Would you purchase this plane for instrument training?

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tailwind22

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tailwind22
What do you think about this equipment list for IFR flight? If you were buying a plane for instrument training, would this one make the cut? I know it technically is IFR capable, but am I going to be making my life much more difficult or expensive because of how basic the equipment is?

Avionics:
dual KX-170B nav/coms
glide slope
KT-76A transponder with encoder
UAvonix tail beacon ADS-B out
Audio panel
marker beacons
intercom

Background: I'm a student pilot looking to purchase a plane (I know there can be mixed opinions on that, but that's not the discussion at hand, thanks). I want to make sure it can get me through my instrument training as well, but I don't know enough about instrument flying to be able to make a fully informed decision. I've got someone who's an airplane expert helping me, and he's pushing me towards a specific plane. But I think his expertise on instrument flying/training may be outdated - I keep reading how many non-GPS approaches & systems are being shut down, and that not having GPS can make life much more difficult. I know most of the other avionics here are pretty ancient, too. I don't need the latest & greatest, but am I getting myself into something where I would immediately have to drop another $5-10k to make the plane actually usable for my purposes?
 

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Wouldn’t be my first choice. Agree with the above - find something with a decent IFR GPS.
 
The truth is you would have trouble finding approaches you could fly with the listed equipment. I would pass on that one if I were you.
 
Thanks for the replies. Any thoughts on adding a GPS? If you were going to add one, what would it be? Could I get away with something like a Garmin 175, or is the screen as ridiculously small and non-useful as it appears?

This plane is supposed to be in fantastic mechanical shape, which I do like the sound of. But how deep into the avionics $$$ am I looking at if I were to consider adding some myself?
 
somorris said:
The truth is you would have trouble finding approaches you could fly with the listed equipment. I would pass on that one if I were you.
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This is exactly what I'm wondering. How do I figure out which approaches in my area can be flown with this equipment? What charts/maps/chart supplements would I look at, and what would I be looking for?

Thanks everybody for all the help. I'm obviously in over my head, but trying to learn to swim as quickly as possible.
 
tailwind22 said:
This is exactly what I'm wondering. How do I figure out which approaches in my area can be flown with this equipment? What charts/maps/chart supplements would I look at, and what would I be looking for?

Thanks everybody for all the help. I'm obviously in over my head, but trying to learn to swim as quickly as possible.
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Without a functional DME or GPS, you can fly ILS for precision and LOC for non-precision. I don’t think that panel would even get you to thru the experience requirements in pt 61.

You’ll need at least a GPS and likely an indicator added to the panel above to….the screen size isn’t what you should be worried about per se….capability is what you need.

Something as simple as a GNS430W and a indicator added to the above would be the minimum. Figure at least $12K+ installed. That alone would likely pay for most, if not all of the IRA in a non-TAA rental.
 
I did my initial IFR in a similar plane, no panel mounted GPS just two nav/coms and two nav heads, one had a glide slope one didn’t, I think that makes for a good trainer as your moving map needs to be in your head


As long as there is a field somewhat near you with a ILS and one or two other approaches, you’ll be fine



Real world IFR, as in IMC to get places, you’ll want /G and a GPSS autopilot


Find your nearby airports and see what approaches they have


https://skyvector.com/

https://fltplan.com/
Go down and select airports and it will show the approaches


Check out the fltplango app, good free starter before you spend the coin on foreflight, though if I was instructing you I’d have you go with just paper to start off and no moving map of any kind
 
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TCABM said:
Without a functional DME or GPS, you can fly ILS for precision and LOC for non-precision. I don’t think that panel would even get you to thru the experience requirements in pt 61.

You’ll need at least a GPS and likely an indicator added to the panel above to….the screen size isn’t what you should be worried about per se….capability is what you need.

Something as simple as a GNS430W and a indicator added to the above would be the minimum. Figure at least $12K+ installed. That alone would likely pay for most, if not all of the IRA in a non-TAA rental.
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Why?

