FAA approves hundreds more engines to use unleaded avgas
aopa.org
aopa.org
It's interesting (but not unexpected in hindsight) that this new slew of approvals (generally) only impacts engines previously approved for low-octane unleaded fuels (e.g., 94UL). Even smaller engines like the Lycoming IO-360 (except the derated -L2A) aren't approved despite only modest power increases over the O-360.
At any rate if GAMI is to be believed this is all academic because the final set of approvals should come out before G100UL is practically available anyway.
As well, every time I test the fuel on a Cessna it inevitably sprays everywhere so there’s that worry too.
You might expect the noise, but you’d have to be versed in general aviation to know you’re being exposed to lead from combustion pollution.
1. Add a lead additive, you don't need very much, and since this isn't exactly your daily driver it's not so terribly inconvenient, you can buy this over the Internet. You just pour a measured ammount in to the tank each time you re-fuel. I don't think this is illegal in the US, but I don't know if it's common. At population scale it isn't a big nuisance.
2. Choose a substitute additive, which is likewise added to fuel. There are several, but whether they work for you is a question and of course the manufacturers are not interested in insuring your potentially unique 100+ year old car for damage from their cheap additive product. If you suffer mechanical problems that's your problem.
There's a lot more piston plane flight than there are people still driving a classic era car on any particular day.
Degraded lead paint consumed by unknowing children would probably deliver high concentrations, but a lot of that will travel unabsorbed through the intestinal track. Aerosolized lead paint would be unavoidable with a higher proportion passing into the bloodstream through the lungs, and therefore on a more express route northwards where it can pass between the blood-brain barrier.
Presumably taxiing and take off burn a few gallons, so 1gm of lead dispersed over a pretty wide area. So at any given point in the area your overall exposure is low.
It's true that as long as that paint is in good condition and isn't disturbed, it's not harmful. However, paint deteriorates and chips, is disturbed when remodeled, etc. One tiny paint chip of old paint can easily have more lead than that Cessna dispersed around the airport, and it's concentrated in a single article.
There's a crap ton of lead paint still around and sooner or later it's going to be mobilized. It's a fiction to think that an EPA-approved hazmat team will be dispatched whenever one of these old houses are torn down or remodeled. I'm much more worried about paint than a little avgas spread out evenly across the landscape.
Comparing it to lead paint is the wrong comparison. Take a look at what lead in the water supply, even at small concentration, can do to people. That's more comparable to air dispersal.
I think that evidence points to plenty of cases of lead poisoning from lead paint and, yes, lead in water. I have yet to hear of anyone getting lead poisoning from living near a GA airport.
Do note that lead paint also leads to contamination of surfaces and soils, as deteriorating paint turns into dust.
I don't think water contamination is similar to air dispersal at all. People consume a certain amount of water out of the tap every day, and whatever is in the water ends up in the body. There is a much less clear absorption chain from lead emitted into the air to the body.
Edit: I did the math based on the numbers above: Within 1 mile of an airport (typical pattern size) with 100 take-offs per day, each using 1 gallon of avgas so emitting 1g of lead will, over a decade, deposit ~50ug of lead per m^2.
If we say a yard is 100m^2, that's 5mg of lead. That's the equivalent lead content of < 1g of lead-based paint.
I'm not disputing that if you live in a new house, far away from a highway, but near a GA airport, avgas might be the major contribution to your lead exposure. But compared to the lead exposure risk from houses still containing lead paint, it seems completely insignificant.
I'm (wildly) guessing 0.1% of those lead levels.
By the late 1970s "88% of children had a level exceeding 10 μg/dl" [1] while current data from near the Reid-Hillview Airport shows that there is no particularly noticable effect [2] with just 1.7% of children having a blood level above 4.7 ug/dl. On average around 2% of children in the US regardless of location have a blood lead level around that number.
[1] https://www.jci.org/articles/view/28232 [2] https://sanjosespotlight.com/san-jose-airport-lead-levels-ar...
