Having enough iterations of the cycle intensive array formula is going to end up bogging his workbook down almost to a stop.
Probably not the case. Unless the thing is running on a dinosaurian legacy machine, the speed will be fine.
The spreadsheet I knocked up for my maintenance records is about 4MB, has in the vicinity of 16,000 line records so far (amongst a bunch of other stuff) spread amongst a number of aircraft and runs something like several hundred automatic array calculations .. it runs without any problem on a four year old laptop.
I can't see the OP having any problems using Excel to run a comparatively tiny log book database setup.
Excel is actually the WRONG tool for this job
Of course it is - no argument there. (Probably more a case of not being the better tool ?). Actually, having thought about it a bit more, a logbook is exactly like a spreadsheet so I don't think it matters which program you use .. preferably whichever you find easier to set up ?
Just like my example where a simple spreadsheet was set up to do a few little jobs and then just grew and I have ever since regretted not taking the time then to transfer it to something more appropriate. One of these days I'll get around to transferring it to a RDB program, whether Access or one of the more capable examples.
For the OP, he most likely doesn't have Access and, for other than really big databases, Excel works fine if it's set up sensibly and is very simple to drive.
In any case, Access is not much more than a fancy, tweaked version of Excel. What, pray tell, is the underlying difference between a RDB program setup, with multiple defacto spreadsheets for it to drive .. and a spreadsheet or spreadsheet workbook ?
Not suggesting that one should prefer Excel for RDB work but it is a very capable program for any sort of engineering and scientific work. The thing must have in excess of 400 or 500 built in mathematical functions and other capabilities ..
For his/her simple logbook requirements, Excel will be just fine .. and comes along with Office .. why buy Access for simple stuff when one doesn't need a sledgehammer to crack a walnut ?
... (stands by for incoming from the diehard MicroSoft folk ..)