General aviation aircraft

This category covers manufacturers of piston and light certificated aircraft for private, training and personal flying. A single-engine turboprop or a utility aircraft sits in its own guide, and a business jet in another, because the certification work and the support model diverge as the aircraft gets heavier. The boundary that matters to a buyer is not the engine count. It is the certification basis, and it is public.

The certification basis is the aircraft's real specification

Part 23 prescribes the airworthiness standards for type certificates in the normal category, which applies to airplanes with a passenger seating configuration of nineteen or fewer and a maximum certificated takeoff weight of 19,000 pounds or less, sorted into certification levels by seating.¹ Since the rewrite, the part states outcomes and the FAA accepts means of compliance against them, which is why two aircraft certificated a generation apart can both be legal and be nothing alike.¹ The FAA publishes the full amendment history of Part 23 with effective dates, so you can see which standards were in force when a type was approved.² Ask a seller which amendment the type certificate is based on. An older basis is not a fault, and it does explain why a design has the stall behaviour, the crashworthiness provisions and the systems it has, and why bringing a new capability onto it takes an approval rather than a software load.

What a buyer decides

Ask for useful load with full fuel, at the equipped weight of the actual aircraft, not the brochure aircraft. Ask what the airframe, engine and propeller life or overhaul intervals are, and what remains on the specific serial number. Ask which avionics are installed under which approval, and whether the installation is on the type design or on somebody else's supplemental type certificate. Ask how parts are supplied for the type, how long the manufacturer commits to that, and what an out-of-production part costs when it is only made by a parts manufacturer approval holder. For a training operator, ask the same questions again with the utilisation you actually plan, because the answers change at 600 hours a year.

Where the public record can be checked

Any aircraft on the United States civil register can be looked up by N-number, serial number, make and model, or registered name, and the file is updated each federal working day.³ The registry proves identity and registration status. It does not prove airworthiness, condition or the completeness of the logbooks, and the FAA runs a procedure under 49 U.S.C. 44114(b) by which private owners can have personal details withheld from the public site.³ Airworthiness directives are the enforceable half. The FAA issues an AD when an unsafe condition exists in a product and is likely to exist or develop in other products of the same type design, and the AD applies to aircraft, engines, propellers and appliances.⁴ Search the type, the engine and the propeller separately, and ask for the compliance record for each recurring directive.

Questions that sort sellers

Ask for the type certificate data sheet and read the equipment list against the aircraft in front of you. Ask which modifications are installed and whose approvals they are. Ask what the last annual inspection found and what was deferred. Ask who in the region maintains the type, because a cheap aircraft with no local shop is not cheap.

The companies below are listed on public facts, each with its source linked.