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It wasn’t just individual homebuilders who were hurt when Direct To Avionics closed. Lancair International also dealt with the company. “The D2A business failure is one which has touched all of us in one way or another,” Lancair CEO Joseph C. Bartels wrote in a memo to customers this week. He says that Lancair Avionics […]

When Direct To Avionics (D2A) closed its doors last month, buyers who had paid up front for Chelton Flight Systems avionics they never received were left hanging. This week, Chelton released a statement saying it will help out those customers by offering replacement Chelton and Pinpoint Inertial components at prices significantly below their own manufacturing […]

And there’ll be a pre-Valentine’s Day love-in of sorts when the General Aviation Manufacturers Association hosts its annual Industry Review and 2007 Marketing Outlook briefing in Washington, D.C. Barring some utter market collapse that we haven’t heard of in the last three months, 2006 will almost certainly have set sales and income records in many […]

Thanks in part to Diamond Aircraft’s willingness to take a chance that diesel engines could catch on in the U.S., Thielert AG is undergoing a major expansion and enhancing its product line after record sales and profits in 2006. Diamond uses the 1.7-liter Centurion engines in its twin-engine DA42 and in a version of its […]

Lest there be any doubt about which is the largest commercial planemaker in the world, Boeing need only point to its year-end results. The Chicago-based company recorded almost double the number of solid orders of rival Airbus to soar back to the top in terms of both popularity and production in 2006. Boeing took in […]

“AOPA has been following this for a number of months now,” spokesman Chris Dancy told AVweb on Wednesday afternoon. “In fact, Phil Boyer had a brief face-to-face meeting with Bill Cutter last August after the story first surfaced. Now that another shop has apparently made the business decision to keep their insurance premiums in check […]

The concern is that if enough lawyers in search of “deep pockets” go after maintenance shops, the cost of defending against that trend could put insurers on the defensive. Professional Aviation Maintenance Association President Brian Finnegan said the FAA’s Aging Aircraft Committee, of which he’s a member, has been carefully monitoring litigation relevant to mechanics […]

AVweb‘s stories (1, 2) on Monday about some maintenance and repair shops turning away work on older airplanes brought in more reports from pilots who have run into similar situations. Readers in Maryland, Texas and Utah said local operators have told them they can no longer work on aircraft over 18 years old due to […]

Next week’s U.S. Sport Aviation Expo aims not just to show off the LSA products but to introduce the masses to the whole concept of sport flying and get them up in the air for a free demo flight. Entrance fees are low, with $40 buying a four-day pass including parking. Fly-ins are welcome, and […]

The third annual U.S. Sport Aviation Expo will take place next week in Sebring, Fla., from Jan. 11 to 14. The user-friendly event has been growing every year, and this time will host about 70 outdoor booths and another 50 or so exhibitors in tents. “We’ll have a number of new aircraft to show this […]