The ultralights of the 1980s looked like, but weren't, toys. Because of their appearance, a lot of people who had no business in the business seat of an aircraft tried to fly them. Those were the days when ultralights, sometimes called "flying lawn chairs," had bad reputations for biting the untrained assembler, mechanic, or pilot. Materials in some of the designs lacked adequate strength, and some designs themselves were poorly engineered. The engines were heavy, short on power, and finicky, to say the least.
What's worse, more than a few of the pilots who attempted to fly these craft were untrained. Yet, none of these deterrents took away the basic fact that in a time when flying became increasingly unaffordable for the masses and increasingly challenging for pilots (with the controller strike and product liability), ultralight flying came as close as you could get to the good old days of no radio, low and slow aviation. Being out in the slipstream at 500 feet, cruising at 40 mph, is the purest, most addicting kind of fun an aviation junkie can find. I know. I got my start writing about ultralights, and to write about them, I had to fly them.
So I flew the Minimax, the Challenger, the Carleson Sparrow, the Kolb Fire Fly, and the Air Commander Gyroplanes. I had fun. Some of the craft handled like Cessna 152s, although others exhibited a few singular flying qualities you had to get used to. They were all single-seaters, and if I hadn't already owned a CFI rating and a few others, I'd never have ventured near them. Flying any of the above named craft without training was (and is today) foolhardy.
The FAA knew a problem was in the making, but didn't really want to deal with it. So some of the brightest minds in this grassroots movement joined together to form the United States Ultralight Association (USUA) in 1985. These pioneers forged a set of rules of their own, Federal Aviation Regulation Part 103.
USUA created a training program, persuaded manufacturers to build two-place craft to be used exclusively for training pilots, persuaded the FAA to create a training exemption for these bigger craft, and certified its own instructors.
Thirteen years later the self-policing system works. Yes, better, lighter engines and stronger construction material has played a large part in the ultralights' much-improved safety record. Yes, the advent of the ballistic parachute recovery system (now making its way into certificated aircraft) has saved a lot of lives, too. But it's the USUA's initiative in training ultralight pilots that will endure as the largest contribution to the growth and overall safety of this once upstart industry. If the organization hadn't stepped in to police its own industry and provide a mechanism for creating safe, well-trained pilots, there is no way the movement could have thrived.
The ultralight movement has spawned countless new "real aircraft" homebuilt designs, including helicopters and multiengine machines. Some complain that the improvements have made the machines too expensive to be considered truly entry-level, just-for-fun aviation. Yet every improvement has benefited safety and polished the overall image of ultralight flying. Now flying ultralights is both fun and safe. Would you begrudge any industry that?
