The phrase irresistible urge is as good as any to describe why some airplanes get fitted with floats. A Super Cub and a 185, sure. But a DC-3 and a Cherokee 140? And now a giant Waco biplane in the form of the companys just-introduced YMF-5F floatplane, with the F signifying floats.
Weve been around enough avionics installations to know that most every project can snowball once the aircraft hits the hangar floor. Thats especially true as more owners finally commit to ADS-B installations. If the aircraft hasnt seen an avionics installation in ages, low-budget buyers might noodle the idea of buying used GPS navigators. But what may seem like a smoking-good deal on used equipment websites could be a setup for a serious case of buyers remorse.
When we evaluated motion-sickness aids in the July 2017 issue of Aviation Consumer, we favored the Reliefband 1.5 wearable therapeutic neuromodulation device over other remedies. Most important is the device is easy to use and doesnt cause side effects, other than potentially minor skin irritation around the area of the electrode. But we thought the Reliefband, which is worn like a wristwatch, had a dated design and a clinical look and feel.
Call them ramp fees, facility charges or handling fees. When you pull up to many FBOs there’s a good chance you’ll be billed a flat-rate charge just for taking space on the ramp. In general, the larger the aircraft, the more you’ll pay. Most facilities that collect facility fees will waive them if you oblige by buying a specific amount of fuel, which of course always works out to be more than the fee. No matter what, my mentality is that I never expect anything for free and thats especially true when aviating.
I read the Cessna 414 report in the February 2018 Aviation Consumer Used Aircraft Guide section with interest. My aircraft partner and I have owned three airplanes, including our current 1977 Cessna 414, through our nonprofit S Corporation. It is set up as a flying club, allowing for as many as five members, although weve never had more than three. There are three primary elements that affect our shared ownership arrangement.
There’s nothing quite like fetching your bird from the shop after a high-quality engine overhaul. Done right, it should perform like it did when the aircraft came off the factory floor. In the world of aircraft ownership, thats a beautiful thing. But done wrong, you could be in for the time-consuming hassles of dealing with warranty work-or worse should the engine fail, despite it running great before handing it over to an overhaul shop. After all, engine overhauls are supposed to increase your confidence, not kill it or you in the process.
The engine is the size of a large picnic basket, easily puts out more power than the biggest horizontally opposed piston pounder, has a TBO nearly twice as long, is more reliable and weighs less-so whats not to like about turboprop engines?
Shop the six-seat, retractable piston-single market and you’ll find three basic choices: Beechs Model 36 Bonanza, Cessnas Model 210 Centurion and Pipers PA-32R series, which is the Lance and Saratoga. At first blush, the Bonanza arguably handles better than the other two while perhaps squeezing out a knot or two over the Centurion. The 210, on the other hand, generally has better short-field performance than the Bonanza and offers an improved hand-flown IFR platform.
Apopular (and lazy) journalistic toss away is to describe a company as owning a market. Yet no company does, not even 800-pound simians like Garmin and Cirrus. There are always buyers swimming against the tide and in the world of aviation, Mooney has made a business of scooping them up; a flea in a world of elephants.
Buying a new airplane is both an act of passion and an act of faith. The very idea of sinking so much wealth into an asset used but 100 hours a year has to be driven by blind love for flight. The faith part has to do with the company remaining solvent to support such an investment.
If youre still holding out for a cheaper mandate-compliant ADS-B upgrade, the calendar is closing in on you. Were hearing that the better avionics shops have sizable installation backlogs-some greater than six months-for even basic upgrades. Some are charging a premium for priority scheduling. We predicted this very scenario years ago, and suspect shop labor rates will increase, moving forward.