Guaranteed kids will have levels medically too high is a policy problem. Immediately downwind of the interstate in the 70s was apparently a very bad place for kids to be, and policy fixed that (more or less).
Almost no kids will have high levels now, and those few with higher levels experimentally are from uncountable random sources rather than the point source airport, is not a useful aviation policy problem.
Allowing leaded avgas has always been a policy decision to cater to GA over the health of, among others, children.
Both seem very countable and fixable.
(disclaimer: am a pilot, so biased) They don't really build small airports anymore, so the vast, vast majority of people who live near small airports chose to move there knowing in advance that the airport was there. Then they complain about the noise and pollution. There's a doctrine in Real Estate law called "Coming to the Nuisance" [1] which exists as a defense to these complaints. People who moved there knew what they were getting themselves into and assumed the risk of harm.
I don't like that our airplanes spew lead into the environment, and am really really happy that an actual viable unleaded solution is finally on the horizon, but I also disagree with moving in next to an airport and then immediately complaining about it.
https://www.google.com/maps/@44.0473359,-121.2771145,1144m/d...
I know I did when I started looking around on Google Maps when we moved here. Hey, wait, is that...?!
A pilot and homebuilder (of aircraft) myself, it’s basically my dream.
That's the case where I live around Dallas and we have a lot of them.
Yeah that bothers me as well. Especially since Tetraethyllead is in the perfect form to be absorbed through the skin.
I started using nitrile gloves during that process but it still gets around with the wind at times.
Would be a cool 3D printing project or even a better drain tube product design that springs flush with the plane so that it can't splurt out.
Edit: After some searching came across this [0] -- will probably be buying that.
Maybe it's truly just my circle but I always found it odd/amusing that such a high percentage had or were going for their pilot's license. Maybe the same personality trait that pushed them to tech pushes them to want to fly themselves. And/or it's just a matter of having more expendable money and free time than the average joe.
Either way I think it's less HN and more the profession.
(Disclaimer: I don’t have a PFL, but my boss does… and his own Cessna)
Not a bad comparison actually. Between the airframe design era, air-cooling etc it's pretty apt.
Fwiw I think the overlap is also because the tech thing. Flying airplanes is a pretty technical hobby so it makes sense it appeals to people like us tech workers
It also requires you to develop a certain level of personal responsibility and good decision making to fly safely. This positively impacts the management of a team/company.
This way even university students can fly (gliders) without being rich & quite a few of my friends did.
Also, not really a problem with leaded fuel in most gliders. ;-)
(The towing aircraft or the winch might be a different matter.)
You don't have to own an airplane, the above presume renting one ($150 to $200 per hour depending on the particulars).
Cessna 172 with G1000 avionics rental rate is 185/hour wet (with fuel) if you pay for a membership program at the flight school. Otherwise ~200/hour.
For rentals you pay for engine time only. There are usually minimums per day if you wanted to rent a plane for a weekend trip or something like that.
Flying Seattle to Orcas Island is a fun little trip.
Considering you can do 10 hours sim time toward the minimums, I don't think $10k is impossible? But ancillary stuff will probably get you to $11k or $12k admittedly. In my case I did the American Flyers weekend ground school for the written test and they gave you a few hours of sim time included with the course cost.
Our non-G1000 has autopilot and the G1000 doesn't (it's an expensive option) but I still prefer the G1000.
I had no problem taking off into a fog with 3D terrain in the panel. On old mechanical gauges with nothing but a beep telling me about the mountain? .... not so much....
Then again, I also live in North-Central Texas. Every black spot on the ground that you can't see at night is a cow pasture devoid of trees, land in whichever one you like with your dead engine and your odds are pretty good.
i'm basically just here as a bandwagon fan so i can celebrate when "we" win this one. the same way i cheer when my local hockey team makes the playoffs. and i suspect that a lot of us are following this story for similar reasons.
I have no interest in or connection to general aviation (beyond agreeing with Mojo Nixon on the topic of small private planes) but as a person who breathes air straight out of the atmosphere I have a strong interest in lead.
