What the aircraft register's fields mean
The Transport Canada register is written for regulators. Here is what each field on a MarketPlane registration page means for an owner or a buyer.
Airworthiness certificate
The type of certificate an aircraft holds sets what it may be used for and how it must be maintained, and the difference between two of them can be thousands of dollars of resale value.
- Certificate of Airworthiness
- The standard certificate: the aircraft conforms to its approved design and is maintained by a licensed engineer. No restrictions beyond the type's own, and it's what buyers and lenders expect to see.
- Owner-maintenance
- Owner-maintenance: a Canadian category letting the owner maintain the aircraft themselves without a licensed engineer signing the work off. Three things a buyer should know — it cannot be changed back to a standard Certificate of Airworthiness, it isn't recognised outside Canada, and it typically reduces resale value because it narrows the buyer pool.
- Amateur-built
- Amateur-built: the owner built at least half of it themselves, under Transport Canada's homebuilt standard. It cannot be flown for hire or reward, so no charter, no rental and no paid flight training.
- Restricted
- Restricted: approved for specific work rather than general use — crop spraying, survey and similar. The permitted operations are set out on the certificate itself.
- Limited
- Limited: usually an ex-military aircraft, or one whose original type approval is no longer supported. Operating limitations come with the certificate.
- Flight permit
- A flight permit rather than a full certificate, issued for a defined purpose such as test or development flying.
The other fields
- Airframe type
- Whether Transport Canada classes it as an aeroplane, a helicopter, a glider, a balloon or a gyroplane.
- Engine type
- How the engine makes power. Piston engines run on avgas like a car engine; turboprops and jets burn turbine fuel, cost far more to overhaul, and are usually reserved for bigger or faster aircraft.
- Engine make
- Who built the engine. The register only records this where the engine isn't implied by the aircraft's type certificate — mostly ultralights and homebuilts.
- Seats
- The register only records a seat count for ultralights, where one seat versus two is what separates the categories. It's blank for everything else, so no number here doesn't mean no seats.
- Max take-off weight (MTOW)
- Maximum take-off weight: the heaviest the aircraft may legally be when it starts its take-off roll, including fuel, people and baggage. It's the number that decides what licence and ratings you need, and what it costs to park.
- Based
- The city or airport Transport Canada holds as the aircraft's base. Where the field holds a four-letter code like CYXE, that's the airport's ICAO identifier.
- Transport Canada office
- The Transport Canada regional office that administers this registration. It follows the owner's address, so it isn't always the nearest office to where the aircraft actually sits.
- Serial number
- The manufacturer's own number for this individual airframe, stamped on a plate. Unlike the registration, it never changes. It identifies the aircraft across every country it's ever been registered in.
- Manufacturer
- The full legal name of the company that built it, which is often not the name on the tail. A Cessna 172 built in 2022 was made by Textron Aviation.
- Built in
- Where the aircraft was manufactured. Most of Canada's fleet was built in the United States.
- ICAO 24-bit address
- A unique 24-bit number your transponder broadcasts with every Mode S and ADS-B message. Flight trackers key on it rather than the tail number. Canada's block runs C00000 to C3FFFF, which is why Canadian aircraft nearly all start C0 to C3. Transport Canada assigns it against the registration, so it changes if the aircraft is re-registered.
- Registration type
- Private, Commercial or State. Commercial means the registration permits use for hire or reward, like charter, flight training or aerial work. It describes the registration, not who owns the aircraft.
- Basis of registration
- The rule the aircraft is registered under. Most are registered against a type certificate, meaning they're a factory design approved by the regulator; amateur-built and ultralight aircraft come in under their own standards.
- Type certificate
- The approval number for the aircraft's design, issued to the manufacturer. Every aircraft built to that approved design shares it, so it's a good way to confirm exactly which variant you're looking at.
- Registered since
- When the current registration took effect. A recent date usually means the aircraft changed hands or was re-registered. It isn't the year it was built.
- Imported to Canada
- When the aircraft was first brought onto the Canadian register from abroad. Only recorded for imported aircraft, which is about a third of the fleet.
Look up any Canadian aircraft by its registration on the registration lookup.