer when he turns 17 (I know; cue the "why are you doing that" questions). I occasionally go up with him and his instructor and I just watch and listen. I'm amazed at what they're doing now in 141 curriculum versus the part 65 when I did mine back some 7 presidential administrations ago. To my shock and dismay, there isn't a standard "engine-out" curriculum in the C172S 141 syllabus. Instead, there are all kinds of "engine out recovery" situations. Now I'm not here to debate the ills or extol the virtues of these many stair-stepped syllabus steps to learning emergency recoveries in a 141 environment--they all have their pros and cons. What does make we amazed and astonished is how rote and routine they try to make all of them. To me, there doesn't seem to be much thought or questions around why they do them or whether there are better ways to react and recall how to recover--it's literally become a check-the-box learning and achievement environment. Case in point: in the "engine fire in-cruise recovery" portion, guess what the very first requirement is? "Turn the aircraft toward the direction of the engine fire". Seriously? That's the stupidest thing I've ever heard. How about establishing where you're going to put the aircraft down safely, first? If one stops long enough to think about the recovery steps in that situation, shouldn't we ask "how on God's green earth, or more accurately, how in God's blue sky are we supposed to determine 'which side the engine fire is coming from'? If you're supposed to "turn in the direction of the engine fire", shouldn't you be able to figure out which side of the cowl it's coming from first? So please tell me, even at C172S cruise speeds of ~110kt, give or take, how are you doing to determine where the flames/smoke are? You can't. Ram air physically prevents it. So what good does that kind of recovery training teach a learning pilot-to-be? I detailed all of this with my son afterward and he hadn't even thought about it that way. Most, if not all such student never would think of it that way because it isn't "in the syllabus", so they aren't supposed to think of it that way. All of that sidebar to say that as long as videos and other elements of learning that are logical and get us to actually think about an emergency situation logically, we'll all arrive safely at our destination, whether such destination is planned or unplanned. After all, that's always our ultimate goal of flying: make sure our number of landings equals our number of takeoffs, period.

Haha. Thanks for the heads-up. Have no idea who he is other than someone IMHO who's doing his best to offer yet another way to fly as safely and as competently as possible. After 40+ years in GA and transport-category aviation in one for or another (but never as a CFI, btw), I hope I've learned the most valuable lesson of all: never stop learning. Hell, I can learn a lot from a bartender, even if I don't like his or her ultimate cocktail in my glass. I can and will always be learning, all the time. Reminds me the rare time my wife was with me at our local FBO years ago in the late '90s. She asked me "does that happen often out here??" after watching our local village (airport) idiot literally ramrod his homebuilt at about a 50kt rolling high-speed turn onto the runway, midfield, and take off. My reply: "not for very long and not very many times in a row". As fate would have it, that same idiot killed himself and 6 other innocent souls (yes, 7 total) when he attempted to takeoff in high DA in a summertime, over-gross Aerostar flight. While that story has nothing to do with the Dan Gryder video I posted above, it has everything to do with my lifelong obsession with being the best pilot I can be: never stop learning and always keep your options open, no matter the situation. That village idiot locked the door on learning years prior to his death and doing so ultimately did him in. The sadness of all of that is less about losing an idiot from the pilot corps and all about losing the 6 others (all from the same family) who had no idea he was such a f*****g idiot. The video is a great reminder that we can all learn from everyone else, both good and bad. I love the approach he shows on how to quickly and easily establish the most important part of any engine-out situation: quick awareness and reaction that gives you options. If we stall in that situation, all options are removed and there is likely only one inevitable result: your family, assuming they're not in the plane with you when it happens, will not be dining at the same table as you that evening. I never want that . . .

I'm lamenting that Mooney ownership doesn't have the capital or the prerogative to do a clean sheet with these guys, or someone like them, for a new 4/5 place Mooney, with a 'chute. They'd sell 800 aircraft a year, if they did. Instead of wasting time that won't exist for the piston-powered legacy fleet much longer on things like 100UL avgas, we should be pursuing certifications like this for both legacy and clean-sheet certified aircraft. We Mooney guys shouldn't be happy watching Cirrus take the lead on something like this (they never will push a turboprop equivalent for their legacy piston fleet, for obvious reasons). We should for our legacy fleet, for equally obvious reasons.

