Importing a plane to USA - adding to FAA register

[Johnny_SA]

Good day, Just a general question.  There seem to be a bit of movement off aircraft from South Africa to the USA (your current GA market and our weak Rand makes a good combination).  Not so good for our future stock, but thats how it goes I guess.  

So if you buy one, get it back in the USA.

Getting it back on the FAA register, it is obviously best to have complete Airframe logs from the time it arrived in SA. (Normally they come from the USA).

Let say the the aircraft does not have the complete airframe logs, would it be impossible to get it registered? Let say only the last 15 years of Airframe logbook is available because a logbook has gone missing.

Or does it mean that it would just take a lot of time and money to get it done?  What would you need to do and what would the cost be?

Thanks in advance.

[Fly Boomer]

  On 8/14/2023 at 5:04 PM, Johnny_SA said:

Good day, Just a general question.  There seem to be a bit of movement off aircraft from South Africa to the USA (your current GA market and our weak Rand makes a good combination).  Not so good for our future stock, but thats how it goes I guess.  

So if you buy one, get it back in the USA.

Getting it back on the FAA register, it is obviously best to have complete Airframe logs from the time it arrived in SA. (Normally they come from the USA).

Let say the the aircraft does not have the complete airframe logs, would it be impossible to get it registered? Let say only the last 15 years of Airframe logbook is available because a logbook has gone missing.

Or does it mean that it would just take a lot of time and money to get it done?  What would you need to do and what would the cost be?

Thanks in advance.

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I looked at importing from the UK and, as I recall, you needed a current inspection in the "old" country, a bunch of paperwork, and about 1 AMU for an FAA guy to come to your hangar, and sign one of the documents.