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  #1  
Old 11-02-2007, 07:08 PM
N941WR's Avatar
N941WR N941WR is offline
 
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Default Carbs are dead, long live the Carbs!

This just in:

Quote:
Originally Posted by Precision Airmotive
http://www.precisionairmotive.com/pr-carbdiscon.htm
November 1, 2007

Precision Airmotive LLC has discontinued sales of all float carburetors and component parts as of November 1, 2007. This unfortunate situation is a result of our inability to obtain product liability insurance for the product line. Precision Airmotive LLC and its 43 employees currently manufacture and support the float carburetors used in nearly all carbureted general aviation aircraft flying today. Precision has been the manufacturers of these carburetors since 1990. These FAA-approved carburetors were designed as early as the 1930s and continue to fly over a million flight hours a year. After decades of service, the reliability of these carburetors speaks for itself.

Nonetheless, Precision has seen its liability insurance premiums rise dramatically, to the point that the premium now exceeds the total sales dollars for this entire product line. In the past, we have absorbed that cost, with the hope that the aviation industry as a whole would be able to help address this issue faced by Precision Airmotive, as well as many other small aviation companies. Our efforts have been unsuccessful.

This year, despite the decades of reliable service and despite the design approval by the Federal Aviation Administration, Precision Airmotive has been unable to obtain product liability insurance for the carburetor product line. While we firmly believe that the product is safe, as does the FAA, and well-supported by dedicated people both at Precision and at our independent product support centers, unfortunately the litigation costs for defending the carburetor in court are unsustainable for a small business such as Precision.

Therefore, as of November 1, 2007, Precision Airmotive LLC has been left with no choice but to cease production and support of its float carburetor line.

We are working with the engine manufacturers and others in the industry in an attempt to minimize the impact on general aviation and to provide future support for this product line. There is a substantial quantity of parts and carburetors stocked at our distributors, which should be sufficient to support the industry for a short time.


14800 40th Avenue N.E. · Marysville , WA 98271 · USA · Phone: (360) 651-8282 · Fax: (360) 651-8080
D A M N attorneys and the US legal system!

As I thought about this, we are very lucky. If this were a board for certified airplanes we would be in a load of hurt. As it is, we can switch over to FI w/o doing much of any paperwork. I can only imagine what the cost would be to convert a 1972 O-320 power Skyhawk to FI.

Someone has to pick up the parts business. Anyone for $700 floats?
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Last edited by N941WR : 11-02-2007 at 08:34 PM.
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  #2  
Old 11-02-2007, 07:17 PM
JHines JHines is offline
 
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Default

Well, the legal system aside, insurance companies have some pretty smart folks working for them that have a pretty good idea of what their payouts are likely to be, and pricing the product accordingly.

Which begs the question, do carbureted engines stop turning, leak, catch fire, or whatever more frequently than fuel-injected engines?
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  #3  
Old 11-02-2007, 07:23 PM
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AlexPeterson AlexPeterson is offline
 
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Default

We need to think of these types of problems as we re-elect lawyers to Congress. Funny thing, Congress' approval ratings are only 11%, but when people are asked how their representative/senator is, they respond much higher. Sort of a grass is browner over there type of situation?

I appreciate the question about reliability between carbs and FI, but the question in this context is irrelevant. With the legal system we have constructed, if you fly a perfectly good airplane into a mountain, the carburetor is also at fault. Any system in the plane with some money behind it is deemed "liable".
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  #4  
Old 11-02-2007, 07:40 PM
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az_gila az_gila is offline
 
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Exclamation Parts?

"....cease production and support of its float carburetor line."

Does anyone else make replacement parts?

Or is this an end to even the parts stream?

gil A.... FI looking better....
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  #5  
Old 11-02-2007, 07:53 PM
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gmcjetpilot gmcjetpilot is offline
 
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Default I am truly SHOCKED!

Wow! really WOW!

I've talked to their customer service guys on several occasions and heard them elude to or lament about lawsuits. Every time someone ran out of fuel they sued for not telling them they could not fly without fuel.

This product line has been around a long time. The line of products goes back to Wheeler-Schebler and 1902. In 1928 it became one of the founding companies of Borg-Warner Corporation and was now called Marvel-Schebler. It was later bought by Facet, Consolidated and last Precision Airmotive, Inc. in 1990. May be someone will buy it?

With all that history and countless old Carbs sitting and flying around, that's a lot of potential lawsuits. Cessna ended up putting a placard on the panel to cover their legal backside. The placard said failure to check quality and quantity of fuel may result in serious injury or death.

I recommend Carbs for a long time over FI but switched over to FI, especially if buying a new engine, since purchase price between carb / FI is now close. The price of Carbs kept going up to the point it cost almost as much as FI. I knew that the rise in Carb prices was from product liability.

