Whose planes do you fly?

Whose planes do you fly?

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Eric Gleason

Eric Gleason

Pre-takeoff checklist
Joined
Sep 6, 2016
Messages
489
Location
Albany, NY
Display Name
Display name:
Eric Gleason
Since I'm relatively new to the forum, I'm curious to know how folks are accessing planes. For a long time I've flown mostly CAP planes, occasionally managing to borrow one for personal flights. Now I have a fiancee and a little boy who loves planes, so it became time to join a club so I can fly with my family.
 
Rented for the first 3 months working on my PPL. Bought a 172 and finished my PPL, flew it for 3 years, sold and bought 182, flew it for 4 years, sold it and bought a Bonanza.
 
Rented for 2 weeks to get my pilots license...got my license, and my own plane, on the third week. That was 23 years ago, and I haven't rented since.
 
Own one, regularly rent another, plus whatever I get paid to fly.
 
I rented airplanes while I was working on my private certificate. Shortly afterward I bought a Cherokee, which I kept for a couple of years. I sold the Cherokee and bought an old Bonanza. A while later I also bought and sold a Mooney. Then I bought a Stinson with floats a little later so at the moment I own the Stinson and the Bonanza. Neither of them are currently in annual, because I have too much work to do.

A friend of mine owns several airplanes and in exchange for maintaining his stuff I get to fly them a bit. I have enough to do here that my planes have taken the back burner and I don't mind since I have planes to fly.

In addition to my personal recreation I also do some instructing for the local FBO so I fly whatever they have available and the student wants to learn in.
 
I belonged to a flying club for 25 years and then finally took the plunge and bought an aircraft last summer.
 
I get to fly a variety of airplanes. I do take care of several also. Right now I have a RV-7, Stinson 108, N3N, C-140, 2 Supercubs, 182, Zenith 760, Glasstar, UTVA 66, and a RV-12 to fly anytime. Should have the Nanchang CJ-6 done by mid summer.
 
Rented for about 4 years. The longer I went on renting, the less I flew, and the more ridiculous renting felt. Bought a C182 three years ago. Haven't flown anything else since.
 
yakdriver said:
I get to fly a variety of airplanes. I do take care of several also. Right now I have a RV-7, Stinson 108, N3N, C-140, 2 Supercubs, 182, Zenith 760, Glasstar, UTVA 66, and a RV-12 to fly anytime. Should have the Nanchang CJ-6 done by mid summer.
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:eek::drool:

I fly with a collegiate club. Must be a student, alumni, or faculty member. Looking at ownership once I finish my PPL. (43 hrs currently and weather/mx has been pushing my schedule back tremendously)
 
Having started flight training at age 13, I rented for the first 8 years or so of my flying career. But then the magic of just flying around the local area and $100 hamburgers wore off, life and other commitments got in the way and I stopped flying for several years. Ten years ago, I decided I wanted to get back into it so I bought a plane. I’ve now put 2200 hours on the two that I have owned since. For me, if I can’t own, I can’t travel and if I can’t travel, I don’t fly.
 
Mine. And trying to figure out what I'll teach in... 'cause it won't be mine... :)
 
RudyP said:
Having started flight training at age 13, I rented for the first 8 years or so of my flying career. But then the magic of just flying around the local area and $100 hamburgers wore off, life and other commitments got in the way and I stopped flying for several years.
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That's what I'm afraid of happening to me. Got my license last year at 17 and I'm a "bit" concerned about having/being willing to spend the money to fly in college and for the first few years after.
 
Eric Gleason said:
Now I have a fiancee and a little boy who loves planes, so it became time to join a club so I can fly with my family.
Click to expand...
What would your mission be? I honestly think owning makes the most sense. Renting is *okay* but paying a lot of money for derelict planes that the prior renter left half tied up with crumpled papers in the backseat, broken foggles jammed into a side pocket, and with a seemingly perpetual host of "inop" gauges gets old fast.. esp when you pay $120+ / hr. Depending on your budget, and long term vision, there is a lot of good planes out there for under $100K

Personally, I would love to buy in the next 2-5 years, or at least be part of some kind of partnership

I started flying before I could drive, saved money from summer jobs and would ride my bike to LWM for lessons. Got licensed, did a bunch of flying in New England, always renting, then pretty much stopped flying from about 2010 through 2016. That 6 year break SUCKED

Flew about 100 hrs though in the first year I got back into it, got instrument rated, and can't get enough of it. Flying for me now though is different, the 1 hr hobbes rides and $100 hamburgers are still loads of fun, but I'm at a point now where I want utility out of a plane for me and my family to actually get places. To get from my house to Sedona via car is a solid 7 hrs... in an Archer 3.5ish, and SR22T about 2 ish.. that's awesome to get such utility

As a tip to @Eric Gleason I stopped renting from outfits that were primarily flight schools since the rental terms tend to be quite onerous for any real usage of the plane as a "go places" commuter, and scheduling is generally a nightmare.. I would much recommend a flying club over a school, or at best buying a plane, or buying into one
 
Matthew K said:
Got my license last year at 17 and I'm a "bit" concerned about having/being willing to spend the money to fly in college and for the first few years after.
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I think that's relatively common. Most of my immediate flying friends got licensed in the 17-19 year old range, but stopped and got back into it in later 20s after college, career, marriage, etc. The good news is your hours don't expire, and you can usually "get back into it" after getting your medical back up to speed and getting a few hours with a CFI
 
Matthew K said:
That's what I'm afraid of happening to me. Got my license last year at 17 and I'm a "bit" concerned about having/being willing to spend the money to fly in college and for the first few years after.
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dang dude, you're only 18? I know we didn't get to hang at GMU but I didn't know u were that young. sheeeit.
 