Two nav coms and two nav heads with a six pack is plenty fine without GPS for getting a instrument ticket

00384IL32L_0001.png


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Just look for airports that have a VOR on them and look up the approaches they have, while not ideal I don’t think you will be lacking with that panel for just getting your IFR
 
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I have access to a club plane that has no gps, and I can tell you that it's essentially impossible to fly it anywhere ifr. Very few approaches that can be done without at least dme. Also, with VOR's being shut down, there are fewer Victor airways every year, so even enroute is getting difficult. You'd end up flying the same two approaches over and over again, which while technically possible, isn't very good training, and certainly doesn't prepare you for real world ifr.

A gps 175 would be fine; you don't need a big screen because you're flying by the cdi anyway. I'm not a fan of the kx170, so if it was my plane I'd probably spend a little more and replace one with a gnc355. You're looking at 10-12k. It would make the plane easier to sell when you're done with it though. It would probably be 6-12 months before you could get into a shop to get it done.
 
CAN you train IFR in this plane? Yes. SHOULD you? Another question. I trained the way I was going to fly, with the equipment I intended to use IFR after getting the rating. My equipment looked like yours...in the 80s. The reality is that the IFR system is incessantly and increasingly GPS-centric. It is becoming rarer and rarer to find non-GPS approaches at non-metro airports. At my home field, our VOR approach was decommissioned several years ago, and the VOR is now also decommissioned. We only have GPS approaches now. This is becoming the norm at most non-city airports. I haven't flown a non-GPS approach for real, except for some metro airport LOC or ILS approaches, for the last 20 years.

If you purchase a plane without IFR GPS, installing a WAAS GPS unit of some sort would probably be the first thing you will want to do. Then train with that unit to fly the approaches you are going to be flying anyway. To be honest, if you are going to do a lot of single-pilot IFR, you are going to want a basic autopilot as well, and would greatly benefit safety-wise from ditching the vacuum system by installing Garmin G5s or the equivalent. I would also want a reliable source of in-flight weather, either ADS-B or XM Weather. This has been in my opinion the greatest advance in single-engine IFR safety since I trained in the late 80s. Its hard to believe I flew around IFR in what I did then without the in-flight weather information we now have available today.
 
tailwind22 said:
What do you think about this equipment list for IFR flight? If you were buying a plane for instrument training, would this one make the cut? I know it technically is IFR capable, but am I going to be making my life much more difficult or expensive because of how basic the equipment is?

Avionics:
dual KX-170B nav/coms
glide slope
KT-76A transponder with encoder
UAvonix tail beacon ADS-B out
Audio panel
marker beacons
intercom

Background: I'm a student pilot looking to purchase a plane (I know there can be mixed opinions on that, but that's not the discussion at hand, thanks). I want to make sure it can get me through my instrument training as well, but I don't know enough about instrument flying to be able to make a fully informed decision. I've got someone who's an airplane expert helping me, and he's pushing me towards a specific plane. But I think his expertise on instrument flying/training may be outdated - I keep reading how many non-GPS approaches & systems are being shut down, and that not having GPS can make life much more difficult. I know most of the other avionics here are pretty ancient, too. I don't need the latest & greatest, but am I getting myself into something where I would immediately have to drop another $5-10k to make the plane actually usable for my purposes?
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What airplane is this? Looks like a PA28 variant of some sort.

You could swap out one of the KX170's for a GNC355 as an IFR GPS navigator and re-use the upper CDI (the one with glide path). That'll run around $8k parts, a couple dozen hours labor and a few months down time. Whether that'd be worth it would partially depend on the airplane.
 
Now is a bad time to install avionics. Backorders, overpriced, and you’ll want to ditch those radios as well. You can spend $20-30k real fast updating that panel.

Is it currently IFR certified (pitot-static tested for IFR within last 24 months)? If not you may be buying/repairing instruments as well. VFR inspection is much simpler.
 
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tailwind22 said:
Thanks for the replies. Any thoughts on adding a GPS? If you were going to add one, what would it be? Could I get away with something like a Garmin 175, or is the screen as ridiculously small and non-useful as it appears?

