Buying an Aircraft
One of the hardest decisions to make is whether to rent, borrow or own. Some lucky people get access to aircraft for seemingly little expense, but for the rest of use there are options of renting from flight schools and clubs or purchasing our own aircraft. If it wasn’t clear from the minimal experiences in “Adventures while Renting” above, I’ll reiterate, renting is prohibitively expensive. So expensive that years went by between me taking an aircraft off the ground. On the other side is owning, yes there are complexities with owning, but the experience is much different. Ultimately I do be believe that owning, caring for and becoming intimately familiar with a particular aircraft makes you a better pilot. That coupled with the variety of aircraft you have flown and the experiences you’ve flown them into roughly gauge one’s overall experience as an aviator. For that, it was time to get to buying an airplane, and that isn’t an easy task.
Above are the “short list” candidates before I settled on my 182. I assume all aircraft buyers are torn between speed, cross country capability, short landing capability, cost to own and operate. At first I really wanted a big tailwheel and looked a a converted 180 and a 185. but as much as those big tires, great prop clearances and classic lines were appealing, I also had a cross country mission. I was planning (and actually do) on flying coast to coast at least twice a year. Speed and fuel burn were important, enter the Mooney and the Cardinal. The Mooney is nice but tight, and the low wing isn’t great for sightseeing, it was out and I was off to look at Cardinals. The two pictured above are beautiful, and I tried to buy both (one at a time) but failed.
Eventually I would stumble across a tidy Skylane in Placerville, CA. By the book it was just as fast as the cardinal, but burned a little more fuel to do it. It had all the backcountry chops of the big tailwheels, except the ground clearance. It couldn’t run with a Mooney, but it could carry more people and fuel than two of them. I didn’t know much at the time, but found that this was a solid, well rounded platform and in great shape.
