Just curious -- as you all know, we've been searching for a 150 to fill out the $59/hr end of our lineup. As the dollar weakens, these two-seat turkeys are now selling for 2-4x what they normally do, and in fact, many of them are exceeding the value of our older 172s.
Harrumph.
As we throw a wider net out into the market, I ran across a 150 Aerobat that was only mildly obnoxious in price.
For those who don't know, a 150 Aerobat is a 150 with numerous structural changes to allow +6/-3G operation, and includes skylights, a G-meter, and a host of approved basic aerobatic maneuvers such as loops, rolls, immelmans and cuban eights. Also, they usually include wild paint jobs, and this one is no exception.
Nobody at FlyC is currently rated to instruct aerobatics. This means we would not want anyone doing aerobatics in the thing until we got up to scratch. It could possibly take months for us to feel comfortable teaching aerobatic maneuvers.
My questions for everyone are:
1. Would an Aerobat be an acceptable 2-seat trainer?
2. Would it seem too much of a letdown to not do aerobatics in an "Aerobat" right away?
3. Would the added structural strength and potential for future maneuvers justify a slightly higher rental price? (probably $69/hr, and all of it from higher insurance and acquisition costs)
4. Or, is the consensus for those time-building economically just "anything cheaper is better, as long as its airworthy and loggable" ?
Friday musings... I'm interested in some opinions, as I'm pretty darn uninformed about Aerobatics.
Cessna 1ES blew out more than a starter yesterday. She now has a keyswitch with "Off, Left Mag, Right Mag, Both, Sparks and Smoke" setting. Ouch. We're on the case, but downtime is assured this weekend.
Cessna 04H has a report of scratchy radios that we are trying to pinpoint. Please relay any information (location, freq, com1 or com2 or both?) to the office so we can track this down and fix it.
We are updating pitot-static and transponder checks for half of the fleet this week. Expect sporadic downtime for 04H, 17J, and 25R. The current batch of checks are good through the end of this month (04H) and next month (17J, 25R).
Blue Skies,
- Mike