This plane is supposed to be in fantastic mechanical shape, which I do like the sound of. But how deep into the avionics $$$ am I looking at if I were to consider adding some myself?
Click to expand...
It will cost you twice as much to add it later.....than if you purchase the plane equipped.

I learned to fly instruments on a plane very similar to that....so, it's very capable. And you'd probably have a portable GPS for backup anyways.
 
tailwind22 said:
What do you think about this equipment list for IFR flight? If you were buying a plane for instrument training, would this one make the cut? I know it technically is IFR capable, but am I going to be making my life much more difficult or expensive because of how basic the equipment is?

Avionics:
dual KX-170B nav/coms
glide slope
KT-76A transponder with encoder
UAvonix tail beacon ADS-B out
Audio panel
marker beacons
intercom

Background: I'm a student pilot looking to purchase a plane (I know there can be mixed opinions on that, but that's not the discussion at hand, thanks). I want to make sure it can get me through my instrument training as well, but I don't know enough about instrument flying to be able to make a fully informed decision. I've got someone who's an airplane expert helping me, and he's pushing me towards a specific plane. But I think his expertise on instrument flying/training may be outdated - I keep reading how many non-GPS approaches & systems are being shut down, and that not having GPS can make life much more difficult. I know most of the other avionics here are pretty ancient, too. I don't need the latest & greatest, but am I getting myself into something where I would immediately have to drop another $5-10k to make the plane actually usable for my purposes?
Click to expand...
Why do you want an IR? What will you use it for? Where are you?
 
Thanks for all the extremely helpful responses. You've filled in a lot of blanks for me, and helped me be able to make a much more informed decision. It sounds like my suspicions were correct: I want to buy a plane that has the avionics I want, not try to upgrade them myself. As much as I'd like to get in a plane now, I'm going to wait for the right one. Hopefully I can find one that's equally mechanically sound but already has the avionics I'll need.

This looks like a great forum. I'll be back here for sure.
 
luvflyin said:
Why do you want an IR? What will you use it for? Where are you?
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I'm currently on the path to my ATP. Like others have said, I want to train the way I'm going to fly IFR for the rest of my career. So it sounds like GPS it is.
 
Glad you came to that conclusion. This question does seem to come up every once in a while, and as always there are several people that have said that training in such a plane is no problem. I strongly disagree. The reduction in the number of VORs and VOR approaches makes such training impractical in many parts of the country and almost useless in preparing a pilot for flying real IFR in the system. What are you going to do, fly the same few approaches again and again? How are you going to effectively fly routine IFR with only VORs? Yes, you can do it, and some people do occasionally. However, I don’t know what the real numbers are, but I’d bet something like 80% of IFR airports have only GPS approaches. So right there, you’ve limited yourself to only flying IFR to 20% of airports.

In my opinion, training pilots on VOR/ILS only in 2022 and then releasing them into the IFR system is doing a great disservice to them.

In another recent thread there was talk about students not knowing how to put gas in the plane, because the FBO always did it for them. This brought some incredulity from the posters - “how could you not know how to fuel your plane? What are you going to do when the FBO is closed?” I view this as a similar situation - you COULD always plan your flights to go where full-serve fuel is available, but that would severely limit your airplane’s utility. Just like an IFR rating without GPS experience would do.
 
No, absolutely no. For instrument training you need to practice different types of approaches. You’ll want ILS capable at a minimum. Precision and non precision approaches. If you didn’t have a VOR that’s fine, but not the reverse.
 
Is the plane good, other than the panel? It’s cheaper to make the panel airworthy than the airframe.

If you are going to use it for instrument training and nothing else, then it’s even more important not to put $100,000 of catch-up maintenance into a temporary investment. If you are going to use it for travel and fun, then the math changes.

You can get the rating in this plane, if it is airworthy. But you can’t really use the rating much in it. If you love the plane, then you can upgrade the panel and get more use out of it as an instrument platform. It could be the right plane for you and, if it is, then go ahead and get it.
 
TravisRNT said:
Why?

Two nav coms and two nav heads with a six pack is plenty fine without GPS for getting a instrument ticket





Just look for airports that have a VOR on them and look up the approaches they have, while not ideal I don’t think you will be lacking with that panel for just getting your IFR
Click to expand...


