One of the last before Experimental came into being.
Vag277
re. your AABA comments, that was a system that was a disaster for amateur builder, in the best Australian fashion bureaucratic, inflexible and expensive. Accordingly, the SAAA version of an Experimental Amateur Built category, as they presented it to Leroy Keith, never saw the light of day in 1997, it was AABA rebadged. It was promptly canned, in its entirety.
That is why we adopted the US style Experimental amateur built, not bureaucratic, not inflexible, no limitations on design, and as cheap or as expensive as YOU wanted to make it, but eliminating all the mandated SAAA costs. The SAAA "business model" was a handbrake on amateur building, as subsequent events demonstrated so graphically.
And no, there wasn't an upsurge in accidents, despite the "expert" predictions, but there was a huge upsurge in VH- amateur building, and particularly when we arranged an amateur built register for RAOz, ne. AUF.
The numbers really took of after 1998, in 10 years AUF/RAOz number went from under 3000 to over 10,000 members, and the aircraft numbers did likewise.
I was there, too.
Tootle pip!!
PS: The AABA "C.of A" was not a legitimate C.of A. at all, just an affectation, in reality it was no better than a Permit to Fly of the day, or the subsequent Experimental Certificate