Hiring planes for longer

[coastfields]

Hello,

Glad to be on this forum!

I've recently started by PPL journey with the dream of flying my wife and my dog on holidays to Portugal, France, Italy, etc... I'd love to understand how it works to hire aircraft for say a week or two? All I see on club websites are quotes by the hour (does that include fuel?). So if I go for say 2 weeks, would I pay just for my flying time to the destination (and a bit of flying while there) and then get to keep the aircraft the rest of the time? Or would it be per hour the aircraft is away from its usual home (i.e. 7 days x 24 hours x £150/hr = £25,200)? The latter does seem excessive.

Thanks all and excited to be on this journey.

[Pilot DAR]

Hi Coastfields, welcome to PPRuNe...

To answer your question.... It depends! This is something you have to work out with the aircraft provider. Yes, if you take a plane away for days at a time, the aircraft provider will want to recover some of the "lost opportunity" that the aircraft could have provided while is was there. That is best handled by discussing your plan.

An example of this occurred for me a long time ago with my flying club at the time. I wanted to go for a week. They said that if I took a C 152, there would be a minimum 8 hours per day charge for the aircraft, because as a trainer, they would use it that much. However, if I rented the Cessna 177RG, it would be only 4 hours a day, because that aircraft was not rented as much, and was not a trainer. Yes, it was much more by the hour, but still not as much as the 152 would have been, so I took it. It ended up that my average was 3.8 hours a day, and that's what they charged me.

Once you're licensed, you may find that joining a group ownership of an aircraft offers the freedom you'd like

[ChickenHouse]

The usual arrangement for longer rents is a minimum number of hours to be billed, sometimes per days rented plus a daily fee.

[alex90]

You could probably buy a spam-can (reads C150 or similar plane) for around that sum!! If you aim to travel around Europe, you would likely benefit from being part of a group. But you will discover opportunities and make your own decisions later on.

About whether or not it includes fuel entirely depends on the schools you are looking at, but most places will offer aeroplane rentals "wet" meaning including fuel and oil. Some planes are rented "dry" meaning you will pay for fuel in addition to the plane rental price quoted.

The best advice I can give is to book a trial flight with schools that are near you, get to know the instructors / staff at the school, and ask these questions after your trial flight. It is important to have a good bond with your instructor and have a good feeling about the school before you commit. Understand that very few people pass their PPL at 45h, most will take 55 - 65h (or more!) to pass. Ask about landing fees and circuit fees, any surcharges to the fees outlined, and MOST IMPORTANT OF ALL - NEVER PAY ALL UPFRONT!!!

It is also important to understand how the hours are charged, some hours are "brakes off to brakes on" which are quite self explanatory, if you log 1h in your logbook, you get charged 1h. (assuming my examples are based on the same price of £150 for 1h; for 1h logged in your logbook you will pay £150)

If it is charged per "tacho hour" this means that you will get charged whenever the engine tachometer registers 1h, with normal cruise this normally ends up being around 0.75 - 0.8 of an hour. ie: £120 for 1h logged.

If it is charged per "hobbs hour", these can have different switch source, some will be electrics, some will be engine oil pressure level, or other. Generally you end up paying for some stationary time, so I would factor in around 1.1 hours recorded by the meter to 1 hour logged in your logbook. ie: £165

If it is charged per "air-vent hour", this is activated by a windspeed switch. Generally this means that you will be charged only for "airborne time", or when your wheels are likely not to be on the ground. This generally equates to around 0.8 of an hour of flight. ie: £120 - however - if you are doing circuits with "stops and go", there may be considerable uncharged time whilst on the ground, so could be cheaper than you expect.

I hope this helps!
Alex90

[Jan Olieslagers]

Little acquainted with the UK club scene as I am, I still think the previous recommendations are spot on. Even if a real club does not aim at profit, it still wants to see its investment used to optimal efficiency.

But most of all, allow me to warn against over-optimistic ambitions. If neither of you two have a job, you are under no time constraints, but if either can only get two weeks off work you may well spend all of that waiting for suitable weather to depart. Even worse, you could depart and spend some lovely days in the South, then be blocked for a week or even more by inclement weather prohibitng your return flight. Can that be explained to the boss? Worse even, imagine some minor damage to the plane - stuck in a pothole upon landing or taxiing on an unknown grass field, bend nose leg, break prop - travel home on Ryanair and how do you get the plane recovered?

Sorry to spoil the fun but there's a thousand things that can go wrong on such a trip. Begin by getting your PPL - or perhaps a lower license, microlights and LSA's are looking better and better - at least you will have the fun of learning, and the excitement of your first solo, and of your first cross country navigation. Only then can you begin to find if travelling on a small plane is really what you and your partner will enjoy - not everybody likes to sit for hours upon hours in a confined space with quite some noise and p...ing in a bottle for lack of better conveniences.

