Selling the Skylane
June 12th 2020, the sad day I sold my airplane.
I’m behind in updating the blog stream, but rest assured I never stopped flying the Skylane. I continued putting 250-300 hrs/year on the bird, flying with any excuse to burn some AvGas. However the time came to sell.So many factors played into this, it’s hard to really weave them all together into a way that expresses my true emotions on the matter, but here are a few:
Time to transition to Tailwheel:
If you know me from backcountry flying, you probably remember me saying “ill go anywhere you cub will go and carry all your shit while I do it”… and although that was true there is a cost to it. For the most part a Skylane is a formidable backcountry machine. 700ft landings are possible, it can carry dam near anything, and cover a lot of ground getting you there in pretty much luxury. However, once you touchdown that prop is awfully close to the ground and tends to pick up all kinds of junk. Now i’m not saying you are at risk of prop strike, actually the nosewheel helps you quite a bit in that regards, but you are going to be dressing your prop frequently (like 2 -3 times a year), repainting the prop annually, and throwing a lot of junk at the wheel pants which will need constant touch-ups. If you’re wondering why I have the wheel pants on, I did try flying without them. There was no notable speed difference, but landing off pavement I was flinging rocks at the horizontal stabilizer. I decided the wheel pants are cheaper / easier to replace so keep them on as “aerodynamic rock guards” and the actually work quite well for that. Moving to a tall tail-wheel will certainly help minimize the impact of my off pavement excursions.
In aviation there is no such “point-of-stability”, you are ether learning, growing,challenging yourself to new things, or you are atrophying generally through complacency. I felt myself falling for the latter. If you are generally familiar with something, you are often tempted to “take shortcuts”… did you really read the checklist item or did you just say it from memory? Transitioning to a new aircraft and a tailwheel one at that forces retraining bad habits and reengaging
Nothing makes you rethink airplane ownership like being unemployed:
I haven’t talked about this online much, and plan to be brief here. The end of 2019 was an interesting one for me, we had succeeded at a major project I was leading at work, I was promoted to Functional Manager of Product Development and we were talking about hiring. With all this comes some level of security, so I set in motion the GPS/ADSB upgrade, a ~$20,000 investment. It was a beautiful unit, and worked very well. Then at annual I found a cylinder with a burnt valve and another consuming oil. I elected to replace both with new, and out went another chunk of money. So closing out 2019 I had spent my “nest egg”, but that happens, you can’t take it to the grave with you… right?
Things didn’t go well. As summarized in my Resume + my former employer lost patience with my success (and his company’s success as well). One thing led to another and needed to change the company structure just as the Covid 19 crisis was taking hold of California. A perfect storm if you will, I had little money and little prospects for sliding into a new position due to the national crisis affecting in-person interviews. I am trying my best to not sound bitter, mainly because I respect the people that work for him, but not Thomas himself, but I digress.
It turns out it wasn’t as dire a situation as you would assume. In about 3 weeks I was actively interviewing as best I could, in 8 had several competing offers. Good ones, at real companies, with real prospects. One problem, none of them are in San Luis Obispo. So a relocation was in the works, and the new plan is that the Skylane wouldn’t be coming with me.
Investment Mechanics
The Cessna 182 is a great platform to own, but not a great project to own. How so, and what’s the difference?
In many projects you cant “get out” what you “put in” financially, or better put: the sum is worth less then the sum of it’s parts. For the Skylane this is particularly true, as they are immensely popular and thus abundant. That coupled with the high cost of avionics upgrades meant as a project you would always be behind, and were just doing it for you.
But projects are part of my life. They help me connect with machines by becoming intimately familiar with their inner workings, and then creating something new and special from what was. The Skylane is not the correct aircraft to embark on that journey. It was in great shape, needed nothing, and had a decent all around build. Why tear that apart? I needed something that had both great potential as a fun project, and restoration potential in it’s future value.
“Every new beginning comes from some other beginning’s end”
Skylane’s Legacy
It’s true that every new beginning comes from some other beginning’s end, the Skylane story is no different. As the third owner of the aircraft it had stories before me, and with plenty of life left in it I expect many stories to come.
Flight Proficiency
In a couple of these blog posts I make mention of practice and gaining confidence through proficiency. The Skylane is a great step up from your primary trainer. With the speed and legs that can actually get you somewhere, every so slightly more complex engine management, and generally forgiving mannerisms, the Skylane really is a great transition from primary training into generally aviating. Plotting it out in Google Earth is fun, but also eye opening. In the three years I owned the Skylane, I performed roughly eight hundred landings. Who knew? And when plotted as shown below, apparently with some consistency at my home airport.
Tracklog of landings at my home airport KSBP, many hours of practice, and many return flights from adventures all culminate to this one spot.
Not Just Training Anymore
But it wasn’t just about training. Although the pattern can be seen as well worn in the flight logs, also apparent is all the tracks going every which way out of the area. The near shoreline route is also well worn, a quick sunset jaunt along the coast is one of my favorites, and coastal flying was always fun when taking people up for their first flight.
in and out of Slo every which way. Some common routes become evident, like along the coast, east towards the southern sierras or north to the high sierras.
From Pilot to Aviator
Probably the biggest achievement the Skylane gave me was the transition from Pilot to Aviator. It didn’t come from countless hours of pattern work, or “local” flying in the area, rather it came from some serious cross country. Living with your plane as you transit coast to coast is an experience. You are completely dependent on it, as well as the services and communities of the airports you stop at. Flight planning is both important and irrelevant. You will make a plan, but often enough the weather will change, or something will cause you to divert. Re planning an entire route while flying is cumbersome and you learn how to progressively re plan keeping options available and being ever so mindful of your fuel level.
In my journeys I have been: forced to land in deteriorating and already bad weather VFR, flown inadvertently into IMC, flow through snow and into IMC, flown through snow at night, diverted to alternates, diverted around entire states, and scud ran myself to an airport to get back on the ground. Each one of these situations would put both my skills to the test and exercise my in-flight decision making… the fact that I’m telling you this story means my decision making was “good enough”, however in surviving these circumstances I know know the point at which it was a better idea to have turned around earlier, got a better briefing, asked for help. Somewhere in that process you become an aviator.
Personal minimums are no longer hollow words you remember your instructor telling you about… instead they are memories of things. Like the time I landed the Skylane in gusting 40 knot winds. The airplane was capable, I thought I was capable and the landing went remarkably well. weathervaning around the taxiway was unpleasant, and having the plane “jump the chocks” while I was refueling it was pretty scary.
All in all, this was the biggest objective of my first airplane, to carry me safely though the “killing zone” giving me enough experience to make good aeronautical decisions, with a little help form a forgiving landing gear and stable in flight behaviors. The Skylane did this flawlessly.
In 3 years the Skylane traveled well, including crossing the country from coast-to-coast 10 times.
Some Stats (I am an Engineer after all)
In 3 years (1151 days) I owned the Skylane I completed 393 flights. That’s 1 flight every 3 days on average.
I completed 705 Day Landings and 109 Night Landings, 814 in total.
I flew 780 hours total airtime, 588 hours (75%) of which was categorized as cross country time. The total distance covered was approximately 105,000 statue miles, which yields an overall gross average flying speed of 135 mph.