We're getting old, folks...

So, you said that's 3x what your ballpark is where you are (in other
words, people in your area should expect to pay around $4000 to get
their private pilot). Is that the "ideal" figure, e.g., 40 hours in a
152, or is that what the average person who isn't a natural pilot
(e.g., me) actually pay? I think by the time I got my private I had
over 80 hours; clearly that was a factor, but I thought that the
national averagge was something like 75 hours. I'm geniunely curious.

Around here you can still rent a clapped out old 152 for $70/hour, and you
can get a CFI to instruct you for $25/hour.

I figure around 55 hours to get your Private. Some take more, some do less,
but if you treat learning to fly like a semester of college, that's about
what it will take. (Both Mary and I finished up with right around 55
hours...)

20 hours x $95/hour = $1900
35 hour x $70/hour = $2450

Total Cost: $4350
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

In article ziMqf.668974$xm3.338032@attbi_s21,
Jay Honeck wrote:
Around here you can still rent a clapped out old 152 for $70/hour, and you
can get a CFI to instruct you for $25/hour.

So, I think that when I learned, the 152 the school I had was something
like $79/hr (I see that it's up to $89/hr now). My instructor rates
were $30/hr. That's pretty reasonable, considering the difference in
cost-of-living between our locales. But let me throw some variables
into the mix.

A 152 isn't a plane you can learn in if you're a fatass. I think I
would have needed a 12 year old instructor to learn in a 152. That
means that 172 is the minimum. Okay, not everyone in America is
a fatass ... yet. But it's something to consider ... a 152 isn't
an option for some people.

You say it takes 55 hours to get your private. But I scheduled two
flights, every week, and it took me around 80. According to some of
the web pages I've seen, 75 is the national average, which means I'm at
least within a standard deviation. So I don't think 55 hours is a fair
amount of time for the _average_ person.

So, I'm curious ... assuming it still would have still taken me 80
hours if I trained in Iowa City, what would that have cost me in a 172 in
your neck of the woods? It doesn't have to be a new one; a clapped
out one is fine.

--Ken

Ken Hornstein - CONTRACTOR wrote:
So, I think that when I learned, the 152 the school I had was something
like $79/hr (I see that it's up to $89/hr now). My instructor rates
were $30/hr. That's pretty reasonable, considering the difference in
cost-of-living between our locales.


I learned how to fly in 1978. Back then, a C-152 went for $24.50/hour and an
instructor was $15/hr. C-172s were $31/hr, IIRC.



You say it takes 55 hours to get your private. But I scheduled two
flights, every week, and it took me around 80. According to some of
the web pages I've seen, 75 is the national average, which means I'm at
least within a standard deviation. So I don't think 55 hours is a fair
amount of time for the _average_ person.


I got my private license in 44 hours, flying 2-3 times a week. I started in
10/78 and finished in 2/79... flying through what passes for winter weather in
the Carolinas. When I hear of people taking 75 hours, all I can think is that
they waited too long between flights and had to spend the first part of every
flight going over what they forgot from the one before. And if I had to assign
a cause, I'd blame it on money. It cost me about $1100 to earn my license,
which sounds pretty cheap these days. What you have to remember is that a nice
new car could be bought in 1978 for $6000 or so. What would you spend today?

I remember an old fellow scoffing at my $1100. "Hell", he said, "I paid $600 to
learn how to fly". Of course when he learned how to fly you could buy a brand
new VW Beetle for around $2500. It's all relative.



--
Mortimer Schnerd, RN

VE

A 152 isn't a plane you can learn in if you're a fatass.

Boy, THAT is for sure. I didn't fly in a 152 until last year (I trained in
Cherokee 140s), and my co-pilot was a 250 pound guy.

We got to know each other a *lot* better than I wanted... ;-)

You say it takes 55 hours to get your private. But I scheduled two
flights, every week, and it took me around 80.

Well, I scheduled three flights each week, and averaged twice, with weather
being the main problem. (I trained in Wisconsin, in winter, in '94-'95.
Not the brightest thing I've ever done...) I was an early flight simulator
aficionado, so controlling an airplane was second nature to me, which
(according to my instructor) made things go very quickly, initially. I
soloed in less than 7 hours.

Did you take 80 because of on-again/off-again training, or some other
factor? It seems like a lot, with a dedicated flight training schedule.
(It seems pretty quick, if you were doing the old "whenever I've got a few
extra bucks I'll take a lesson" method.)

So, I'm curious ... assuming it still would have still taken me 80
hours if I trained in Iowa City, what would that have cost me in a 172 in
your neck of the woods? It doesn't have to be a new one; a clapped
out one is fine.

Hmm. I don't know what 172s are renting for, but I'm assuming somewhere
around $90 per hour? (For the not-so-new-ones.) More for the glass
cockpits.

How many hours did you fly with an instructor, and how many without? That
makes a HUGE difference in cost.
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

Jay Honeck wrote:
A 152 isn't a plane you can learn in if you're a fatass.


Boy, THAT is for sure. I didn't fly in a 152 until last year (I trained in
Cherokee 140s), and my co-pilot was a 250 pound guy.

