FAQ

ICON A5 Questions

Wherever I stop people typically have a lot of questions about the A5.
Here's some of the ones I get most often:
  • Have you landed on the water?

    Yes! Many, many, many times - both on lakes and on the ocean (when waves are below one foot).

    The ICON transition training courses are heavily focused on water operations, and they are required to be endorsed for the A5.

  • What's the A5 cruise speed?

    About 80-85 knots

  • What's the A5 range?

    If it's just me I can carry a full 20 gallons of fuel, which gives me about 350nm with my preferred one hour fuel reserve. 

    With a second person I can't carry full fuel, so the range is more like 180nm.

  • What engine is in the A5?

    A Rotax 912 iS

    • Horizontal 4-cylinder
    • Fuel injected
    • Water and air cooled
    • 100hp

    The Rotax engine can run on 100LL avgas or 91 octane automotive gas and switch between them at any time.

  • What's the fuel burn rate of the A5?

    In cruise it's typically under four gal/hour.

  • What's the A5 landing speed?

    Around 55-60 knots but, honestly, I barely look at the airspeed indicator on landing. I'm watching the angle of attack indicator. When that's on the horizontal white line then I'm at the proper approach AoA, which is a more accurate indication of how the wing is performing regardless of bank angle, speed, G-load, weight etc.

    Then it's just a matter of managing power to control descent rate and hit my landing mark.

  • What are the A5 safety features?

    The ICON Aircraft website has information on the safety features of the A5.

  • Is the A5 actually shipping?

    Yes! ICON continues to deliver aircraft to customers regularly. 

    As of this writing, there are about 100 A5s currently out in the wild, with more being added every day.

  • What are the full A5 Specs

    See the ICON Aircraft website for the full rundown of A5 specs as well as more details on the aircraft and its systems.

  • What's the price of an A5?

    For specific price information, you should contact ICON Aircraft directly from THIS web page.

    If you're interested in purchasing an A5, be sure to mention my name as a reference.

  • There are planes with faster speed and longer range. Why would you choose the A5?

    The primary mission of the A5 is going out on a beautiful day and having fun punching holes in the sky. It's not designed to be a fast way of getting from one place to another with tons of cargo, so judging it's specifications under that criteria is totally missing the point.

    Check out this page for a longer explanation of my mission and why the ICON A5 works for me.

Gear Questions

Here's a list of gear I've tested and selected for this trip.
Compact and lightweight were important factors in choosing what to bring into the relatively small A5 cockpit.
  • Bose A20 Headset

    When I started fixed wing transition training, I was using a David Clark helicopter headset that I already owned. While it was a great headset back in 1998, after trying some active noise cancelling headsets I knew I could never go back. The Bose A20 was light, comfortable and had really good noise cancelling.

  • Garmin GDL50 ADS-B Receiver

    I chose the GDL50 mostly because it integrates with the Garmin Aera796 that's built into the A5 and is also compatible with ForeFlight. 

    I previously used a Scout and then a Stratus2 and was very happy with those, but being able to see traffic and weather directly on the Aera796 pushed me over to the GDL50.

    I decided not to go all out and get the GDL52 because the Aera796 has XM capabilities if I ever decide to go for that.

  • iPad Mini 5 with 'My Clip' strap

    The A5 cockpit is not super roomy. It's not crazy small, but there isn't a lot of extra room for - stuff. You have to keep it minimalist.

    The newly updated iPad Mini 5 is small enough to fit on my leg but has a big enough screen to be useful when working on ForeFlight.

    I did a LOT of searching around for an iPad kneeboard that would work in the A5. In the end, the simple 'My Clip' solution worked the best. It holds the iPad securely in place without adding bulk or extra options that I don't have room for. 

  • ForeFlight EFB

    ForeFlight is the first EFB I was exposed to and, in my opinion, has the most intuitive interface of all the ones I've tried. The only downside is I can't transfer flight plans between Foreflight and the Aera796, but so far that hasn't been a big enough deal to make me look to another solution.

