Nathan Young wrote:

For your cost questions, here's some input: This is based on a
Cherokee 180.

Hangar (chicago suburbs): $300/month = $3600 / year
Insurance $900/year
Fuel: 200hrs/year @ 10gph @ $2.95/gal = $5900/year
Oil: 5 cases @ $50/case = $250/year.
Total: $10650 / year

So those are the known costs. The big question mark is maintenance
and annual inspection. I probably average a bit over $2k/year for
this, but have been as low as $1k and as high as $5k.

You've left out some major costs, like engine reserve. True, it's not
cash out of pocket, but it's an accrued cost just the same.

My guess is for a Cherokee 180, you should be reserving something on the
order of $10/hr for engine overhaul/replacement. Get a quote from your
machanic on an overhaul or replacement. Divide that by the published
TBO, and you come up with an hourly depreciation rate. It's really only
a guess (your engine could crap out earlier, or it could make it past
TBO, and overhaul costs are variable depending on what they find when
they open it up), but it's a reasonable guess, and that's better than
nothing.

One nice thing about a flying club is you get the benefits of scale. My
club owns 7 planes, most of which fly 3-400 hours a year, so we average
a little more than one engine overhaul per year. Sometimes we make it
to TBO, sometimes we don't, sometimes we go past TBO. The good and the
bad average out so we can get a pretty good handle on what to expect in
the long run.