I should not be shocked, it was inevitable but I thought the company would be sold again. Mom's and Dad's tell you kids don't grow up to be cowboys or build things which have huge product liability.

P.S., I would not pat the insurance companies on the back. They just want to make as much money as possible. Nothing wrong with that, but clearly helping people takes a backseat. The goal is to calculate the odds. They are called Actuaries. Job #1 - take in as much money and pay out as little as possible. It's not like they can't cover the risk and still make money. It's about making 7.5 billion verses 4.5 billion. It's called greed.

Insurance drops homeowners from coverage for natural causes, flood, fire, storm and earthquake where people NEED that coverage. Nice. They drop people who need medical insurance due to preexisting conditions Nice. It makes sense from a statistical standpoint, but than insurance companies wounder why people hate them. I have been paying Car, Home and Medical insurance for decades and never made a claim, save a minor one. I wish I did not make that claim. They punished me and raised my insurance to make me pay for it anyway, even though it was not my fault. Nice. The same thing happens in coverage for our planes. They have a corner on the market. The attitude is take it or leave it. Nice.

They may be smart at the insurance companies. I understand free-market, capitalism and profit, but insurance companies SOP is drop coverage or refuse to pay coverage for the most needy, while making more money than imaginable. That leaves a bad taste in my mouth. "For a lack of a better word, it's GREED. Greed is good." The richest and most profitable businesses in the world are insurance companies. They HATE to pay out. Their job is NOT to pay out and drop any coverage that does not make MAX profit. I understand that, but don't tell me insurance companies are not full of conflict of interest. States regulate and NEED to regulate insurance companies because THEY have a bad reputation.[/b] Insurance companies rarely do things out of the goodness of their heart.

Good news is there are parts avaiable from Kelly-Aerospace.
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Last edited by gmcjetpilot : 11-02-2007 at 08:41 PM.
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  #6  
Old 11-02-2007, 08:12 PM
asav8tor asav8tor is offline
 
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Someone in the heathcare insurance section at AIG transfered over to the acft section. They were told "If everyone would get on the Atkins diet and cut the carbs we would save X millions in claims" Now they find to their horror GA is using carbs and wants to cut them to save money.
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  #7  
Old 11-02-2007, 08:50 PM
hngrflyr hngrflyr is offline
 
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Their are groups in this country who want to kill general aviation. What more effective way than price our fuel out of reach and cut off our supply of support parts. If they get their way, very soon there won't be a certified airplane that will be legal to fly, even if you can buy fuel for it.

Haven't you noticed? That's the way our system works these days.
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  #8  
Old 11-02-2007, 08:59 PM
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Mike S Mike S is offline
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Default

Quote:
Originally Posted by JHines View Post
Well, the legal system aside, insurance companies have some pretty smart folks working for them that have a pretty good idea of what their payouts are likely to be, and pricing the product accordingly.
Yep, but it is the lawyers and legal system that has created the obscenely huge payouts in the first place.
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  #9  
Old 11-02-2007, 09:14 PM
JHines JHines is offline
 
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Default

My point about the insurance companies is, they raise rates or drop coverage when it's unprofitable (or not profitable enough) - when they are expecting to have to make big payouts.

There is only so much room to "extort" payments for a product if it is truly safe - there are real processes in place to counteract frivolous and excessive awards. And by the way, at least one court has already held that GARA cuts off Precision's liability for carbs over 18 yrs. old.

I'm not defending bad pilots or their lawyers that just cast about looking for a payday- only pointing out that, what you may hear about how much litigation and liability has "hurt" aviation ought to be taken with a grain of salt. Reasonable awards and non-meritorious cases dismissed on summary judgment don't make for nearly as exciting news as $3M hot cups of coffee or $2M BMW paint jobs.

Look at it from this perspective. Think about every airplane crash you've ever heard about on the radio or seen on TV. Being a pilot/owner/builder, how accurate was the reporting?
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  #10  
Old 11-02-2007, 09:33 PM
Kyle Boatright Kyle Boatright is offline
 
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Some smart individual (call him X) will buy the assets of the company, then lease the assets to a corporation (call it Y)which will build new parts and carbs. The lease rate will be high enough to insure "X" makes a good profit. The new corporation "Y", will forgo buying liability insurance and will do a good job of minimizing assets (by paying out most of its $$ in salaries and lease costs). If the company gets sued, it simply goes out of business and someone starts company "Z" to do the exact sames thing.

There are more than a few companies in aviation running this business model. It is a good model to avoid being sued, simply because it isn't worth suing the manufacturer unless it has assets or insurance.
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