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magicbroncoride
barbaric neanderthal

Registered: 05/27/13
Posts: 208
Last seen: 8 years, 5 months
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Are you looking to be a big air pilot or a lil air pilot? Big air is big ass commercial multi engines and lil puddle jumping people. Big thing nowadays is the sky chauffeurs. Most have thier fixed and rotary certs, but they get to play with the coolest toys in the best places. Its a niche market but definitely the top of the food chain. Lots of rental companies popping up doing on call g5s and shit. Make sure you get every cert you can because it is a cut throat business and most big companies look for prior mill experience or a shit ton of hours. One key thing is that there are old pilots and there are bold pilots but there are no old bold pilots.
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spiny
Stranger
Registered: 11/15/12
Posts: 160
Last seen: 5 months, 20 days
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Re: Starting flight school [Re: MushyMatt]
#18830629 - 09/11/13 11:28 PM (10 years, 4 months ago) |
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Quote:
MushyMatt said:
Any other private pilots in here?
I am - PPL, IFR, and Glider rated. Used to own an AA5B Tiger then a 182. Can't wait to move back to the mountains and get back into it. I'm thinking a Maule with big-ass tundra tires or a 180. Hopefully I'll still be able to afford it when avgas hits $10/gallon. I'm pretty well priced out at the moment.
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MushyMatt
LSD-25



Registered: 10/13/11
Posts: 2,551
Loc: Under a Mushroom
Last seen: 2 years, 2 months
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Re: Starting flight school [Re: spiny]
#18830925 - 09/12/13 01:21 AM (10 years, 4 months ago) |
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Quote:
magicbroncoride said: Are you looking to be a big air pilot or a lil air pilot? Big air is big ass commercial multi engines and lil puddle jumping people. Big thing nowadays is the sky chauffeurs. Most have thier fixed and rotary certs, but they get to play with the coolest toys in the best places. Its a niche market but definitely the top of the food chain. Lots of rental companies popping up doing on call g5s and shit. Make sure you get every cert you can because it is a cut throat business and most big companies look for prior mill experience or a shit ton of hours. One key thing is that there are old pilots and there are bold pilots but there are no old bold pilots.
Honestly, I really don't care what I fly, as long as I get to fly, I am more than happy with that. Except I am not going to lie, if I had the opportunity to fly fighters, I would be on that so fucking fast. Been doing a lot of reading up about the flight school the AF has and just because you are in flight school, doesn't mean you will fly aircraft behind the yoke, some were saying how you can get stuck behind a computer flying a UAV. That does not sound very fun for I.
Quote:
spiny said:
Quote:
MushyMatt said:
Any other private pilots in here?
I am - PPL, IFR, and Glider rated. Used to own an AA5B Tiger then a 182. Can't wait to move back to the mountains and get back into it. I'm thinking a Maule with big-ass tundra tires or a 180. Hopefully I'll still be able to afford it when avgas hits $10/gallon. I'm pretty well priced out at the moment.
Fucking right on man. How hard is it to get a glider cert? I've always wanted to fly one of those. I would really like to own a C-172 one day, a 180 though would be fucking epic.
Right now around here, gas is $5.64/gal, so I don't expect it to hit $10 for at least 4-5 years.
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Reborn - 6/08/13
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spiny
Stranger
Registered: 11/15/12
Posts: 160
Last seen: 5 months, 20 days
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Re: Starting flight school [Re: MushyMatt]
#18831937 - 09/12/13 10:33 AM (10 years, 4 months ago) |
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If you make a career out of it, owning a 180 isn't out of reach at all. Just be careful and keep passing those medicals, if you know what I mean.
The glider rating is pretty easy if you're not starting from scratch. I already had my PPL, and although it was a long time ago I would guess that it only took 10 hours of training. Flying "on-tow" was the hardest part. Super weird, but really fun, too. It's a real yank-and-bank kind of flying. Very different than powered flight.
Jealous that you're starting flight school, but happy for you. I have always regretted not making a career of flying. If you know you love it, just keep doing it until you have an awesome job and awesome career. Who cares if the first-year jobs are low paying. Honestly. Trust me on this.
By the way, there are other routes to flying gigs than the Air Force. A friend of mine with one of the best jobs/careers in the world went an aeronautical university (UND, I'm pretty sure), and was picked up by Bombardier out of college to sell their business jets. From what I gather, he was either working with clients from the head office or delivering (flying) their business jets all over the globe to clients. He has crazy stories of flying into the Middle East, Europe, over the North Atlantic, etc. At some point, he and a few of his collegues broke off and formed a business jet brokering service and from what I can tell they're absolutely killing it, and now he gets to fly an even wider array of even more bad-ass planes from King Airs to Gulfstreams. Anyway, my point is to not give up if you can't get into the Air Force, and that the aeronautical universities can be a really good feeder into some unusual but awesome flying jobs.
If only I could do it over with what I know now...
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MushyMatt
LSD-25