This blew me away and is well worth the 25 minute time suck it requires to watch:

Thanks for supporting the topic, @T. Peterson. I agree with everything said on here, some more than others, of course. My hope is that we start/continue to think far beyond just the fuel issues and look to support the progress, investment and anyone who supports a more efficient/simplified certification process to give our Mooneys and their owners more options when it comes to powering them for the next generation. I submit that merely looking at the fuel equation and fuel options will certainly help in the short-term, but isn't a viable long-term solution. Only a fresh, new, innovative power plant upgrade(s) will do the trick. It's either that, or extinction of the mark will be inevitable. I'd hate to see that happen. With DOGE and the over-due look at government inefficiencies that's taking place currently, it'll only be a matter of time before we'll see our very world become a blip on the map of history (see the upcoming sea-changes to privatizing air traffic control, flight planning, etc., that is just around the corner, for example. DOGE has already held up the Euro/Canadian model as "the best" from an economic standpoint, which I can't disagree with from a pure efficiency/operating cost-benefit analysis, but I'm scrambling to find reasons to agree operationally from a user's viewpoint, primarily because there aren't near the number of operations in Canada and the whole of Europe combined in a week as we have every single day in the US). Let's not let our lack of considering other power options/engineering mean the end of the line for legacy single engine piston aviation. Fuel alternatives alone will not save it. Everyone who has expressed a concern about the outright costs of re-engining the fleet or pursuing and obtaining a completely new recip engine program for Mooneys and other legacy single engine piston aircraft is correct--it just will never make economic sense to do so. I can't argue with that. What I am suggesting is that we learn from our Cirrus brothers and sisters who, by way of not selling or marketing a "new, safer alternative aircraft", but instead have done a hall-of-fame job marketing a lifestyle brand differently than all other aviation manufacturers had ever done before, we can save the entire single engine piston fleet. What have Textron/Beech/Cessna/Piper ever done to make anyone not already involved in general aviation think that they should become involved? A lot, if you're talking about post-WWII pilots earning their civilian wings after the war and into the boomer years under the GI Bill. But literally zero after that, at least by way of marketing and innovative ways to bring in more people to GA. Zilch. Enter Cirrus. I loath Cirrus and love Cirrus, all at the same time. I loathe them for producing an inherently unstable airframe that I believe is far inferior to Mooney. I LOVE them for single handedly rescuing single engine piston aviation. Without Cirrus, we'd be stuck in the rut that Cessna/Textron have hewn through the decades of stale thinking, stale engineering and without Congressional support in tax deduction/depreciation legislation, would have run all of piston aviation into the museum by now. Sorry for the rabbit-hole of topics here on this reply to your post (to my OP), but that's my intent with this thread--get us all thinking outside the box of merely supporting a 100UL replacement, which is what we should all be doing anyway, and on to more grandiose goals of securing the operational future of all of piston aviation for the next generations and beyond. It will not survive if we're focused merely on fuels . . .

Thanks for your take on this, @jlunseth. I appreciate the concern. That said, I am thrilled that there has been the response to this topic. While I'd love to see "that all of GA should replace all of its engines", that certainly will never happen, much less happen in my lifetime. Overall, my attempt at getting us to think about a lot more than just the energy and time (and $$$) in getting 100UL replacement fuel(s) certified is time well-spent. I appreciate your take, for sure, but would never consider all of the input here not worth responding to--it's valuable insight into our collective mindset. I argue that such collective mindset should be expanded beyond just considering the benefits (and costs) associated with 100UL replacement. It should go far beyond that if we really do value preserving the utility of our Mooneys for more than a few more years.

