The Frugal Pilot: How to Fly on a Budget

Frugal Pilot

Frugal Pilot

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Frugal Pilot
Flying can be expensive! How can you bring down the cost of going up? Be a Frugal Pilot! A Frugal Pilot is one who makes common-sense decisions toward getting good value from every flying activity and dollar. THE FRUGAL PILOT: How to Fly on a Budget includes hundreds of tips on aircraft maintenance, price shopping, barter and trade, multitask flying, co-ownership, partnerships, flying clubs, reducing taxes, owner maintenance, selecting a frugal airplane, renting your wings, and practical advice from other pilots. Fly more and spend less as a Frugal Pilot. (Not yet a pilot? Read my BONUS chapter on what you need to become a pilot – on a budget.) Let's go flying! --FrugalPilot.com
 
Dan Ramsey, eh? And a way to save money or make your money go further.... some co-inkydink going on with this.... by design or happy circumstance.

And I know you're not the guy from Tennessee who is on the radio every day since you have too much hair

Best of luck to ya! And welcome to PoA!
 
Flying on a budget. That's funny. I didn't realize you could use those two words in the same sentence :)
 
Welcome,first step is to not buy any how to save money books.
 
AggieMike88 said:
Dan Ramsey, eh? And a way to save money or make your money go further.... some co-inkydink going on with this.... by design or happy circumstance.

And I know you're not the guy from Tennessee who is on the radio every day since you have too much hair

Best of luck to ya! And welcome to PoA!
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You mean DAVE Ramsey. Not me. Too much hair and not enough money. That's why I'm FRUGAL!
 
EminiTrader said:
Flying on a budget. That's funny. I didn't realize you could use those two words in the same sentence :)
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Actually, I also wrote a book titled BUDGET FLYING thirty-plus years ago. Sadly, aviation isn't as popular as it was then, somewhat because of the higher costs. That's why I wrote THE FRUGAL PILOT, to offer tips on bringing down the costs of going up.
 
This is a great topic.

To keep costs down, first of all find a well-built Experimental. The folks that build these planes often are builders first and pilots second, sometimes they're not pilots at all - they just love building. They often finish a project, fly it for a a year to get the kinks out, then sell it to make room for another project. Some designs like the RV series are somewhat of an exception but there are many other Experimentals which get sold for a fraction of what it cost the builder to build it, or of what it would cost a person to build it themselves.

Going this direction has many advantages over the long run. You do all your own work and when working with an A&P friend who trusts your mechanical proficiency it's not hard to get the condition inspection signed off each year with a minimum of expense. Of course the builder may sign if off as well if he trusts your proficiency in maintaining the plane.

That's step number 1 in flying frugally. Step number two is sharing a hanger with someone else. In most cases (with singles) a normal sized hangar is large enough to put a high wing in with a low wing and vice versa.

This idea depends upon a person having some mechanical skills and a willingness to learn about those things which may not be familiar.
 
Excellent tips, Mike. Should we start a topic titled FRUGAL FLYING and ask others for tips?
 
Sawtooth flying in a rental. Climb at max power to the service ceiling. Mixture to idle cutoff, then best glide, at 2000agl, restart the engine, and repeat.
You may need to do some research about how the hobbs in your rental works. For example, if the system is oil pressure driven, than you need to do a stall to get the prop to stop windmilling and driving the engine. If the hobbs is simply connected to the master, you only need to switch off the master.

With a little extra work, and some research, you can save hundreds in rental costs.

Feel free to send a percentage of the savings my way.
 
Frugal Pilot said:
Actually, I also wrote a book titled BUDGET FLYING thirty-plus years ago. Sadly, aviation isn't as popular as it was then, somewhat because of the higher costs. That's why I wrote THE FRUGAL PILOT, to offer tips on bringing down the costs of going up.
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I was given the book "Budget Flying" by my parents when I was a pre-teen many decades ago (perhaps my parents were trying to reconcile my love of aviation with my lack of a future?). That book, at least in part, is responsible for my pilot's license and owning 5 planes as an adult...so I'm not sure if I should thank you or curse you Dan Ramsey!
 
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I still have the book, by the way...and my first plane, a Piper Tomahawk, was one of your recommendations!
 
Glad to hear that I could be of help. Take a look at my latest book on budget flying: THE FRUGAL PILOT. (Reviews appreciated.) --Dan
 
The easiest way to be a frugal pilot:

twoods_setup.jpg


:D
 
Great fuel mileage!

