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Ron,
That's a good comparison. A Glasair or Lancair kit costs about double what a
Van's kit costs and it still takes about the same build time to complete. In
fact even the Van's quick-build costs less than a Glasair slow-build and you
get probably less than half the build time.
And what if the Van's kit were designed to be built with pulled rivets? This
would cut build time dramatically and that slow-build kit could be built in
about the same time it takes to build one of the composite fast-build kits
that cost three times as much.
Look at the Zenith 601, and compare its price to some of the sportplane
composite kits. The composte kits are usually twice as much money.
The conclusion has to be that composites are more expensive because it costs
more to make them. No question about it, composite construction involves
lots of hands-on labor.
Also composite materials are expensive compared to aluminum. So if there is
no advantage in labor costs and material costs are higher, how does
composite make sense for a cheap airplane? It doesn't.
Regards,
Gordon.
"Ron Wanttaja" <ron.wanttaja@comcast.net> wrote in message
news:h8ssi1t88ufeqv3qpqtgbumucaiip4h4cu@4ax.com...
> On Mon, 19 Sep 2005 03:47:38 -0400, Roger
> <Delete-Invallid.stuff.groups@tm.net>
> wrote:
>
>>On Sun, 18 Sep 2005 23:37:30 -0400, "Gordon Arnaut"
>><goarnaut@yahoo.com> wrote:
>>
>>>Evan,
>>>
>>>I do not want to drag this out, I think some good points ahve been made --
>>>however, I do not see why fiberglass airframe construction is going to be
>>>less labor-intensive.
>>>
>>Once you have the moulds constructed, fiberglass lends itself well to
>>making large compound structures as one piece.
>>
>>>There is almost zero opportunity for automation in fiberglass
>>>construction,
>>
>>That depends on your thinking. Fiberglass composite also lends
>>itself well to putting pieces together.
>
> I dunno, Roger. I have been both to the Glastar factory and the Vans
> factory. At
> Vans, a guy feeds a big piece of aluminum into a big CNC machine and
> whango-whango-whango out comes a big pile of RV parts. But then I go see
> the
> Glastar's fiberglass fuselage made, and its spray the release agent onto
> the
> mold, then the gelcoat, then cut pieces of fiberglass and lay them into
> the
> mold, then squeegee on some resin, then apply the foam, then apply another
> layer
> of fiberglass and more resin, etc. etc., lather, rinse, repeat, then let
> the
> assembly tie up your every expensive mold while the resin cures.
>
> Looked to me that manufacturing aircraft parts in fiberglass is a *lot*
> more
> effort...though I allow that less-skilled workers can probably be used.
>
> Ron Wanttaja
>
> P.S. Wanna hear something *really* scary? My spell checker passed
> "whango-whango-whango" but hiccuped on "gelcoat."
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Re: These are not YOUR airplanes - Was: High Cost of Sportplanes
