1. Do any of you work part time at a airport to earn extra flying time? What type of job do you perform if so? Do you trade work for flight time?
Never have. I think there's jobs out there that pay a little better per hour, and that's the measure you should look at. Make sure you're not getting hosed on hours worked vs normal rental price, if you go that route.
For kids looking to put "aviation" jobs on a resume', the airport jobs give them something other than the paycheck, and there's kids lined up out the door most of the time who want airport jobs... so I'd generally say you can probably do better with more hours at your own job, or a different part-time job, especially if you can minimize travel time to/from the job, to make "flying money".
Just my opinion, there could always be an airport so hard up that they're paying great wages, but I haven't seen that.
So generally I would say that if you don't need the resume' line item or the networking that working on the airport provides, nah. Don't bother.
Just bust some butt elsewhere.
When I learned to fly I worked three jobs, one at a gas station, one throwing baggage at the "big" airport, and one as a phone operator -- and I was looking to move to public safety dispatch (and doing an extended internship at a 911 office, pre E911 days) to replace two of those jobs.
Paid WAY better than pumping gas or working the counters at the airport(s).
2. For a PPL and vfr only, is 50 hours a year a good number? Will I even get close to that being I work on week days and weather might cancel weekend ventures?
While it may be down near the minimums for proficiency and therefore safety, I think a lot of folks are exactly where you're at. There's only 52 weeks a year, and an hour a week stretches many budgets for fun flyers. Usually folks have a couple of weekends booked up so you're talking a couple hours every other week in that hypothetical and I think that's pretty normal.
That said, the pilot population runs the gamut from "horribly bad" to "very well prepared but knows their limitations" in the weekend warrior crowd and you'd want to strive to be toward the latter end of that spectrum. Toss in some safety seminars and personal study and keep the brain going and be careful about weather until the opportunity arises to make some long cross countries and see real weather changes enroute, and you'll do fine.
Make friends at the club / airport and ride along, or share flights and keep learning and soaking in the stuff the old farts know that seems sane and dump the bad stuff.
And about that long XC... try to do some. You'll learn faster what it's all about if you really use the airplane to travel VFR and it'll probably whet your appetite for the Instrument ticket and more training down the road. Don't just do the same laps around the pattern every time you go out. Save up a few bucks and go somewhere.
Now one more thing... I wouldn't recommend your PPL training be done that slow. It can be done but a couple of weeks between flights is a really long time and you'll forget way too much and your muscle memory / skill manipulating the aircraft will suffer a lot with that much time between flying sessions.
I'd try to save up for a bit and do the training faster. A couple hours a week is about as slow as you probably realistically can go and retain most of it.
But there are pilots and instructors who have worked out the molasses slow once a week or less schedules -- it has been done -- but it will take you longer overall and present an additional challenge to stay motivated and also keep your head in the material.
"Them's" some thoughts, as grandpa used to say.
