Noe wrote:
I’d certainly use it for certain trips if available! (flying commercially to Norway to get the plane would be worth it)
For a long trip to KOSH, the CAT leg UK to Norway is just a warm up 
Diamonds Aircraft fuel cost is so small that you can’t use “2.5*fuel burn rule of thumb”
Fuel cost is ridicusly low (even in Greenland where fuel is in the order of 1 Euro / litre). Maintenance less so.
I’ve been told (by maintenance people, on a trip to Lisbon I did with them) that the cost for a DA42 was around 150 EUR/GBP /h, when you consider fuel + maintenance.
Noe wrote:
that the cost for a DA42 was around 150 EUR/GBP /h, when you consider fuel + maintenance.
Minus 40-50€ fuel/h that leaves around 100€/h for everything else. Maybe if the planes flies 500 hours a year. Some local „non club“ prices here:
PA28R200 (1970, 240€ wet)
C172G1000 (201x, 240€ wet)
DA40NG (2011, 252€ wet)
DA42 NG (201x, 480€ wet)
SR22 (2006, 402€ wet)
My guess is the owners aim for 50-100€ on top of the costs. Eg. the piper costs around 190€ an hour for the owner to fly it. The Cirrus 300€. The DA42 350€.
Noe wrote:
Something doesn’t sound right with that math. It would be the cheapest DA42
No, the math is correct. Something was wrong with the plane… It was of course a DA40, as the article say, my bad, sorry
The rent was 15485 NOK for 12 hours. This includes fuel for 4500 NOK. Take off charges was 599 nOK and food was 100 NOK. In total 16080 NOK.
1500 NOK for a DA 40 is actually not cheap when taking fuel into considerations. My club charges 1560 NOK for G1000 C-172, 960 NOK for a brand new (all glass VFR night) Tecnam P2008, all running costs included.
I think what many people “forget” (or close their eyes or don’t understand, I don’t know) is a plane has two costs (roughly speaking)
What people also forget is how members in the club fly the planes. For instance, my club has ca 200 members. Of these, maybe 50 fly regularly (10-20h), and only 10 fly 50-100h + (roughly speaking. I don’t have the numbers in my head, but the concept is important here). The cub owns the plane, and the club is “owned” by the members. The club is a non profit organisation. All the income is from membership fees and renting fees.
The cost of having a plane available for usage can be considerable, but since there are many members, this cost is relatively small per member, let’s say 1-300 € per member per year for a nice G1000 category plane. For other planes, like a Cub we have, that cost is approaching 0 € per member per year because the plane is already depreciated (since ages), leaving only insurance etc. For the whole fleet, 7 planes in my club, this cost is around 2-400 € per member per yer and this is roughly the member fee.
Without this member fee, the cost of the C-172 is 2100 NOK/h, which is what we charge when flying round trips etc. If you pay up front, 15000 NOK, an additional NOK 120 per h is subtracted, leaving the hourly rate to 1440 NOK. You can say that 2100 is the “real” cost of renting, but it’s meaningless, a play with numbers. What people who wan’t to fly pay, is membership fee of 3000 NOK per year + 1440 per hour regardless how much you fly.
What people also “forget” is the cost (3000 + 1440 or simply 2100) includes future renewal of the fleet. This is also a bit playing with numbers IMO, since it is implicitly included in all planes that aren’t fully depreciated, but nevertheless it leaves a club with the possibility to operate a relatively new fleet all the time with little extra cost. This is very important for members because they would (much) rather fly a new plane than an old and worn plane. (I, and many with me, would rather fly the classics like Cub and the Safir , but in general people like a new C-172 rather than an old C-172, which I do as well)
My club would have no problems operating a Cirrus used exclusively for travelling. It’s more that it wouldn’t be fair. It would only be used by a few, and the cost of having that plane available would be high and divided by all members. One way to offset this to rise the rate per hour to considerably more than simply the running costs. Another way is to rise the member ship fee exclusively for those flying it. I think maybe only the first solution would be acceptable. However, the interest isn’t there, and those interested rather get their own RVs or Lancairs for less hourly cost (while still being members of the club)
A well run club typically has a fleet of relatively new trainer types that the majority like to fly, and people travel with them all over the place. Additional planes are classics, already depreciated planes that cost very little to have around, but gives lots of fun. The same goes for microlights. They aren’t cheap, but the operating costs are a tiny fraction.
Peter wrote:
The main factor is that if you criticise the UK on a European forum, nobody is particularly bothered, whereas pilots from other countries are generally reluctant to write openly about negatives in the scene in their own country
I don’t think so. Only people from the UK talks in bad terms about clubs. Why is that? If it’s based on experience, then it must be true (I would think). If it’s based on perception only, than it can be a whole bunch of reasons that probably includes some agenda of sorts.
skydriller wrote:
I know nothing of flying costs in Norway, but for Pilot & Pax (ie 2+people), there are times when GA (even flying aeroclub aircraft) can be cheaper and most certainly faster than flying commercial.
Absolutely. But that sweet spot lies usually in up to 2-3 hour flights (one way) to places to which there are no direct airline connections. My preferred route is Salzburg, for which out of ZRH I can be there in 1-20 and therefore easily can fly there as a daytrip. WIth the airlines this is not possible for a reasonable fare nor time wise. If my small family were to fly there, it is also massively cheaper than going by airline via heaven knows where. A trip there costs about €600 all included, day trip tickets for 3 people will be easily in the 800 to 900 euro range.
For longer trips, this changes quite quickly. Obviously the more people you can share the cost with, the more you can do, but e.g. from Zurich to Bulgaria, with 6 hours and one stop inbetween costs spiral out of control fast. Usual tickets there go from between 150-300 Euros, whereas 12 hours of flying will be over 3000 Euros.