It depends a bit on the location where you are training at. I agree the OP probably needs either a DME or an IFR GPS. An IFR GPS would be preferred so he can learn and be proficient GPS procedures, not that they are hard other than learning the buttonolgy for each type of GPS.
Around my area there are no precision approaches that can be done without DME or GPS without flying over 100 miles or more to get to one. Which makes doing a checkride and to some extent training impractical without some sort of distance measuring equipment.

Brian
CFIIG/ASEL
 
Ask yourself "is this the equipment to make me a competent IFR pilot?". Ask yourself what you want and need to learn.

Some guys have a strategy to check ride in a "dumbed-down" paneled plane to hamstring the DPE's opportunity to test them.
 
If your actually going to fly it In IMC ,a was GPS would be recommended .
 
I'm midway through my instrument training; and I'm in the middle of having a GNX375 and GI275 (MFD/CDI) installed in my Archer; I had the same layout you describe (I added back a Narco DME previously uninstalled) but after thinking it through, I wanted something besides a pair of 42-year old radios and VOR/CDI indicators to get me back on the ground. I'd rather train for and pass the checkride with the equipment I'll fly with most of the time.
 
If you're going for your ATP, then the only hours you'd spend in it would be to get your PPL, IR, CPL, and CFI ratings. After that your next 1200 hours or so will be as an instructor in your students' rental plane. Except for your multi rating, which will require you to rent a different plane anyway.

I can't see how you'd be money ahead, even though you'd be flying for 300 or so hours to get to CFI. (?) You'll be facing risk of unexpected repair costs, as tying up all of your money in a plane, take a lot of depreciation from installing new avionics and then selling the plane a short time later, not flying it after your CFI check ride, etc.

Even if costs are close to break even, the risk of you hitting a financial sink hole as as starving student pilot would be harsh.
 
TravisRNT said:
Why?

Two nav coms and two nav heads with a six pack is plenty fine without GPS for getting a instrument ticket
Click to expand...
Nope. Maybe in 1985 this panel would have done the job. Today, it ain’t even close.


TravisRNT said:
Just look for airports that have a VOR on them and look up the approaches they have, while not ideal I don’t think you will be lacking with that panel for just getting your IFR
Click to expand...
Nope. VOR approaches are becoming very rare, and of the ones remaining, many require a DME.

The panel in question has two VORs plus a GS receiver. Oh, and a boat anchor inop LORAN. This would be an absolutely lousy panel to try to go for an instrument rating with.
 
WDD said:
If you're going for your ATP, then the only hours you'd spend in it would be to get your PPL, IR, CPL, and CFI ratings. After that your next 1200 hours or so will be as an instructor in your students' rental plane. Except for your multi rating, which will require you to rent a different plane anyway.

I can't see how you'd be money ahead, even though you'd be flying for 300 or so hours to get to CFI. (?) You'll be facing risk of unexpected repair costs, as tying up all of your money in a plane, take a lot of depreciation from installing new avionics and then selling the plane a short time later, not flying it after your CFI check ride, etc.

Even if costs are close to break even, the risk of you hitting a financial sink hole as as starving student pilot would be harsh.
Click to expand...
There are so very many assumptions in this post, but I'll just address the main one: due to my schedule & other obligations, I'm going to be pretty limited on how much instructing I can do. I want to make sure I teach at least a few students, as I know that will make me a better pilot. But most of my hours will be in this plane, either by myself or splitting time with a safety pilot.
 
Ok. Not ATP bound.

Are you thinking of using this plane to teach students in?
 
tailwind22 said:
…But most of my hours will be in this plane, either by myself or splitting time with a safety pilot.
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What is the purpose of these hours you speak of?
A forever plane is different than an IRA plane, which is likely different than a CSEL plane.

If I was going to take a trip on the ratings train, I’d buy a plane that would allow me to work through as much of the experience requirements as possible and that’s either a Complex or TAA.

And a basic Cherokee 140 ain’t on those lists.
 
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