Vintage jet for £25k

I suspect it’s that price due to the running cost. Bit like how old piston twins often are sold for peanuts.

IO390 wrote:

Jet Provost MK5 for sale

An interesting one on Afors. A complete JP5 for £25k…

The caveat is it has no permit and hasn’t flown in 4 years.

600 litres/hour for 250kt – plan 100L for startup and taxi.

Seems worth a punt at that price.

1. The list of inspectors who can give a permit for a jet will be very short.
2. All of them will be connected to the vintage jet ‘system’ – a small network of individuals and companies, almost all ex-RAF, who basically own this little sector.
3. None of them will give you a permit without spending enormous sums of money within said network – either justly or unjustly, probably a bit of both.
4. Parts will be unobtanium and more expensive than you can imagine.

Old trainer jets are always cheap, this one no exception, although it’s good that it seems to be basically airworthy.

A couple of friends bought a Fouga for $50K not too long ago, for a while they flew it and benefitted from one of them being the employee of a large FBO (meaning fuel supplied at cost). Now he’s moved on from the FBO and I notice the plane isn’t flying any more. He’s still flying his Marchetti, 14 gallons an hour of Avgas makes more sense.

Another friend had an L29 in really nice condition, ten years ago. He flew it once a month, as often as was practical based on the fuel cost which I believe was something like $1500 per flight. He meanwhile lived on a boat to save money, his ex-wife had got most of it pre L-29 anyway, as I understand it. Eventually he decided to move north, the L29 was sold cheap and he kept his Cessna instead. Then it sat outside until it wasn’t so nice anymore, and now I notice it’s been donated to a museum and is sitting in their storage yard. I remember that it dug impressive holes in the asphalt when started, pre-taxi. That heat came from burning expensive Jet-A, costly even at US prices.

A similar Jet Provost was also on the scene and flying at one time, before I showed up. By the time I noticed it, it was off the airport property and sitting in a commercial storage lot nearby. Interesting to see it on the way to lunch, red and white with RAF roundels looking incongruous with its surroundings. After a while it disappeared – old military jets have a very risky existence after being bought cheap and flown a bit

To clarify my point, it is inconceivable that the present owner has not discovered that obtaining a permit to fly will involve a very large outlay of cash. This regardless of the stated ‘fantastic condition’, which could still be true if the obstacle is a purely paperwork based one, i.e. the ‘need’ to change a lifed part.

If the permit were easy to get, they would get it and then advertise it at a much higher price.

The sport of kings, low level VFR sorties with bingo fuel at around 45 minutes. Instructors liked the JP5, it had a bit of variable thrust with the variable noise :)

RAF fitters were quite specialised so assembling an actual team that could maintain all the systems and airframe would be a challenge.

I spoke to a former owner some years ago, briefly (standing next to him in a toilet at Shoreham!) and he said the JP has little power, useless brakes (only just able to stop in 1000m tarmac and that if you don’t care about the brakes) and is basically a waste of time and money. The noise is impressive though!

There’s one in “my” hangar. Ejection seats deactivated, I’ve been told, but parachutes are worn. So problem at height too low to roll inverted, drop out, and open parachute unlikely to be survivable.
Not my choice for flying.
Flies occasionally.

I am a former owner. I was in a group that had both a JP3 and a JP5.

The JP is a really simple jet, and very easy to fly. But operating one is something completely different than a regular GA aircraft. I considered joining one of the remaining groups, so I got some insight into what the current issues are as well.

There is a lot of paperwork to get your setup going. If you don’t know what is involved, you are not in a position to figure it out. But there are people who are quite good at this. The trick is to find somebody who will do it for free. Ditto for the training. There are quite a few people who will be qualified to train you, the trick again is to find somebody who will volunteer. The only way to do this is to set up a group of like minded pilots, and make sure some of them are able to do the normally expensive things for free.

Jets don’t like to sit, especially in a cold maritime climate like the god forsaken island that many of us in reside on. This is another reason to have a group. The thing needs to be flown regularly. You will get little things happen like a bit of corrosion in the clockwork mechanism that runs the start up sequence on the engine. The RR Viper itself is relatively idiot proof but the 1950s mechanical engine controls are not. You have to watch for a hot start and pull the fuel cock before the engine melts. A likely cause will be corrosion in the clockwork mechanism and the best way to fix this is to open the hatch and bang the metal box that holds it with a ball peen hammer a few times to free everything up. Another reason to have a group, you will need somebody who has owned one before and can tell you all the tricks.

There are very few people who can work on these jets but they are generally very enthusiastic about them and are as keen as you are to get them flying. But a jet that has been sitting for 4 years might need a lot of man hours to get going. And you will have to get it to someplace that can work on it (which may be very difficult if it has been sat so long) or get somebody who is capable to go there and may it ferryable (which could be rather expensive as well).

Once you get the thing rolling down the runway with all your paperwork in place, it is a lot of fun. But there is a lot of time and money between where you are now and that point.