I think your point is valid. My point, though not very well said by me, is I think people aren't disinclined to use 100UL based solely on price per gallon. I think they're disinclined to use it for the simple reason that it isn't readily available in as many places as 100LL. Obviously this will change once more and more 100UL options become available. However, I don't think the use or non-use of 100UL is due solely to it being priced higher per-gallon than standard 100LL. On the price per gallon issue, I'll always agree with you. That said, and perhaps this is more about options at TBO/OH point in time, which we'll all face in one way or another (much akin to the decisions we face when replacing panels or a panel upgrade), should we be pining for more recip technology and the options that go with that, instead of hoping for ubiquitous 100UL options to pop up everywhere? The tech and investments being made in fuel research seem to me to be a bit misplaced because we're talking about piston engine tech that is 65+ years old. Again, this is no different than restoring or reinvesting research and development in cathode ray tube television sets, which is cool for the exercise but not viable or even remotely smart going forward. By the time we have ubiquitous 100UL options, we could have far better and affordable piston recip upgrade options. We'll never get there unless we can foresee the next set of trees way ahead instead of trying to figure out how to harvest the virtually extinct species of trees we've been using for decades with little to no tech advantages.

+1 for wondering about the LoPresti cowl whereabouts/costs/availability (LASAR?). Amazing to see his cowl induction engineering influences in literally every production piston from Piper, Mooney, Cirrus. The only reason Textron/Cessna/Beech don't use his cowl designs is because they stopped aero engineering those designs when Gerald Ford left the White House.

adding to my post above: maybe we should be lobbying for legislation that expands to an accelerated personal depreciation of the replacement piston engine tech, etc. This is a way the agencies can support private industry to invest in the development and support the user/consumer to buy it. It won't ever get "cheaper", but it certainly could become more "beneficial" to all involved. If the user/buyer/taxpayer were incentivized as equally as the OEM/developer could be, then we'd be closer to a longer term solution. But you're right, merely relying on pure marketplace economics will never get us out of the piston engine or piston leaded-fuel dark ages. Plenty of policy makers want to eliminate private aviation altogether. We need to support those that should be supporting it in creative and sustainable ways going forward, otherwise we'll only be enjoying our piston aircraft on static display posts in museums some day . . .

I totally agree. Respectfully, however, what does a full-glass, kicka$$ Garmin or Dynon panel replacement cost? Nearly that, I'd say. And that's what all this boils down to, the dollars. I also argue that our regulatory agencies have to get on board and make the certification process a lot less burdensome and time consuming. I'm all about safety and security in designs and function and the DOT/FAA systems of certification are second to none. We should all be thankful for just how top-notch it is. That said, and I got in to this friendly argument with my non-aviator neighbor the other day, the marketplace won't be the reason none of us are zipping around in our own little Jetson's drones, point to point, anytime soon. It will be the regulatory agencies who can't seem to move at the speed of any marketplace whatsoever. Hell, the FAA can't even decide if/when it wants to replace or remove its terrestrial vacuum tube driven ground-based pre-WWII radar technology. What makes anyone think the FAA will agree to move at the speed of post-1990s development on anything in this new century? My cynicism aside, I argue this is a twofold problem: it isn't just a fuel replacement solution; it is a recip engine technology replacement solution, too. It may truly come down to the likes of DeltaHawk and others deciding to actually develop a certified replacement for our Mooneys (and others like them) or not, much akin to the decisions which led to the unbelievable panel tech we now have, thanks to those same 1990s certification efforts. They just as easily could have decided only to make a better steam gauge back then (many did that are no longer around). I'm very glad they decided to go a different route and the agencies supported them for it. Hint: it also significant tax legislation and GAMA and many others' coordinated efforts on the lobby and legislative side to make it happen. This is what I'm talking about when it comes to the agencies easing up on the timelines and expenses OEMs and other developers have to endure just to propose something that makes it better for all of us. ***this is the asterisk explanation that I forgot to include above, btw.