PS and if you hope/plan to fly to those Southern destinations, do brush up your languages! English will do fine in North and Central continental Europe but the small fields in the South really require local language, both on the radio and for negotiating fuel, local transport, lodging &c after landing.

[Genghis the Engineer]

In my opinion...

- Club rental, forget it, they won't let you at any reasonable rate.

- Join a syndicate, should be no problem.

- Or do a deal with a private owner who trusts you and doesn't use their aeroplane enough.


Light aircraft touring holidays are a lot of fun, but also demand a lot of flexibility from you, and whoever you are with. You WILL have diversions, weather problems, aircraft snags, and MAY NOT make it anywhere when you actually planned for it. I've done 5½ flying hours this week, a long trip, business conference, flight back - great views, nice excuse to fly in working hours, actually fairly affordable and on this occasion saved me about a day of my time. But at least 50% of such trips I've either ended up diverting somewhere en-route, been late at one end or the other, or simply given up and gone by other means. GA is not a reliable way of getting from A to B.

My 1/18th of a 4-seat spamcan, share value about £1300, costs me £40/month and £100/hr tacho in an aeroplane that typically cruises around 100 knots. You can do the sums yourself about what will mean for the trips you want - but yes I can take it away for a week with prior warning. That is as cheap as it'll usually get. I am only paying for the flying I do (and airport fees of course). For this trip that was £470 (tacho increments slower than the clock most of the time), and about £70 in airport fees - the round trip was 260nm each way and I could have taken a passenger and small dog at the same rates. Until the day before leaving however, I still had a backup plan to go by train.

G

[Glasgow_Flyer]

I reckon once you have your license it'll all come together.
At our club (to be fair, we're little bit too far away for you to consider!), we have no restrictions on what members book planes out for (within reason). People going on longer trips do tend to fly for an hour or two a day, but we don't require it - simply we don't want people having any pressure to fly when they are not 100% comfortable to fly (weather/fatigue/whatever).
You'll get to know people who own planes, groups that hire them etc. There are always plenty of options - it pays to shop about though and don't get trapped in that mentality that it's easier to stay with the place you learned to fly post-license and hire from them (I wasted 4 years doing that!).
Enjoy!!

[TelsBoy]

As was very well summed up by Genghis, the best way if you want to do long trips away is to purchase a share.


Most clubs will charge a minimum 3hrs flying per day when the a/c is away, which makes most overnight trips unworkable.


Be aware that Wx can instantly destroy even the best-laid plans for any trip, unless you have an IR and fly something very well-equipped and is certified for FIKI. And as for tech issues... :\


Good luck.

[ChickenHouse]

@Coastfields: You are obviously in an early euphoric phase of a PPL.
How many flight hours did you pass already?

London, Portugal, France, Italy - sounds like a pack of dreams, but, knowing the usual training, how well are you prepared for international flying? It is easy once you get used to the procedures, but frankly, almost noch school will teach you the necessary administration of these flights (Just to point one, do you know what it takes to be allowed to take your dogs on international flight ... and back to the UK? -> not an easy issue!).

Next important question: what are your planned yearly hours flown? Depending on that it may make sense to think ownership quite early.

[Ebbie 2003]

You do not pay for hours when the airplane is not in use, with mine that means the engine running.

Here I let people fly mine away, we agree a minimum number of hours per day, I usually say two hours per day, but can agree less. Since the nearest islands are about an hour away it's not a grest imposition.

As the only alternatives are commercial flights it works out cheaper than any alternative if going to an isolated island.

So if one was going to say Union Island, park up for a week with two other people it would cost about US$2,000 -2,500 for three people commercial return - say three hours normally US$600, but if one just did the flight direct there and back 7 days it would at 2hrs per day cost a notional 2 x 7 x $200 i.e. US$2,800, but I would rebate unused fuel and oil at US$100 per hour to deduct US$1,400 for a total cost of $1,400 for the trip.

Most other owners would do something similar - I tend to rent my airplane to get it used jot for a profit - the airplane club here would maybe do something similar but with a higher starting price of around US$285 per hour. This can reduce to around US$225 per hour if you join the club, one may not want to do that as one likely ends up owning part of their decades of debt!

Overall it is much cheaper to rent than to buy unless one will be doing several long trips every year.

One is better off joining a small group that has lower usage and would appreciate the use - bigger groups are usually not so keen on fly away at weekendsl

[coastfields]

Thank you everyone for their super valuable input. It does seem like fractional ownership/club is best idea.

For those asking, I've now done 26 hours (I do 2/3 hours a week at the moment), so weather permitting (and of course my ability, testing, etc), I should have my PPL by the end of the summer. As for my planned hours per year, hard to tell, but I intend to fly at least for a couple of hours every couple of weeks, or around 50+ hours a year.

Again, thanks a lot and if anyone has further input, would love to hear it.

