Inoperative Equipment Under 91.213: Can the Airplane Fly?

You've got the club 172 for the afternoon, and during preflight the landing light won't come on. Can you go? Under 14 CFR 91.213(d), a piston airplane without a Minimum Equipment List can fly with inoperative equipment only if that item isn't required by the type certificate, the equipment list or KOEL, 91.205, or an AD, and only after it's removed or deactivated, placarded "Inoperative," and judged not to be a hazard. For a dead landing light on a day VFR flight, the answer is usually yes. For a dead fuel gauge, it's no. And in most clubs and schools, the renter isn't the person allowed to do the deactivating and placarding.

1. How 91.213(d) works when there's no MEL

Most club and school airplanes are small pistons with no MEL, which is exactly what 91.213(d) covers. It lets you take off with something broken only if every condition below holds.

First, the inoperative item must not be any of these four things:

1. Part of the VFR-day instruments and equipment prescribed by the airworthiness regulations the aircraft was type certificated under.
2. Shown as required on the aircraft's equipment list, or on the Kinds of Operations Equipment List (KOEL) for the kind of flight you're making. Newer POHs carry a KOEL. Older airplanes may only have the equipment list in the weight and balance papers.
3. Required by 91.205 or any other rule in Part 91 for that kind of operation. Day VFR, night VFR and IFR each have their own list.
4. Required to be operational by an airworthiness directive.

Then the item has to be removed from the aircraft (with the cockpit control placarded and the maintenance recorded under 43.9), or deactivated and placarded "Inoperative." The rule adds that if deactivation involves maintenance, it must be done and recorded under Part 43. Last, a certificated and appropriately rated pilot, or a person rated to maintain the aircraft, has to determine that the inoperative item isn't a hazard to the aircraft.

Meet all of that and the regulation says the aircraft "is considered to be in a properly altered condition acceptable to the Administrator." Miss any piece and you're flying an unairworthy airplane, and under 91.7 the pilot in command owns the call on whether it's in condition for safe flight.

2. Three squawks, worked through

Three common trainer squawks run through the four checks. Your own equipment list, KOEL and AD history decide the real answer, so treat this as the method.

Landing light, day VFR

91.205(b) doesn't list a landing light for day VFR. The only landing light requirement in 91.205 is for night flight when the aircraft is operated for hire, under 91.205(c)(4). If the equipment list or KOEL doesn't call for it on day VFR and no AD applies, it can be deferred. Once it's deactivated, placarded and logged, a day VFR flight is legal. The same airplane can't go out on a paid night flight until it's fixed.

Fuel quantity gauge

91.205(b)(9) requires a fuel gauge showing the quantity in each tank for day VFR. Check three fails, so the airplane is grounded until it's repaired. Dipping the tanks doesn't change that.

Second nav/com, day VFR

A second radio isn't on the 91.205(b) day VFR list. Two-way radio and navigation equipment "suitable for the route to be flown" shows up under IFR in 91.205(d)(2). Airspace rules elsewhere in Part 91 can still require a working radio for where you're going, which is why check three says "any other rule of this part." If the first radio works, the route allows it, and nothing else on the list requires the second one, it's a straightforward deferral.

3. Can a pilot deactivate and placard inoperative equipment?

The regulation lets a pilot make the hazard determination. Who may do the deactivation is less clear in the rule itself, and the FAA's current guidance takes a strict line. AC 91-67A, issued October 16, 2023, says "Deactivation of an inoperative system is not preventive maintenance as described in part 43 appendix A." It says that whatever the method, including pulling and securing a circuit breaker, a person authorized to approve the aircraft for return to service under 43.7 must make the 43.9 maintenance record entry, and "No person may operate the aircraft without the entry required by § 43.9." The AC also points out that turning a switch off doesn't remove power from the system.

That's narrower than the old hangar wisdom. The original 1991 AC 91-67 was canceled on November 3, 2017. An AC isn't a regulation, but if your FSDO or your insurer reads it the way it's written, a renter collaring a breaker and taping a label next to the switch hasn't completed a legal deferral. Pilots can perform preventive maintenance under 43.3(g) on aircraft they own or operate, but the Appendix A list of preventive maintenance items doesn't include deactivating systems.

The placard itself is simple. AC 91-67A asks for a legible label next to the affected control or indicator that doesn't cover anything else, with the wording left to the operator. 91.405(c) then requires the owner or operator to have each item deferred under 91.213(d) repaired, replaced, removed or inspected at the next required inspection. So a deferral lasts until the next annual or 100-hour at most.

4. Who decides in a flying club or flight school?

The rule describes what a pilot may decide. A club or school is the operator, and the operator gets to be stricter, and should be. Twenty renters each making their own 91.213 call on the same airplane will reach about six different answers. The policies that hold up tend to share a few lines:

• Renters and students never defer anything. Their job is to write the squawk, decide whether they're willing to fly, and call the person named in the policy.
• One named role, usually the maintenance officer in a club or the director of maintenance in a school, decides on deferrals, working with the A&P who deactivates, placards and signs the logbook entry.
• Anything on the 91.205 list for any operation the airplane routinely flies grounds it, even if today's flight wouldn't need it. A trainer that flies at night shouldn't be carrying a dead nav light for two weeks just because the next booking is in daylight.
• Every deferral has an expiry date no later than the next required inspection, and the placard text matches what the logbook says.
• The PIC can always refuse an airplane that's legally deferred. Write that into the policy so nobody gets billed or pressured for saying no.

5. The squawk-to-grounding workflow

The pilot who gets hurt by a bad handoff is usually the second one, who books the airplane Sunday morning and finds out about Saturday's problem during the runup. A workflow that closes that gap runs like this:

1. The pilot who finds it writes it up in the shared system, at the airplane, with a photo if that helps. Don't put it in a group text.
2. The pilot marks it as grounding when it's on the four-check list or they don't know. Grounding something that turns out to be deferrable costs a few hours. Missing one that isn't costs a lot more.
3. Grounding takes the airplane off the schedule and tells the people already booked, so nobody drives to the field for it.
4. The maintenance role either sends it to the shop or records a 91.213(d) deferral: the basis, the expiry date, the placard wording and the logbook reference.
5. Every pilot who dispatches the airplane after that sees the placard text before engine start, not on the panel at the hold short line.
6. The squawk is closed with the repair recorded, at the latest by the next required inspection.