Regulation
Replica or original?
Headset review
LAA Chief Engineer, Francis Donaldson, explains how the aviation equivalent of Trigger’s broom may, or may not, be agreed to be an original!
R
ecently, we at HQ, have had a number of enquiries from the CAA Registrations Department asking us whether we can vouch for the fact that a particular LAA-style aircraft that’s being added to the register is indeed the aircraft that it claims to be. Sometimes, this is straightforward but there are other cases where the discussions have been complicated and verging on the surreal – certainly not engineering. Given that inevitably, the question involves the fulfilment of one of our member’s dreams, replying to these questions in a fair and transparent manner has needed a great deal of care. The problem usually hinges around whether the project is an original factory-built aircraft that’s been restored, or an aircraft that’s been built, perhaps incorporating a few pieces of an original, and perhaps with an associated old logbook belonging to the aircraft bearing an original identity, but not qualifying as deserving to be classed as more than a replica.
Provenance
Below The stunningly beautiful Miles Whitney Straight was rebuilt by Ron Souch and his small team at Aero Antiques. Very little of the original woodwork remains, although a lot of the original metal parts were salvageable, and the aircraft rightly retains its original identity. Photo: Ed Hicks, FLYER.
In the vintage car world, as in the art world, issues of provenance are of course treated very seriously. If a modern company makes a car that looks exactly like a Jaguar XK 120 in every respect, inside and out, so that its parts were indistinguishable from the original, in the vintage car world it wouldn’t be considered to be a Jaguar XK120 because it hadn’t been built by Jaguar. In the same way, in our world, the convention is that unless an aeroplane – a Stampe for example – was originally built by the original manufacturer (or a manufacturer licensed to produce Stampes) who issued a serial number for it, then it isn’t a Stampe.
Replica or reproduction
In the aviation world the convention is that ‘replica’ is the term used to describe an aircraft that has no original identity, and the powers-that-be are rigorous in including this term in the designation so as to avoid any risk of confusion. Some have suggested that ‘replica’ should be used for a merely lookalike machine (for example the reduced-scale WAR Replica WWII fighters) and to give it due distinction, the part-for-part identical copy should be called a ‘reproduction’. This idea seems to have failed to find traction with the CAA, however, who’ve stuck to the all-embracing ‘replica’.
‘Official’ plans builts
The situation is different if the plans for a factory-built aircraft are later knowingly and legitimately supplied to the amateur-built market, with the intention that amateurbuilt examples can be built from them. In that case, as with the Jodel and Emeraude ranges for example, amateur-built examples are not termed replicas because amateur-building of certain models was officially sanctioned by the respective designers. This contrasts with the situation where, for example, de Havilland drawings have been available for many years from BAE Systems, and latterly DHSL, only on the strict proviso that they are not to be used for the purpose of building new aircraft, only for maintaining the existing factory-built fleet.
Type certificate responsibility
In the aviation world, there’s another side to it again, because of liability, where the original manufacturer of a certified aircraft (or those who subsequently pick up the 66 | LIGHT AVIATION | April 2021