I hear you, for sure, and I am all-in on a viable fuel replacement. And if it were just as simple as a plug and play fuel replacement, we'd already have it ubiquitous easily. Fact is, and we all agree, it isn't easy, nor will it be ubiquitous anytime soon. It just doesn't work that way when it comes to fuel supply and distribution, which is what I'm really getting at with this topic. Thinking globally, an unleaded 100LL replacement likely won't move any needles and won't solve the long-term problem. Globally-speaking, there is a huge need for more modern, viable, serviceable piston engine replacements far more than the more desirable and more (short term) feasibility of a viable fuel replacement. To overstate the obvious, the US GA marketplace is the largest of its kind in the world, so whatever works "best" for the US is, in popular view, the "best" solution. I'm just curious what the business case was back in the day when the avionics wizards figured out both the regulatory side of the puzzle***, as well as the actual sales-to-market side of the puzzle. By all respects that I can ponder, we're at the same inflection point regarding making the business case for going a bit (okay, a lot) further with the unleaded fuel replacement technology and doing it right: let's focus on viable, outright piston engine replacement tech instead of just the fuel for it. Again, this isn't anything new, its just perhaps a different way to solve a lingering problem. I'm afraid the pursuit we're after with just a replacement fuel is akin to forcing the marketplace to retain its old VCRs just so we can continue to use and play our old VHS tapes. Is a replacement fuel solution really a long term solution? I'm not so sure it is.

. . . well, not quite. Here's my thought: Just like you guys, I've been reading just about everything I can find on the boiling EAGLE/100LL/unleaded debate/debacle/call-it-what-you-will issue. And I apologize if this specific idea has been thrown around in here and I just can't find it, but I've been wondering a lot if we're simply missing the point altogether here. Instead of wringing our hands over unleaded fuel options du jour and all of the worries with supply chain, distribution, pricing, loyalties between suppliers, does-it-play-well-with-others, etc?, should we get to pondering a larger opportunity? With credit to the latest article on the topic in this month's "EAA Sport Aviation" magazine, I think the solution might be in not trying to proffer the best "fuel" alternative and instead proffer the best reciprocating engine alternatives. What do I mean by this? Well, for starters, we have to wonder if on the fuel/engine side we're sitting on an upcoming sea-change in technology, not on the fuel side, but on the engine side. And in support of this (possibly) exciting change, should we look no further than what has happened with avionics since the day the GNS430 was born? Cue the logical coffee spewing over computer screens at this point, and I'm not trying to stir a long-tormented hornet's nest, but since the certification process is what it is (anything but cheap), should we as the marketplace look for a cheaper/viable engine replacement program instead of just pushing the rope further uphill on fuel alternatives? The real answer lies in the cert process and the example shown us from those who dared to tread the shark-filled void of avionics upgrades, circa late 1990s. It was said then, as it is being said now for engines in legacy types such as our beloved Mooneys, that "uprooting the legacy steam-gauges will never catch on" in the legacy piston fleet. We see now how short-sighted that viewpoint was then and just how great it has been since. I agree that there are legion reasons a recip engine replacement wouldn't be viable or feasible for most, if not all legacy piston fleets. But, long term, a viable SAF-burning alternative recip engine for IO-320/360/IO-470/520/550 fleets out there seems to me to be money far better spent toward certification than a yet-to-be-determined acceptance rate of unleaded fuel replacements. It is less than ironic to me that in the time you have to wait for a FOH we'll likely have the debate over the very unleaded fuel we'll be forced to use in that FOH solved--this is not a sustainable logic. Let's put that effort in to gaining the best engine replacement for a longer term, instead of wasting this decade-plus over a fuel to be burned in engines that aren't sustainable themselves. We now have streaming and digital music. Is this entire debate about unleaded avgas replacement going to end up being the VHS/Betamax debate? Fast forward 5 or 10 years from now and will this fuel debate end up on the academic editing room floor, when we really should be debating not if, but which recip alternatives should be out there?