  • Canon M50 Mirrorless Camera

    I was always a little frustrated with pics that I took using my phone, especially from the air. Everything  looked too far away or I had to sacrifice image quality to zoom in.

    The Canon M50 strikes a nice balance of compact size, features , image quality, and price with the ability to switch to a longer lens if I want to get some more interesting shots.

    I am not a high-end photographer, and a larger DSLR wouldn't fit as easily inside the A5 cockpit, so it works well for my needs.

  • Action Cameras

    I'll be documenting my flights with several GoPro Hero7 cameras.

    I did test the Garmin VIRB Ultra 30 and I actually prefer it in some ways over the GoPro, but it had a major deal-breaker. There's no easy way to connect both external power and external audio on the VIRB, and I need to be able to record in-cockpit audio for at least 2-3 hours at a time. I wanted to use all the same type of cameras and GoPro has an external audio adapter that provides both power and a mic input, so that swung my decision. 

  • Insta360 One

    Capturing 360 video of my flights really changes how the experience is shared. It's much more immersive and viewers can look around in any direction [which sometimes isn't the most flattering, I have to say]. The big advantage of the Insta360 is its size. It's not too obtrusive in the cockpit while still having decent resolution. Because it creates pretty large files, I'm only going to break this out when it makes sense to capture 360 video.

  • Garmin InReach Mini

    This little tracker updates the map on this website with my current location as well as the path I've traveled.

    It's also an important piece of survival gear if I ever get into trouble or have to make an off-field landing. With satellite texting and an SOS button, I can call for help and have an interactive conversation to speed up the search and rescue. Hopefully, I'll never need to test that, though.

My Aviation Story

My first memories of flying are when I was about six years old riding in the back seat of a sailplane with my father. He would let me take the controls and put his hands over his head so I could see that I was really flying. I may not have fully realized it then, but I was hooked.
My dad is a natural teacher, so even when we weren't flying he would explain to me the physics of flight, how NDB and VOR navigation worked [pre-GPS], the airspace system and general procedures. It was basically free ground school and I think it helped Pops keep that stuff fresh in his head as well.

Pops was in partnerships on a few planes over the years and every so often he would fly the family from Michigan to the east coast for vacations. I was his co-pilot, navigator and autopilot for those trips, which gave me some real hands-on experience and really cemented my interest in flying.

I 'officially' started my flight training in Ionia, Michigan when I was 14 - flying an old Schweizer 2-33 sailplane. I soloed in gliders at age 16, but shortly afterward school and other parts of life pushed flying down on the priority list. 

I didn't pick it back up again until my late 20s, when I considered pursuing a job flying helicopters for an air ambulance service. I went to work getting my private pilot certificate in a Robinson R-22 at Torrance Airport [Zamperini Field], home of Robinson Helicopters. I got my ticket in September 1998 and started building hours toward my commercial license.
 
Problem was, my 'real' job was keeping me busy and, frankly, paying pretty well. So it was a tough choice to go from making money at a job that I enjoyed, to spending money on a career change that most likely wouldn't pay as well even if it would mean I got to fly all the time.

For some, the passion for flying, and that lifestyle, is a stronger draw. But, when push came to shove for me, I chose to stick with my regular job. It would be almost 20 years before I climbed back into a General Aviation aircraft as Pilot in Command.

It was the ICON A5 that got me back into flying. This amphibious light sport airplane is so incredibly well-designed and well thought out. It looks the way I always felt planes should be - inside and out. It's easy to fly and, above all, very safe. 

In early 2016 I spent six months getting back up to speed with all the changes in general aviation and doing my fixed wing transition in a steam gauge Cessna 172. I followed that up with the ICON Transition Training shortly before taking delivery of one of the first ICON A5 aircraft to be available outside the company.

Since then I've gone on to complete transition training on the Cirrus SR-20 as well as getting my tailwheel endorsement in a Super Decathalon. I feel it's important to keep flying a lot of different types of aircraft to avoid getting stagnant or complacent. But the A5 is the plane I decided to own and the one I enjoy flying the most.