Sometimes the clue bus arrives late to the airport, which is the case with the FAA’s PS-ACE-23-08 policy statement for getting rid of vacuum attitude gyros, including the primitive system that drives them. Still, kudos to the FAA for finally offering take-it-to-the-shop policy on a situation most of us have known for years—vacuum systems are plain unreliable. Our guess is that a new generation of regulators hip to the superior reliability of solid-state, AHRS-driven gyro technology has at least something to do with it. Moreover, the FAA is long aware of the insidious nature of vacuum instrument failure, evident by the research it has done of NTSB reports littered with vacuum failure-related augers. But in its new policy, the FAA uses some interesting language to describe old-school gyros, while also recognizing the buying trend of AHRS-based instruments and the cost burden of maintaining old systems. Still, the policy statement for Part 23/CAR3 aircraft under 6000 pounds equipped with vacuum-driven attitude instruments isn’t a free-for-all. Plus, aircraft equipped with traditional directional gyros still need a vacuum system, short of upgrading to a full-up PFD or electric HSI system.