"He added that the accelerated commitment reflects new urgency arising from the FAA’s awareness that some local governments are taking action to ban leaded avgas from being used at airports in their jurisdictions.
Local governments threats driving innovation at the federal level :P
It's always been a real estate issue with KRHV.
The nearby busy highways emit vastly more emissions than trainers, likely including lead.
What city councils refuse to acknowledge is that once you close a city airport, you can never build another one. This is especially an issue in an earthquake zone.
If RHV air quality is monitored, then so should some locations around the highway. In fact, there's enough cars surrounding the airport that it would influence air quality measurements inside the airport perimeter.
I mentioned the quake issue because I have seen documentation that RHV is part of the emergency response plan for transporting relief cargo.
100LL by comparison contains 550mg per gallon by intent.
* Sorry for the crazy mixed units; I didn’t write the regulations.
Is that a bad thing? A substantial fraction of the population uses the local highway on a daily basis, whereas very very few people use small local airports with any similar frequency
There is a small graduated cylinder with a spike at the top it is pushed into a valve under the wing to get some fuel from that tank. You look to see if there is any water floating in the gas. After you check it you toss the leaded gas on the tarmac. Then you do the same for the other wing tank.
Airports especially small airports with piston powdered light aircraft using leaded avgas must be soaked in 70 years lead.
https://www.pooleys.com/shop/pooleys/the-gats-jar-fuel-teste...
Pretty common when there's a fog and you get condensate. The tank on a small airplane isn't gonna be sealed air-tight, it's vented to the outside air so a little condensate is pretty normal.
Water is heavier than the gas, so it sinks to the bottom where the drain fitting is.
Good god, I think I'd be chewed out if I did this at my field. Always back in the tank. Avgas is too expensive to dump it all over the ramp.
We take about 20-30ml in general (about half a shotglass)
Also the 7ml is not my figure. The "shotglass" is usally more than half full. I agree 7ml is not a lot.
I think it's highly preferable because many airports don't really want to be selling avgas anymore, and this will only become more of a problem as it's phased out. There's also a huge price difference.
Also the main reason for weight limits (including fuel limit) is to limit potential damage in the event of a crash. This is through a limit on kinetic impact (in addition to weight limit there is a speed limit) and hazardous material (the gasoline).
So if we eliminate the highly flammable gas, then it's possible the battery weight doesn't really matter because a 254 lbs airframe will be physically limited in the weight of batteries that it can support.
And replace it with a battery that has to burn out because it is impossible to extinguish?
What happens if a 100LL aircraft lands at such an airport? Do they have to disassemble/tow it, or is there some sort of financial penalty?
And the issue isn't only slightly less power.
Avgas is the only remaining lead-containing transportation fuel. Lead in avgas prevents damaging engine knock, or detonation, that can result in a sudden engine failure.
If engine knock can knock you out of the sky, it's probably not something you want to just take a chance with.
The effect of running too low octane fuel in an aviation engine is not "slighly less power", but likely detonation and catastrophic engine failure.
And that's why it's a violation of FAA regs to run aircraft on non-approved fuels.
If your perfectly reasonable next question is, why aren't standard aircraft engines just built with the appropriate seats, well, then... The answer is low market volume coupled with high regulatory hurdles. There aren't any villains here, just written-in-blood safety regs coupled with a small enough market that there is a lot less money available to fight inertia.
To be clear, this is literally true. Those safety lessons were paid for in blood.
As for reliability, I'm not convinced. In practical terms, I think automobile engines are far more reliable than aircraft engines. When was the last time your automobile engine broke an exhaust valve, cracked a cylinder head, or had a magneto come apart?
Exactly. An automobile engine is subjected to far less stresses in normal operation. 300h at full load is considered an extreme torture test for one, while a typical aircraft engine is meant to run for over 1000h between overhaul ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time_between_overhauls ) and spends a significant amount of that time at full load --- that's normal operating conditions.
Bio-based is a minefield of a few ways to have it reasonably ok'ish (mostly if it's stuff that would otherwise be waste) and countless ways to produce more emissions than before. The latter is usually what happens...