[Shoestring Flyer]

I would also check that any club you might be thinking of hiring from is happy for you taking your dog on a trip in their aircraft?

[Forfoxake]

Don’t buy or be a part of a syndicate for a generic spam can.
The problem with primary trainers is they are only good for two hours flying
You can’t go anywhere.
When I mean primary, I mean anything powered by a Continental O-200 of Lycoming O-235 or similar.
You will soon out grow one of these.
Then you’ll wish you’d never bought it.

My recommendation would be to buy something more of a primary/intermediate trainer that you can go places in.
Consider a plane powered by a Lycoming O-320.
Like a Cessna Skyhawk, Piper Cherokee or Grumman Cheetah
It won’t burn much more fuel than a O-235.
These type of planes often carry 40 gallons, giving you an easy four hours between stops.

But before you buy anything.
Please consider where you’ll keep it at, and how it will be maintained.
The fuel is the cheapest thing you’ll put into it.
I’m out flying an overtime trip, just to help pay for an inspection.
Even being a licensed aircraft engineer and doing most of the work myself.
It’s still an unbelievably expensive hobby.

Good advice if you want/need a CofA aircraft.

However, a permit aircraft would be cheaper.

And if you buy a share in a group that does most of the maintenance itself, it can be an unbelieveably inexpensive hobby!

PS There are some four seaters on a permit now.

[Genghis the Engineer]

Like a Cessna Skyhawk, Piper Cherokee or Grumman Cheetah

Mine is a Grumman Cheetah, and whilst I'd prefer the bigger engined Tiger, it's nonetheless excellent and I agree.

G

[Maoraigh1]

I've been in a syndicate with an O200 aircraft for 28 years. I've joined another syndicate forming to buy a different type of aircraft, also with an O200.
I haven't tired of the Jodel DR1050. The other proposed aircraft is unlikely to bore me.

[jan99]

After about 25 one week VFR trips in the last 10 years with a DA40TDI from the Netherlands to the ends of Europe I can report the following:
- 2 of these returned 1 day late due to weather
- 1 returned 2 days late due to weather (miserable warm front)
- 1 returned 6 days late due to weather (flooded runway in Spain)
A factor is that the general destination - say Iberia/Morocco, Italy/Greece, Baltic, British Isles, Eastern Europe - was commonly decided late by looking at the long term weather prognosis. This did often but not always work out.
Mountain crossings need a little extra weather care.

Some other remarks:
- English language RT will generally do
- but smaller airfields in France require some minimum of French RT (by law)
- France has extensive military low flying routes that tend to be in the way (notams)
- secondary surveillance radar is not available in several countries and frequent waypoint-time estimates and reports are demanded
- Spain requires local flightplans for all flights (and there are many local reporting offices)
- close flightplans, know the numbers to call

But all quite doable provided there are no set plans (!).

[Pilot DAR]

The problem with primary trainers is they are only good for two hours flying
You can’t go anywhere.
When I mean primary, I mean anything powered by a Continental O-200 of Lycoming O-235 or similar.
You will soon out grow one of these.
Then you’ll wish you’d never bought it.

Hmmm... I've owned a C 150 for 31 years, and more than 3000 hours. I can carry my wife, two folding bikes in the back, and a bit of luggage - from Canada to Florida or the Bahamas. I've flown it to Texas, and the mountains in western Canada. It's dispatch reliability has been only two flights missed in all those years and hours. And it was fully paid for in the first year. A plane is what you make of it. I'm not pushing the idea that a C 150 is good or bad, but smaller planes are affordable, and can make a long trip, albeit in shorter steps.

My other aircraft, two seat, 180HP is slower than the 150, and flies about as far on a tank.

By comparison, I've flown a C 182 amphibian around Scandinavia, and across Europe. It was not much faster, and would not carry much more than my 150, but it sure burned a lot more gas! It can land in water twice though ;)

Every plane has its specialty, and some can be adequate in other roles too, get to know them, before you choose!

[Piper.Classique]

You can fly your wife out of the UK, no problem. The dog is a problem, as the current regulations for taking him out of the country (and back) require transport by an approved carrier. So, UK only for the dog, and please get him or her protective earwear, they are more noise sensitive than we are.
As to the type of aircraft, they will all go touring, but some take a long time.. �� Try to fly as many different types as you can, and remember is a buyer's market, so no rush!

[Dan Winterland]

As to the question as to what is the best aircraft for touring, there are as many answers as aircraft. If you need it as a business tool, the speed is probably the main criteria. If you're hours building, then it may not matter. A PA24 with 250hp may well work out cheaper per mile than a 160hp PA28 due to the 60% speed increase. But if you don't need a 160 knots cruise, then there are some very cheap options. A friend built hours flying a J3 Cub around the US at 60 knots. He was a flight engineer and they tend to know the value of money.

And another flight engineer told me that if it flys, floats or fornicates, it's usually cheaper to rent! (Polite version).