Registered: 10/13/11
Posts: 2,551
Loc: Under a Mushroom
Last seen: 2 years, 2 months
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Re: Starting flight school [Re: spiny]
#18833189 - 09/12/13 04:29 PM (10 years, 4 months ago) |
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Quote:
spiny said: If you make a career out of it, owning a 180 isn't out of reach at all. Just be careful and keep passing those medicals, if you know what I mean.
The glider rating is pretty easy if you're not starting from scratch. I already had my PPL, and although it was a long time ago I would guess that it only took 10 hours of training. Flying "on-tow" was the hardest part. Super weird, but really fun, too. It's a real yank-and-bank kind of flying. Very different than powered flight.
Jealous that you're starting flight school, but happy for you. I have always regretted not making a career of flying. If you know you love it, just keep doing it until you have an awesome job and awesome career. Who cares if the first-year jobs are low paying. Honestly. Trust me on this.
By the way, there are other routes to flying gigs than the Air Force. A friend of mine with one of the best jobs/careers in the world went an aeronautical university (UND, I'm pretty sure), and was picked up by Bombardier out of college to sell their business jets. From what I gather, he was either working with clients from the head office or delivering (flying) their business jets all over the globe to clients. He has crazy stories of flying into the Middle East, Europe, over the North Atlantic, etc. At some point, he and a few of his collegues broke off and formed a business jet brokering service and from what I can tell they're absolutely killing it, and now he gets to fly an even wider array of even more bad-ass planes from King Airs to Gulfstreams. Anyway, my point is to not give up if you can't get into the Air Force, and that the aeronautical universities can be a really good feeder into some unusual but awesome flying jobs.
If only I could do it over with what I know now...
Damn, thank you for the awesome reply.
How much would a 180 cost used that has a good amount of hours still left in the engine until a complete overhaul?
As for your buddy, talk about one lucky mother fucker. I would love to learn how to fly lear jets, hell, maybe try and become a pilot for some corporate clown or something. That would be pretty nice.
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Reborn - 6/08/13
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spiny
Stranger
Registered: 11/15/12
Posts: 160
Last seen: 5 months, 20 days
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Re: Starting flight school [Re: MushyMatt]
#18833625 - 09/12/13 06:16 PM (10 years, 4 months ago) |
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180s are a little pricey for what they are (a 182 in tailwheel configuration) because they're really popular with the bush crowd. You're probably looking at $70,000. If you want to get into ownership someday, do your research first. Operating costs are the real issue - for instance, you could buy that 180 and finance $50,000 or more (i.e. get a loan) leaving you with a monthly payment of $500-600 bucks. Not unreasonable, right? But then you have hangar costs, annual costs, general maintenance, overhaul reserve, not to mention direct operating costs including fuel (14 gallons an hour - do that math at $6/gallon, ouch), etc. This is what ultimately soured me on ownership: easy to afford to buy the thing, hard to afford to fly it as much as you want! If / when I get back into airplane ownership - and I undoubtedly will - I'll definitely be more conservative than in the past. Thinking 172, 170, Piper Pacer, something like. Buy the thing for $30k, burn 6-7 gallons an hour, tie down outside (no hangar), and fly the shit out of it.
I think I bought my first plane at 26, and I'm NOT a trust-funder. Go to school, keep your nose clean, get the best job you can, etc. Granted, at the time I didn't have any debt (until I bought the plane), lived in a dingy apartment with two roommates, and spent my time working my ass off, but it was so worth it.
PM me if you're interested in discussing further - have some more thoughts for you but don't want to overwhelm you if you're losing interest in this back and forth.
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Synthe
Gatorade me, bitch!



Registered: 11/10/12
Posts: 7,961
Loc: Three bags of Funyuns
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Re: Starting flight school [Re: MushyMatt]
#18833698 - 09/12/13 06:33 PM (10 years, 4 months ago) |
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Congratulations man! Tell me how it goes, I used to be interested in flying, still am a bit.
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