Aircraft Documents & Airworthiness

Required aircraft documents — ARROW

Memorize this — it appears on every checkride and ramp check:

• Airworthiness Certificate — § 91.203(a)(1)
• Registration Certificate — § 91.203(a)(2)
• Radio station license (international ops only — FCC requirement, not FAA)
• Operating handbook / AFM / POH — § 91.9
• Weight & balance data — required from the equipment list, also covered under § 91.9

Only the airworthiness certificate has to be displayed. § 91.203(b) requires it at the cabin or cockpit entrance, legible to passengers or crew. The registration must be within the aircraft under (a)(2) but need not be displayed, and nor must the flight manual or the weight and balance data. “Both certificates on display” is the usual wrong answer on a ramp check and in the oral.

14 CFR § 91.205 — Required equipment

The “ATOMATOFLAMES” / “FLAPS” mnemonics cover § 91.205(b), the day-VFR list, but they were built around airplanes and several items in that list simply do not reach a helicopter. Read the paragraph rather than the mnemonic: (b)(10) landing-gear position indicator applies only if the gear retracts; (b)(11) the anticollision light requirement is written for small civil airplanes certificated after 11 March 1996; (b)(14) shoulder harnesses are an airplane manufacture-date rule, while the rotorcraft equivalent is (b)(17) — a shoulder harness for each seat on rotorcraft manufactured after 16 September 1992. (b)(15) is the ELT, if required by § 91.207. There is no airspeed-indicator exception for helicopters anywhere in the paragraph: (b)(1) applies to every aircraft on the list.

For night VFR, add (per § 91.205(c)):

• Approved position lights
• Approved aviation red or white anti-collision light system
• Adequate source of electrical energy for installed equipment
• One spare set of fuses (or three of each kind required)
• An electric landing light (if for hire)

For IFR, add (per § 91.205(d)) — the GRABCARD list:

• Generator/alternator of adequate capacity
• Radios / nav appropriate to ground facilities
• Attitude indicator
• Ball (slip-skid)
• Clock with sweep-second/digital seconds
• Altimeter, sensitive (adjustable for barometric pressure)
• Rate of turn indicator
• Directional gyro / heading indicator

14 CFR § 91.213 — Inoperative equipment

If equipment is inoperative, you may legally fly only if one of these applies:

• The aircraft has an approved Minimum Equipment List (MEL) (§ 91.213(a)) and the inop item is permitted by the MEL
• The inop equipment is not required by:
  • The VFR-Day type-certification equipment list, OR
  • The aircraft's equipment list / Kinds of Operations Equipment List (KOEL), OR
  • 14 CFR § 91.205, OR
  • Any other rule (e.g., § 91.207 ELT)
  • An airworthiness directive requiring it to be operational (§ 91.213(d)(2)(iv)) — a separate condition from the three above, and the one most easily forgotten
• The inoperative item is either removed, with the cockpit control placarded and the maintenance recorded under § 43.9, or deactivated and placarded “Inoperative” — § 91.213(d)(3). A mechanic is required only where the deactivation itself involves maintenance; where it does not, the pilot may deactivate and placard. Under (d)(4) the determination that the item is not a hazard may be made by either an appropriately rated pilot or a maintenance person.
• Worth knowing for this fleet: the no-MEL route at § 91.213(d)(1) is written for rotorcraft, non-turbine airplanes, gliders and lighter-than-air aircraft — it is the route most helicopter operations actually use.

The flowchart: required by 91.205? — required by KOEL/AFM? — required by another reg? If "no" to all three, placard and fly. Otherwise, ground.

14 CFR § 91.409 — Inspections

The inspection cycles you must verify before flight — "AAV1ATE" remembers them all:

• Annual inspection — every 12 calendar months (§ 91.409(a))
• Airworthiness Directives — compliance status verified (§ 39.3)
• VOR check — every 30 days for IFR ops (§ 91.171)
• 100-hour inspection — required if used for hire or flight instruction for hire (§ 91.409(b)). May be exceeded by not more than 10 hours only while en route to a place where the inspection can be done — and the excess counts against the next 100 hours, so it is borrowed, not free.
• Altimeter / static system — every 24 calendar months for IFR ops (§ 91.411)
• Transponder — every 24 calendar months (§ 91.413)
• ELT — battery replaced/recharged after 1 cumulative hour of use or 50% of useful life; inspection within 12 calendar months of the last one (§ 91.207(d)) — noting § 91.207(a) is written for airplanes, so this bites a helicopter only where an ELT is installed or required by another rule

For commercial helicopter ops, the 100-hour inspection becomes the dominant cycle — flight schools and tour operators see it constantly.

14 CFR § 39.3 — Airworthiness Directives

• ADs are legally enforceable rules issued by the FAA when an unsafe condition exists or is likely to exist in a product (aircraft, engine, propeller, appliance).
• AD compliance is mandatory before further flight unless the AD itself permits continued operation under specific conditions.
• Categorized as Emergency ADs (immediate compliance), Standard ADs (compliance by date or hours), or Recurring ADs (e.g., every 100 hours).
• Compliance status must be recorded in the aircraft's permanent records (§ 91.417). Owner/operator responsibility is in § 91.403.
• Service bulletins from the manufacturer are not mandatory unless made mandatory by an AD that references them.

Search current ADs at the FAA Dynamic Regulatory System (DRS). The Robinson R-22 / R-44 fleet sees frequent ADs — your CPL oral may include "name a recent helicopter AD."

14 CFR Part 47 — Aircraft registration

• Aircraft must be registered to a US owner to operate in the US — § 47.3.
• A Certificate of Aircraft Registration expires seven years after the last day of the month it was issued, and renewal is applied for in the six months before that date — § 47.40(a) and (b). The three-year term some study material still quotes came from the 2010 rulemaking and has since been extended.
• § 47.69 — Dealer's Registration: only valid for required flight testing, or flights necessary for/incident to its sale. A prospective buyer may operate the aircraft for demonstration purposes only, under the direct supervision of the dealer or their agent.
• Registration online via registry.faa.gov.