NEW AIR PLANE- Model and Fuel options?
I live in Istanbul Turkey, and I am about top get my PPL in a few weeks. Due to the very small number single piston engine A/C in Turkey, it is very difficult to rent, say, a C172 on a regular basis for local flights (let alone cross country or commuter flights).
Almost all of the exisiting ones belong to flight schools training students on their way to their CPL's, and they can barely address the needed hours for PIC and training flights of these students.
For these reasons, I decided to buy my own C172 with possibly a second shareholder.
Due to difficulty of bringing the plane from USA and dealing with JAA conversion issues which I hear may be costly and difficult, I am looking for models in Europe. What I found until now was it is possible to buy for 60000€ a nice N model with reasonable avionics, and a relatively recently overhauled engine and prop with little time on them.
I talked to one of the flight schools and they told me they could hire an aircraft I was to import for their students' PIC flights, and this seems logical to keep the cost of ownership down.
One problem we have in Turkey is that price of AVGAS is very high (around 2,6 USD per liter). Therefore I am also considering a plane with 1.7 diesel centurion, but with all the uncertainty regarding Thielert, and also problems I hear about the engines reliabilility, I am not sure ıf the economics in fuel consumption and cheaper JETA 1 will work with one of these earlier centurions.
A final option is MOGAS. MoGAS is much cheaper than AVGAS here, and a mogas STC would seem logical in Turkey. However,there are no planes currently with mogas STC here, and I do yet know the national aviation authority SHGM will behave when one tries to import a mogas stc plane to Turkey.
What would your suggestions be at this point? I have about 60000€ budget to buy a plane, and although it would proove very difficult for me, I would somehow try to dish out 90000€ for a centurion engined model if and only if the cost savings would be guaranteed and enough to justify the difference.
Many thanks in advance, I appreciate any help...