I wrote about "Flying at Home" in my second edition of BUDGET FLYING in 1990 after Microsoft released Flight Simulator (actually written by and licensed from Bruce Artwick of Sublogic Corp). Really clunky by today's standards. I covered it again in my 2004 book, THE COMPLETE IDIOT'S GUIDE TO SPORT FLYING. Much more realistic. The latest versions come with a barf bag! ;)

Let's go virtual flying!

--Dan
 
Bought the Kindle version of the book - so far it's great!
 
Sharing an airplane with a partner runs all your costs down to half. With the right partner you'll never be without your aircraft. If you really want to be frugal you can fly ultralights with lawnmower engines that burn mogas. Doesn't get cheaper than that, especially if you hangar and launch off your own property.
 
steingar said:
Sharing an airplane with a partner runs all your costs down to half. With the right partner you'll never be without your aircraft. If you really want to be frugal you can fly ultralights with lawnmower engines that burn mogas. Doesn't get cheaper than that, especially if you hangar and launch off your own property.
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Partnerships are smart. If you can find enough local interest, a flying club makes sense as many of them have multiple planes.
 
Partnerships:

With your first partner your costs go down 50%.
With your second partner your costs go down 12%.
With your third partner your costs go down another 12%.
With your fourth partner your costs only go down an additional 5%.

Inversely with each additional partner your chances of booking the aircraft go down significantly for a particular date.

Many insurance companies also consider more than five partners a club and will charge different rates.
 
denverpilot said:
With your first partner your costs go down 50%.
With your second partner your costs go down 12%.
With your third partner your costs go down another 12%.
With your fourth partner your costs only go down an additional 5%.
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New math, Nate? :)
 
Bottom line for frugal pilots is: save a few bucks, but fly safe. Frugal pilots aren't cheap nor unsafe, just smart.
 
timwinters said:
New math, Nate? :)
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Nope.

You and first partner, your share is 50%. Your personal cost dropped by 50% to own a plane.

You and two partners, your share is now 33.33%. Rounded to 33, your personal cost dropped only 12% to add this partner.

You and three partners, your share is now 25%, and your costs dropped another 12% rounded.

(Put the decimals back in if you like, it doesn't matter for purposes of this point.)

You and four partners, your share is now 20%. Your costs only dropped 5% to add this partner.

The post was to show that there's a significant diminishing return on adding new partners beyond 3 or 4. At five people, the delta in your price is only 5% when you add person number five.

But your chances of scheduling the aircraft when you want it are dropping like a rock at five. More people, more chances for interpersonal peoblems, very little fiscal gain for the original four. Or three or two.

The biggest bang for the buck is adding that first partner. Price cut literally in half.

After that, it's a marginal change until partner number five, at which point it's probably not worth the potential problems of adding another human being to the mix. A 5% discount for the originally four isn't very compelling.

We specifically wrote into the LLC by-laws that no further patters beyond a fifth could join the LLC unless an additional aircraft is added, for the above reason. We decided we could live with 5 because there's always someone who isn't flying enough at any particular time.

A non-flyer saving everyone else 5% is maybe reasonable. If all five are flying heavily, you might as well go rent from the FBO that has 20 aircraft 100 yards from our hangar.
 
Excellent advice on partnerships, DenverPilot. Bill Sneed of Aviation Insurance Resources says that a club of 5 to 10 member pilots per aircraft is the most economical. --Dan
 
timwinters said:
...

(Pssst...try 50, 17, 8, 5)

:)
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Good lord. Someone put common core in my coffee. LOL. ;)

Glad I'm not doing flight planning or logbook stuff tonight.

Maybe there was something else in the coffee.

What the heck is that pattern stuck in my head that I posted it twice like that? Haha.

First time was via dictation when I was doing something else and had hands busy -- no not that! -- so i was definitely distracted.

Second time???? LOL.

Anyway. Use Tim's math. It's the non common core variety. And ya'll get the idea.

Partnerships are rapidly diminishing returns for adding more humans and potentially more drama. But like someone said, it's a lot nicer to pay for 20% of an engine than 100% of one.

(Tim knows that pain. How's it running, Tim? Hopefully well.)
 
The non-monetary value of having your own (or maybe one partner) is sometimes worth ponying up a little cash for.
 
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