Leaded fuel is an obvious externality. As with all of those, there is no pressure on the ones causing the immediate harm to stop. Government action is required.
In order to sell an assembled aircraft, with very few exceptions, it needs to be certified by the FAA, and convincing them to allow you to sell a new engine is sufficiently complicated and expensive that the very small airplane market does not make it worth it. (The total number of piston aircraft sold in 2020 was 1300. The best-selling aircraft, the Cessna 172, sold in the 200s.)
The only development of new piston aircraft engines are for experimental aircraft, where no FAA approval is needed. In that market you find electronically controlled engines with the same features as automobile engines, and not requiring leaded gas. But those airplanes cannot be sold except as kits.
Even engines that need 100-octane gas would benefit from unleaded fuel, because the lead deposits are very bad, forces the use of inferior, non-synthetic oil, makes valves stick, fouls spark plugs, and is generally nasty. Believe me, no one wants to use leaded gas if they can avoid it.
darn TLAs
It's hard to find a car with a carburetor these days; fuel injection is ubiquitous and cheap. Not so in airplanes. You can actually find fuel injected and/or turbo airplane engines but they're priced as if they're made of gold, so they're strictly for rich pilots.
GA aircraft electronics are quite modern. But GA engines use 70-year-old technology. It's ridiculous.
If you want to talk to the FAA about an engineering approval you're looking at a 6 month lead time before you get an appointment for a meeting. If you are looking to compete with someone who has a similar approval for a similar thing, you can expect them to cancel the first meeting or two inexplicably and stretch it out to a year, maybe two, because you haven't paid the FAA's brother in law engineering firm to keep competitors out, the other guy you're trying to compete with paid them. All the while you pay your fixed costs, salaries, etc out of pocket.
Whatever you bring to the meeting won't be good enough, they'll send you back to change something at least once, even if you copy and paste someone else who has done an identical thing for a marginally different application.
If you run the gauntlet you'll get an approval to make your thing for ONE make/model of airplane. Want to put it on a Piper instead of a Cessna with the exact same engine? Go back to square one, repeat.
This all became the norm when? IP was extended to aircraft modifications, during the Clinton admin when the internet took off.
So you see, it isn't aviation that slowed aviation to an innovative standstill. The tech world's ideas of IP ideas did that. Prior to the advent of IP in aircraft paperwork, it was pretty common to be able to come up with an idea, sketch it out by hand, fly over to the local FAA office, demo it to an FAA engineer on the ramp, and have him help you go forward with it to get it approved. IP took away the motivation to innovate and created a motivation to fight back and forth with lawyers instead. You know... like tech corporations do with software patents.
This is a shocking level of corruption you're describing.
I had an airplane until 2018 that optionally shipped with a rather unique air conditioning system. Rather than the compressor being engine powered like most other cars and small piston engined airplanes, there was a second alternator on the engine used to drive an electric motor which in turn powered the compressor.
This was all done mostly for weight distribution. The design of the airplane was somewhat nose heavy because the factory added a turbo system with a cast-iron manifold. So they moved the A/C system to the tail with the electric motor for power, and put it all on a shelf behind the baggage compartment in the back.
Since the airplane was built in the mid 1990s the factory is out of business, they went bankrupt in the early 2000s. The supplier of the electric A/C system components is still in business but they only deal with helicopters now, they don't have anyone left at the company who knows about the airplane units they used to make. Only about 50 of the make/model of airplane with the turbocharger option were built, so there's no motivation to keep them going for anyone else who might make parts. The market is too small.