When I was power plane flying, I rented until my father bought a plane. Hang gliding, everyone has their own gliders, you can get a good used one for $1500, or a new one for less than $5000.

It's been my observation that new pilots who don't get into some sort of ownership situation, whether it be as a full owner, partner, or part of a flying club, tend to drift out of aviation after a short while.
 
FormerHangie said:
It's been my observation that new pilots who don't get into some sort of ownership situation, whether it be as a full owner, partner, or part of a flying club, tend to drift out of aviation after a short while.
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Yeah that.

Once you get your PPL I think a lot of people think "no what?" .. without a plane, or a mission, unfortunately people fade out
 
Matthew K said:
That's what I'm afraid of happening to me. Got my license last year at 17 and I'm a "bit" concerned about having/being willing to spend the money to fly in college and for the first few years after.
Click to expand...

Well, the good news is that even if that does happen to you, your PPL is for life and you can always jump back in. And it’s easier than you think. When I got back into it after an 8 year hiatus, I thought it would be like learning all over again but after 3-4 hours with a good instructor over a weekend, I was back in the saddle and fairly comfortable.
 
There are some planes you can fly for free, as long as you pay, but not really...and as long as it's to Sun n Fun, without having any fun.

But right now, I'm in the rent (or borrow/steal) zone.

Any donations are welcome. (beg zone)
 
Own one. In a club with 4. And will also fly just about anything someone gives me money to fly, that doesn’t happen that often though...
 
Tantalum said:
What would your mission be? I honestly think owning makes the most sense. Renting is *okay* but paying a lot of money for derelict planes that the prior renter left half tied up with crumpled papers in the backseat, broken foggles jammed into a side pocket, and with a seemingly perpetual host of "inop" gauges gets old fast.. esp when you pay $120+ / hr. Depending on your budget, and long term vision, there is a lot of good planes out there for under $100K

Personally, I would love to buy in the next 2-5 years, or at least be part of some kind of partnership

I started flying before I could drive, saved money from summer jobs and would ride my bike to LWM for lessons. Got licensed, did a bunch of flying in New England, always renting, then pretty much stopped flying from about 2010 through 2016. That 6 year break SUCKED

Flew about 100 hrs though in the first year I got back into it, got instrument rated, and can't get enough of it. Flying for me now though is different, the 1 hr hobbes rides and $100 hamburgers are still loads of fun, but I'm at a point now where I want utility out of a plane for me and my family to actually get places. To get from my house to Sedona via car is a solid 7 hrs... in an Archer 3.5ish, and SR22T about 2 ish.. that's awesome to get such utility

As a tip to @Eric Gleason I stopped renting from outfits that were primarily flight schools since the rental terms tend to be quite onerous for any real usage of the plane as a "go places" commuter, and scheduling is generally a nightmare.. I would much recommend a flying club over a school, or at best buying a plane, or buying into one
Click to expand...

I have also found that renting outfits are so detailed in what you can and can’t do, it’s basically a new, stricter, Set of FARS. I am looking for a place to do my multi and there is an 8 page operating manual describing what, when, where, and how to operate the planes. Including but not limited to detailed flight plans, school specific vfr and IFR minimums, special checkrides for flying at night, special checkrides for airports over 3,000, etc etc.

My clubs rules don’t stretch far beyond 1. Don’t break FARS and only land at faa recognized airfields. My own plane is pretty much the same because insurance requires it.

If I had started flying with one of these schools with pages of rules, I wouldn’t be flying today.
 
Eric Gleason said:
Since I'm relatively new to the forum, I'm curious to know how folks are accessing planes. For a long time I've flown mostly CAP planes, occasionally managing to borrow one for personal flights. Now I have a fiancee and a little boy who loves planes, so it became time to join a club so I can fly with my family.
Click to expand...

I fly my Super Viking for all of my x-country trips, Angel Flights, Currency maintainence flights, and $100 burger runs. I rent a Super Decathlon whenever I feel like doing some acro, and I rent a Lake Amphibian whenever I feel the urge to land on the water (with the ability to take off again).

Before buying the Super Viking, I rented exclusively. Worked fine for the day trip, sighteeing, and just having fun type of flights, but there were some issues when trying to rent for overnight trips: plane availability, negotiating to lower or eliminate the minimum per day charges, etc. Owning means that you know the condition after the previous flight, and, except for maintainence downtimes, the plane is always available.

For me, my mix of owning the plane that matches my primary needs and renting the planes that match the secondary needs (acro and water) works well.



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AndrewX said:
I stopped flying for 30 years. I'm back now at age 51.
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Welcome back! I have a similar story. Got the license in 1989, moved to start my first job, and didn’t fly for 23 years. Got back into it about 7 years ago, and I’ve been flying a lot since then. Bought my plane the year after restarting.




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Own one ,and have a friend with two so occasionally I fly his .
 
I'm an A&P, and sometimes trade Flight Time for a substantial discount on my per-hour rate for MX.
 
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