Reliability and Clubs...

Andrew Gideon wrote:

One of the many things I like about the club to which I belong is that the
owner of the aircraft is the club...in other words, the members. So
there's no "owner" making choices; just the members.

That avoids any motivational conflict.

[It also makes for an excellent training ground for ownership.]

- Andrew
Paramus Flying Club
http://flyingclub.org/



Good points.. The club I was in was 100% leaseback. BUT.. the way things
worked.. planes with chronic squawks or issues didn't rent much compared
to others in the fleet. If the plane wasn't well kept, wasn't reliable
(even with minor stuff) then the consumer didn't rent it (club members).

After two months of not renting enough to even generate enough revenue
to cover its insurance premium, the board would usually "ask" the owner
to remove his plane, lower the rental rate, or address the concerns.
More than one plane/owner was fired in this manner.

Dave

In a previous article, said:
4)Took off in 172 to finish my IPC tonight and at 700 feet just off
the end of the runway the engine lost power for the longest 5 seconds
of my life. Returned to the field did a hard runup all normal.

Did you put on the carb heat?

Clubs vary in the quality of maintenance, but my feeling is that a 25 year
old plane with 5000 hours on it is going to have maintenance problems
whether you are paying the whole shot or just a share. And in a club, if
plane "A" is down for maintenance, you can switch to plane "B", which you
can't do if you own only one plane.

--
Paul Tomblin http://xcski.com/blogs/pt/
You've got to love a newsreader with a menu option named "Kill this Author".
Does it work? And if so, is the death traceable?
Nah, but Dave the Resurrector will just bring 'em back again.

I've been renting from the local flying club.
In the last five flights I've had 4 issues /maintance problems.

Find out who the "maintenance officer" for the club is, and let him
know the facts of life.

If there is no "maintenance officer", leave the club. If the club is
pinching pennies on maintenance, leave the club. If you don't find out
what went wrong with the plane that lost power, leave the club. There
are plenty of rental birds in the fleet -- there's no need to put up
with bad maintenance.

As for buying, I can heartily recommend it. Knowing who flew the plane
last, and having everything in the plane PRECISELY the way you left it
(and always leave it) is worth all the headaches, IMHO.
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

On 23 Aug 2006 07:09:07 -0700, "Jay Honeck" wrote
in .com:

As for buying, I can heartily recommend it. Knowing who flew the plane
last, and having everything in the plane PRECISELY the way you left it
(and always leave it) is worth all the headaches, IMHO.

As long as you overlook the price differential between the per hour of
operation cost of owning vs renting, your recommendation is valid. One
generally gets more by paying more.

As for buying, I can heartily recommend it. Knowing who flew the plane
last, and having everything in the plane PRECISELY the way you left it
(and always leave it) is worth all the headaches, IMHO.

As long as you overlook the price differential between the per hour of
operation cost of owning vs renting, your recommendation is valid. One
generally gets more by paying more.

IF you find an honest, good A&P to work with, and IF you are inclined
to do a lot of work yourself, and IF the plane is in relatively good
shape to start with, you can own a plane and fly the pants off of it at
an affordable rate. (It helps to own a robust, common design, like a
Cherokee or a Skyhawk/Skylane.)

However, IF you take your plane to a big corporate shop, or IF some
major mechanical problem(s) arise, owning can literally rip the hide
off of you, financially.

It's no different than buying a house, a boat, or a business. YOU can
make a big difference, and some luck is involved.
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

On Wed, 23 Aug 2006 07:50:34 -0700, Jay Honeck wrote:

fly the pants off of it at an
affordable rate.

My understanding is that ownership works better, financially, if you "fly
the pants off" the plane. If you don't fly enough, then
renting/partnering/clubing will be *financially* better.

- Andrew

fly the pants off of it at an
affordable rate.

My understanding is that ownership works better, financially, if you "fly
the pants off" the plane. If you don't fly enough, then
renting/partnering/clubing will be *financially* better.

True. But for me, the fact that Atlas is sitting in my hangar, fully
fueled and ready to go at a moment's notice, is absolutely
irresistable. I find it amazing to see how few privately owned
aircraft fly regularly -- those owners apparently have more will power
than I do!

:-)
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

Larry Dighera wrote:

As long as you overlook the price differential between the per hour of
operation cost of owning vs renting, your recommendation is valid. One
generally gets more by paying more.

The price differential depends on a lot of factors Larry. I'm assuming
that you're implying owning is more expensive than renting. In many
(perhaps most) cases, I would agree, it's cheaper to rent. However, I
think it depending on what you fly, how much you fly, whether you own
outright or through a partnership, and whether you're willing to do some
of the maintenance.

I fly a '71 Arrow and co-own with two other guys. We do as much of our
own maintenance as we can. The local cost of renting a newer Arrow
(Arrow III, they don't say what year) is $151/hr. wet. I flew 170 hours
in my first year of ownership. Renting would have cost $25,670. I
spent way less than that in my first year of ownership (even after
dividing up an $8K bill three ways as a result of the required repairs
discovered at our first annual).

Will I always fly 170 hours per year? Probably not but I'm shooting for
more than 100/year. Will we continue to have really expensive repairs?
Hopefully not but time will tell. Will I always have two other
airplane partners? I sure hope so.

--
Jack Allison
PP-ASEL-Instrument Airplane

"To become a Jedi knight, you must master a single force. To become
a private pilot you must strive to master four of them"
- Rod Machado

(Remove the obvious from address to reply via e-mail)

On Sat, 26 Aug 2006 23:09:34 -0700, Jack Allison
wrote:
The price differential depends on a lot of factors Larry. I'm assuming
that you're implying owning is more expensive than renting. In many
(perhaps most) cases, I would agree, it's cheaper to rent.

Goes back to the old saying, "If it flies, floats, or ****s, it's
cheaper to rent than to buy"... Regardless though, if you want to own,
then you just put a higher value on the 'convenience factor' until the
numbers come out the way that you want them to come out... It doesn't
make them right, but you managed to 'justify' owning one of the above
three types of money pits...

On Sat, 26 Aug 2006 23:09:34 -0700, Jack Allison
wrote in
:

Will I always have two other airplane partners? I sure hope so.

Right. But Jay is the sole owner of his PA28. He pays more per hour
of operation, and enjoys increased utility for increased cost.

The financial advantages of coownership are undisputed (unless one of
your coowners crashes into a school bus full of children, and the
liability exceeds the value of your insurance policy). The fixed
costs (except engine overhaul) of aircraft ownership (hangar rent,
insurance, annual inspections, etc) become a smaller factor of hourly
operational cost in proportion to the total number of hours flown
monthly (more owners/operators means more hours flown) and depending
on how the ownership agreement is structured, those fixed costs may be
further reduced by their division among the coowners.