Justification?

[Citationkid]

Do you owners try to justify your aircraft? I have a nieghbor who owns a perfect '86 T210R with the full de-ice, GNS530, ect. and only flies it 50 hours a year. I was out flying with him and he was talking about buying a Meridean and I said can you justify buying a King Air and he said he can't even justify the 210 and doesn't care. He loves his airplane and that's all that matters to him. So do you feel the same way or do you try to justify your aircraft?

[IO540]

Freedom.

The big problem with that approach is that in the UK, having fun is not allowed :O

[Flyin'Dutch']

The only justification you have to make is whether you will be able to be current and on top of these very capable machines with a relative limited amount of hours.

And whether these machines do well by flying so little.

Other than that no justification required, after all what is life without a bit of fun and xs?

FD

[Keef]

My worry is FD's. Lovely toys, but need a great deal of skill and currency.

The Arrow is about as much as I can handle with the hours I fly - if I had a hot ship like that, I'd be wanting to fly most days, partly for the joy of it but mostly to keep current.

[S-Works]

The sheer pleasure of flying is justification for owning an aircraft nothing else matters!

[maxman]

I hope to be in his position one day, enjoy. who wants to be the richest guy in the cemetry,

sorry i'll get me coat, and go back to Jet Blast.

[formationfoto]

Sadly most of us have to have some form of justification for spending large sums of money it is just that the nature of the justification changes on a case by case basis. In my case I work to earn the money to fly so my justification for spending is that it makes sense of all the hours I spend working my fingers to a stump!.

I know others who justify spending £3m on a brand new turbine fixed wing by letting the business buy it. Another person I know had a £500,000 Jet Ranger and flew for around 5 hours a year (mostly with a more current pilot). He sold the 206 to buy something more expensive.

It does often seem that those who are less deeply committed to aviation are most able to throw money at it. I am sure there is some perverse law at play here.

Personally I wish I had the funds to do all of the things which I have already mentally justified. I need to replace my twin. The Chipmunk share really should be swapped for a Mustang. The Brantly share should be swapped for a Bell 47 and a Gazelle. Somewhere I need to find time to fly the Gnat I haven't yet got.

Did I mention the TBM 700 or the PC12?.

How much further justification would i need if I suddenly found myself with the £5m required to fund the items above?.

If I only flew these for a total of 50 hours a year would I be safe?. I think I would have to justify handing in my notice and flying a little more frequently.

[Genghis the Engineer]

I've never felt a strong need to justify that I fly. I have been known to spend hours justifying why I fly what I fly.

G

[FlyingForFun]

There are lots of ways to justify an aircraft purchase. It might be cheaper than the alternative (hiring), it might be that you can fit the aircraft out the way you want it fitted out, or maybe that you can take it away for weeks at a time without anyone complaining. Maybe you want to fly faster than you can in any aircraft you currently have access to. The list is endless.

And then there's the aircraft where none of these apply, and the only way you can attempt to justify it is by saying "because I want to."

I personally don't have any problem with anyone who says that, and if I wanted to use that justification myself then I wouldn't have any time for anyone who had a problem with it. It might be a little difficult to persuade a spouse to agree to this I suppose - but I'm fortunate enough not to be married. :D

FFF
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[IO540]

Talking of purchasing outright, that has some clear advantages.

Unless you are in the extremely unusual position of having a self fly hire operator with modern and new planes in your airfield, a purchase is the only way to get a plane which isn't a decrepit piece of junk. Even if the pilot is an aviation anorak and thinks that a 1970 PA28 is really good, most ordinary people won't touch it and this will show up in who will be a willing passenger :O

It's the only way to get unrestricted availability.

It's the only way to get maintenance to one's own standard.

For most people, it will be the only way to get an aircraft which is IFR legal in CAS.

The marginal cost (per hour airborne time) of a brand new £200k aircraft is less than the cost of hiring an old C152 - so it's a lot cheaper to keep current.

If flying more than say 200hrs/year, it is cheaper to buy than to rent something properly maintained, overall. I say "properly maintained" because the economics of most flying schools rely on non-maintenance of of anything which isn't essential, so the aircraft slowly falls apart.