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How often and why do we fly ?

Indeed, I should have been more specific – fly to Dublin Weston EIWT. Lovely GA airport with NP approaches at both ends and reasonable parking charges. Its 20 to 30 minutes by taxi around the ring road to Dublin Int.

RobertL 18C asked if it is Croft Farm we fly to for shopping. I have been there but an even better one is Vegetable Matters in Ebrington, near Chipping Camden. My mate with a strip allows us to park the plane 100m from the shop, and it is an excellent shop!

Upper Harford private strip UK, near EGBJ, United Kingdom

Its a beautiful flying day, where’s the Cub?

I fly as often as I can trying to fly every weekend if possible. In the past I used to fly to meetings if location could be reached easier with GA than CAT (which is not hard when you live in Croatia and have meetings in Italy, Poland, Romania or Bulgaria). Also, when the kids were small, we traveled together for weekends or holidays to scenic locations. Last two years or so it’s mainly holidays and mainly with my wife.

Last Edited by Emir at 03 May 15:57
LDZA LDVA, Croatia

Hello,
I am new to this forum and I really appriciate that I became part of this community.

As a huge aviation fan I tought about changing my business career path and joining Wizz flight school.
Since I have stable business it is not easy transition. Now I am thinking about LAPL licence.

So I am wondering how often do you fly?
Are you owner of aircraft?
What is annual cost? Alot of different factors but rough estimate.

Thank you for your time.

LJLJ, Slovenia

Hi Adnan,

I think there are many more knowledgeable pilots than me here, but if you wish to join Wizzair flight school, you have the money, the time and you are meeting the requirements, then you don’t need to buy a plane or have to get LAPL or PPL – just apply. I suspect that program is zero to hero.

LHFM, LHTL, Hungary

Annual cost of flying varies greatly. Depending on where you are, what you fly, what kind of flying you do, and your experience.
Hangarage, maintenance, and insurance if you own the plane, and fuel cost added.
Renting is easy to price – look at local clubs and flying schools.

Maoraigh
EGPE, United Kingdom

Welcome to EuroGA, @Adnan Post moved to an existing thread of same name.

Flying patterns vary greatly. The average in Europe is somewhere between 10hrs and 30hrs a year and that is mostly the “high GA activity” countries, of which there are only a few (out of the 30 or so). There is a lot of variation around that. Then this search finds more of our regular annual discussions. A small number of people fly 150-200hrs/year (these are mostly owners) and a large number do 5-10hrs/year (these are mostly in the aeroclub scene and renting by the hour).

Flying is not a cheap hobby You can work out for yourself the annual cost, and it is probably a good idea to do that before starting a PPL.

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

Generally flying between 600 and 900 hours every year with a mix of long-haul airline and GA Turboprop in PC12 and Piaggio Avanti aircraft.

The GA job takes me to the many regular European airfields and some not so regular. Long-haul takes me to the usual international capitals east and west. Nothing interesting about that.

LFMD - Cannes Mandelieu, EGLL - London Heathrow, France

From here

Peter wrote:

The cost is 10x lower, too.

Not compared with a non certified autopilot. But let me rephrase it. Obviously those who would like to tinker with an autopilot are the typical tinkerers. Homebuilders or owners of a non certified aircraft are the typical tinkerers. I cannot imagine anyone who would chose this over a typical Denon or similar installation, where only servos are usually needed anyway. Homebuilt is all STOL/bush/backcountry nowadays. An autopilot is not high on the list of priorities, not even in RVs.

This leaves us with certified aircraft owners, who usually never tinkers at all, except perhaps emptying the ash tray in their ’67 C-172 Who exactly is the target audience? and how large is it? I cannot imagine it is very large. I would say I am the typical target audience (it is a seriously cool gadget IMO), but I would not get myself an old C-172 just to be able to install this autopilot. I cannot think on any reason to get an old C-172 Those owners of certified aircraft who think they need an autopilot, usually also think they need at least a C-210 for their 6h legs, and they all have built in autopilot, as do all newer C-172s.

It’s a cool solution, but do we have a problem?

The elephant is the circulation
ENVA ENOP ENMO, Norway

Those owners of certified aircraft who think they need an autopilot, usually also think they need at least a C-210 for their 6h legs

That is such a load of BS. I have no idea why you post it. Maybe you are on a mission of some sort? You know better, I am sure. EuroGA is supposed to be informative, not carrying this kind of BS.

But if you really believe this, I would recommend popping outside Norway, one day. And actually go somewhere, not just over the border to Sweden.

An autopilot is a brilliant safety enhancement because it reduces pilot workload by a huge margin. I am wasting my time writing this anyway because everybody who flies for real will know this already.

Whether this yoke clamp-on device is good, and safe, etc, I have no idea. Any autopilot needs to obey control loop stability criteria i.e. has to be stable all around the loading envelope and at all speeds from Vs to Vne. In classic control theory the loop gain needs to fall below unity before the phase shift reaches 180 degrees, but aircraft behaviour is more complex. That takes a lot of flight testing, which not all autopilot mfgs have done. King did it, STEC did it in some cases and no so well for others. This one? I have no idea. It’s a cunning idea; that’s for sure.

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom
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