Quote Originally Posted by Mike M View Post
Set during certification? Reference? In the aircraft flight manual? Reference? How that applies to EAB? Reference? I'd love to do more reading, and I will. Reference? Chapter and verse?
Interesting discussion regarding "required flight crew". I could find references in 14 CFR part 23.1523 and 25.1523, both of which state, in part:

"The minimum flight crew must be established so that it is sufficient for safe operation considering..."

and then list stuff that they need to consider. Since these are both in the certification of aircraft sections, my interpretation would be that the MFG of the aircraft needs to determine how many required crewmembers there will be for the aircraft for it to be certified. That then implies that EVERY time the aircraft flies, required crew must be on board. So it's not a pilot's decision, and it's not on a flight by flight basis (I suppose unless the POH lists conditions under which different crewmembers might be required - i.e., VFR = 1 but IFR = 2). The aircraft type will determine how many crew is required.

Now, of course, EAB aircraft aren't type certificated. But using the logic of part 23 and part 25 (and who knows whether the FSDO would do so), the MFG of the plane (in my case, for my COZY MKIV, me) gets to determine how many required crewmembers are needed for the plane (not the aircraft designer, in my case, Nat Puffer - the MFG, by analogy). BUT, using the same logic as 23 and 25, whatever number I choose for required crew is then required for EVERY flight - I can't pick and choose some flights to have a 2nd person (or Cthulhu/FSM forbid, a third) be "required" for that flight so that they can take pics or retract the nose gear or take data or tell me good jokes. If I stupidly chose to get my plane's airworthiness certificate with "2 required crewmembers" (and I have no idea how that would happen for an EAB aircraft, but let's just say...) then EVERY flight would have to have 2 people on it to be legal.

So, I'm not at all sure how this applies to Ron's original question about 91.307, but it at least forced me to do a bit of research on what the hell "required crew" means (or seems to, or might in an EAB environment).

My $0.02.