We got to know each other a *lot* better than I wanted... ;-)


You say it takes 55 hours to get your private. But I scheduled two
flights, every week, and it took me around 80.


Well, I scheduled three flights each week, and averaged twice, with weather
being the main problem. (I trained in Wisconsin, in winter, in '94-'95.
Not the brightest thing I've ever done...) I was an early flight simulator
aficionado, so controlling an airplane was second nature to me, which
(according to my instructor) made things go very quickly, initially. I
soloed in less than 7 hours.

Did you take 80 because of on-again/off-again training, or some other
factor? It seems like a lot, with a dedicated flight training schedule.
(It seems pretty quick, if you were doing the old "whenever I've got a few
extra bucks I'll take a lesson" method.)


So, I'm curious ... assuming it still would have still taken me 80
hours if I trained in Iowa City, what would that have cost me in a 172 in
your neck of the woods? It doesn't have to be a new one; a clapped
out one is fine.


Hmm. I don't know what 172s are renting for, but I'm assuming somewhere
around $90 per hour? (For the not-so-new-ones.) More for the glass
cockpits.

How many hours did you fly with an instructor, and how many without? That
makes a HUGE difference in cost.
I was just looking over my log book and it looks like I had about 80
hours or so when I took my check ride. The raw numbers don't tell the
story in my case and I bet they may not in others. The day of my
planned solo I was told by my flight school that my instructor was no
longer working there and I had to start with a new one. I was among her
first students and she wanted me to do things her way and it added
another 13 hours to my totals before I soloed. After I had soloed and
got signed off to go to the practice area and several area airports I
could fly whenever I wanted to and there were times I did just that. I
was not specifically working on any set of skills, I was just flying
around. I do think I could have cut some of those hours out but I
enjoyed them very much and that's why I was learning to fly anyway.
When it came time to take my checkride I needed to fly to a airport
about 45 min away and on my first attempt the winds had picked up during
the day and it became turbulent enough that I did not want to try to
maintain PTS standards in heading and altitude for the test. My DE
thought that my decision was a good one and so we just did the oral that
day. The flight home was bumpy but uneventful. The next 2 scheduled
checkrides were canceled due to bad weather and I did some training
flights in between to keep my skills sharp and it turned out to be a
month before the weather gods and her schedule aligned for me to take my
checkride. I guess the point of this story is that the numbers are a
guideline but you must very very careful when you draw conclusions from
them.

John

PS. After my checkride I added up the costs for getting my private and
it was about 6000 in 1998. I've never added up costs again. I just
don't want to know

In article aPTqf.669446$xm3.354931@attbi_s21,
Jay Honeck wrote:
Did you take 80 because of on-again/off-again training, or some other
factor? It seems like a lot, with a dedicated flight training schedule.
(It seems pretty quick, if you were doing the old "whenever I've got a few
extra bucks I'll take a lesson" method.)

There was actually no break in training. It was pretty continuous, and
I think I was pretty dedicated to it. From what I remember, there were
two factors.

- Lack of aptitude. Anything to do with book learning, I was fine. No
problems with flight planning or cross-country navigation. But the
actual stick-and-rudder stuff, I had problems with. I've always
had a problem with tasks that required coordination ... it always
took me longer to learn a physical skill than it did for anyone
else. Maybe part of it was my instructor was relatively inexperienced,
and the thing I had real problems with (landings) was something he
mastered very easily, so he couldn't really give me useful advice.
I read all of the books I could find and every newsgroup posting on the
subject and tried all of their tricks, but they didn't really help.
I flew with other instructors as well, but it didn't help. I think
it was 20 hours until I soloed. I also really liked flight simulators,
but they didn't help me one bit (nothing in real life felt like the
sim).

- We only have one DE for the area. My checkride got rescheduled a couple
of times (weather once, he got delayed once), and in the intervening
time I flew a lot to keep my skills up (and I still had a lousy
short-field landing, but the DE passed me anyway).

Hmm. I don't know what 172s are renting for, but I'm assuming somewhere
around $90 per hour? (For the not-so-new-ones.) More for the glass
cockpits.

How many hours did you fly with an instructor, and how many without? That
makes a HUGE difference in cost.

I think I had something like 20 hours of solo time by the time I got my
private (I didn't need much; the cross-country stuff was a breeze). I'd
have to check my logbook to me sure.

So, assuming $90/hr:

$115 * 60 = $6900
$90 * 20 = $1800
$8700 total.

But if I had zero hours with an instructor, it still would have cost me
$7200 ($90 * 80). Clearly the high number of hours and the 172 are what
drive the cost here.

I know everyone is going to say that 80 hours is too high, and maybe it
is. But I've seen a number of places that the national average is 75
hours (but to be fair, I've never seen the source of that statistic).
Assuming that number is accurate, that means for everybody that gets
their private in 55 hours, there's some duffer like me that's doing it
in 95 hours. Maybe most of those people are have other factors at
work, but that doesn't change the base cost.

I see that one guy recently got his Sport Pilot in a week. I doubt I
could have done that, but maybe a two-week camp would have worked for
me. Maybe there's hope for GA yet.

--Ken