I was recently perusing old (ancient?) copies of the RVator, and noted the Mother Ship apparently started posting the counter for flying RVs sometime in 1997 .... the oldest counter I show is February '97 and it shows 1556 RVs flying. Later that year, the counter showed 1704 in the August '97 issue. Jumping forward to today, the RV counter is at 9182. Basic cipherin' shows 7478 RVs gone airborne over 18yrs, 1 month. That's an average of 415 RVs per year, 34 RV's per month, or more than ONE PER DAY across nearly 20 years.
My brother then opined, "I wonder how that compares to Piper Cubs, Ercoupes, etc?" A little probing around in Wikipedia reveals production numbers for popular GA makes as follows:
Navions - 2,634
Cessna 170s - 5,174
Stinson 108s - 5,260
Ercoupes - 5,685
J-3 Cubs - 19,388
Bonanzas - 17,000 (all variations, all years '47 - '82)
Cherokee series - 32,778+ (incl. Warriors, Archers, Arrows, etc; 1961-2015)
So rejoice, RV fanatics! Our wondrous RV builder community is a bigger deal than many us realized. We have enabled Van to nail down a significant place in general aviation history.
My brother then opined, "I wonder how that compares to Piper Cubs, Ercoupes, etc?" A little probing around in Wikipedia reveals production numbers for popular GA makes as follows:
Navions - 2,634
Cessna 170s - 5,174
Stinson 108s - 5,260
Ercoupes - 5,685
J-3 Cubs - 19,388
Bonanzas - 17,000 (all variations, all years '47 - '82)
Cherokee series - 32,778+ (incl. Warriors, Archers, Arrows, etc; 1961-2015)
So rejoice, RV fanatics! Our wondrous RV builder community is a bigger deal than many us realized. We have enabled Van to nail down a significant place in general aviation history.