While technically not a winning bid from a salvage auction, my very good friend in Texas (Mark Hasse, sadly flew west in 2012, God rest his soul) won a sealed bid from some tiny county in the Carolinas on a '65 310K. All the listing said was something to the effect of "Seized/forfeited aircraft; Cessna 310; locked with no keys; no known records; seized in drug raid; unknown condition, sold as-is, where-is". All interested parties were to send in written sealed bids via US Postal service to the county clerk (in other words, the selling entity wasn't aviation-related at all). Nearly wincing at the potential of offending the county, he sent in a bid for $10,000.00, thinking the IO470 cores would be worth at least double that (this was in the early 'aughts). He then went about his usual business and forgot all about his bid. About 3 months later, he gets a call out of the blue from the "X County Courthouse". He was a retired prosecutor/lawyer at the time, so getting a call from a "county Courthouse" wasn't altogether unusual. He answered and the very nice lady on the other end of the line said, "Mr Hasse, congratulations, you won the bid." "What bid?", he replied. She said, "the airplane that was seized here in South Carolina in the drug raid". He then remembered his sealed bid. She told him he was literally the only bidder. Now to the juiciest parts of any similar aviation auction/sealed bid-related story you'll ever hear: Mark was a consummate A&P/IA and an extremely cunning individual. He flew commercial out to see his "new-to-him" acquisition imposed upon him by the local authorities by virtue of his forgotten-bid (evidently the listing in the aviation auction periodical where he found out about it in the first place wasn't completely accurate, or at least had scared off everyone else because it made everyone think that the aircraft had actually been used in running drugs to and fro and was thus seized during an actual drug raid--it hadn't been and suffered no such fate. It was merely owned by some local idiot who had been caught running drugs elsewhere and this was merely an asset of his). Anyway, back to the story: Mark arrives at the county courthouse to give them his $10,000.00 cashiers check. The nice lady there giving him his bill of sale then tells him "go to the airport and ask for Jed. He'll take great care of you. Thanks so much for helping us out with this nightmare airplane problem." Still thinking he got a complete piece of crap, Mark then hops in his rental car and goes to the airport where the aircraft was sitting on the ramp, still in its "seized state", all locked up without keys or "records". Mark hoped that the old wives-tale about all 1960s-era Cessna locks being identical to unserialized Samsonite luggage locks was true. By damn, it was true. With less effort spent than tying his shoelaces, he was able not only to unlock the cockpit door, he also unlocked both nacelle lockers and guess what was inside? Yep, all records, from new, with fresh annual sign-off and fresh, complete OH on both engines AND props, full-stop--the owner had evidently overspent some of that hard-earned drug running money on his own airplane and had just returned to his local airport from that lengthy, extraordinarily expensive shop visit. Icing on the cake was that the other engine nacelle locker had 4 sets of brand new DC headsets. Remember "Jed"? Well, Jed was the local groundskeeper at this tiny little county airport in the middle of fly-over Carolina and explained to Mark that the county seized all of the owner's property because he was a known, local drug dealer and hadn't paid his property taxes. This was never a "drug seizure" and the aircraft was never involved in anything nefarious. Mark corroborated this with the local FBO guy, too (Mark used his jacks and shop to do his own gear-swing and ferry flight permit inspection to fly it back to his own shop for further eval in TX). My buddy got a great twin that I flew in with him for dozens of hours in later years for about 10% of its market-value, all for responding to a no-pictures, written ad in an auction periodical from some tiny, random county in the Carolinas who truly had no idea a) how to properly list a aircraft for sale; and b) how to determine its true condition and c) literally gave zero effort to even try to unlock the aircraft and find out what was inside. The local sheriff just wanted it gone and the lovely clerk at the courthouse saw to it that it was gone with minimal effort. PS--this story is 100% true, even down to the county waving any and all ramp fees/storage and they even paid a full fuel top-off since Mark was "so nice and pleasant to deal with". With ode and respect to my great friend Mark Hasse, Rockwall, TX. A true gem, if there ever was one on this planet. May he rest in peace.