I found an aftermarket A/C system very similar to the one the factory built in the 1990s and with the maker of that system went to the FAA to get approval for it. The aftermarket system is actually simpler electrically. Rather than two alternators with a relay system it uses one of the largest alternators you can buy, on all of the airplane's existing electrical circuit. You just have to beef up the battery cables and the circuit breaker on the alternator to handle the extra amperage. It took us 6 months and ultimately a suggestion that we have a particular engineering firm look at our plans. They were basically requiring us to re-approve the entire system, even though the system is approved in other airplanes with identical engines. All we needed approval for was a larger alternator (minimal change to weight/balance) and the repurposing of a material made by Boeing for the rear shelf (we told them we intended to use the floorboard material that Boeing puts in 737s, it's a fiberglass sheet reinforced internally with an aluminum honeycomb mesh, that can bear about twice the weight per square inch that we needed to put on it).
They made us have that engineering firm submit stress and load test data on the shelf material that Boeing already uses for the 737.
The only reason we jumped through all the hoops was the fact that the aftermarket A/C system's installer has a relative that was a 30 year Embraer engineer. He would just help us do the drawings and calculus for free as long as his son's maintenance shop was going to get the installation job. Absent that, the ~$25,000 job would've been a $50,000 job, which just isn't worth it for an airplane that's worth less than $175,000 to start with.
When we were willing to turn over the copyright of the plans to the engineering firm we were suggested to hire to "review" the data for the requested approval, including them copying and pasting Boeing's stress and load test data for the floor material Boeing already uses, suddenly the floodgates opened and everyone was happy. The paper was all signed and we got permission to put a marginally different air conditioner in one make and model of airplane (of which only 50 exist in the wild).
From initial sales call to cool air in my airplane: about 8 months.
The time to install it for two guys was about a week of shop time. After all, they put it in dozens of other makes/models and it's all the same stuff.
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If you want another example, you can go down the rabbit hole of a local (to me) company called Navworx, which was aggressively pursued and ultimately closed by the FAA, because the FAA changed the ADS-B spec rendering their ADS-B receiver worthless, after the spec had been in the field for about 3 or 4 years.
The ADS-B system has a "sleep mechanism" on the network, in which a data relay tower for a particular air traffic control sector will turn itself off if no ADS-B equipped airplanes are in its service area. The initial spec allowed a generic ID to report its presence in the sector and wake up the tower.
After Navworx had been making ADS-B receivers for old non-GPS equipped airplanes for about 3 - 4 years, the FAA pulled the rug out from under them by changing the spec and requiring any airplane requesting that the relay tower "wake up" have an FAA approved GPS unit installed. The initial spec only required an approved GPS for send + receive units, not receive-only units. After changing the spec with existing units already in the field, Dallas FSDO then promptly ordered Navworx to cease and desist manufacturing their previously approved ADS-B receive-only unit for older airplanes.
In effect, people who had a traffic display in an old airplane (an obvious safety benefit) were ordered to take their traffic display out and throw it away, and go back to flying without a traffic display unless they were willing to pay $10,000 for a GPS.
It just so happens that the Dallas FSDO was also the FAA office that approved Garmin's ADS-B boxes (which were technically inferior and more costly than Navworx's ADS-B boxes on initial release), and at the time Garmin was the only aftermarket supplier of approved GPS units. There was another maker of standalone ADS-B receivers with integral GPS units also in the Dallas area dealing with the Dallas FSDO, which was sold to a private equity fund that buys DoD / CIA / NSA contractors.
I leave it to you to ask yourself whether all these facts are relevant to who the FAA decided to close down and who the FAA decided to protect the market of...
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This business model of the FAA guaranteeing the work for legal and engineering consultants in pervasive across the entire spectrum of things they license.
Wanna buy a King Air 350 and charter it to dentists going to Aspen for the weekend when you're not flying it to lower the ownership cost? You have to hire an aviation specialized attorney and probably another consultant or two (read: someone who will sell you their paperwork) to represent you as the FAA goes through a manual review of your standard operating procedures (pilots, training, maintenance, the whole shebang) just like you were the first air charter service to ever buy a King Air 350 in the world.
It doesn't matter if you are literally copying and pasting another charter license approval for an identical airplane. Someone from the FAA office demands to physically show up at your hangar and look over the paper, pretend like he's never seen it all before, order a few changes, and then maybe approve or deny your request for a charter operator license after the second visit.