So it's flying about 300hrs/ year. It's a std machine with little in the way of avionics.
It's earning profit after costs of between £50 and £63 per flying hour for SFH after accounting for the insurance loading for SFH and training (which is quite high). BUT not taking into account any risk based costs for damage/ fried engine/ etc
At 300/ yr it would have a TBO of ~7 years so quite good utilisation. The owners are to be congratulated on establishing a viable business rather than a charity.
£380 - £410 (all up incl VAT/ 1 landing/ fuel/ insurance/ circuits at base) is a reasonable commercial cost to deliver not excessive profits on that type of airframe.
I heard a view from an FI I have known for some time a couple of years ago that the SFH market could disappear by the time we host the London olympics due principally to insurance costs. Most R44's now reside in people's gardens and fields leaving few airframes for SFH hence D > S price goes up. The cost of insurance is sucked down where it is flown only by limited higher hours pilots and you need to sell a lot of hours to make any profit.
h-r
Added later - local 100LL prices will also affect rates. Some locations charge a lot so this is passed on in pricing - some schools control their own supply from the wholesaler so have more price control.
Last edited by helicopter-redeye; 6th Sep 2007 at 07:39.
Reason: Adding further data