Possibility of a large co-ownership

There is at least one J based there. Maybe two.

@frequent_flyer Last week, I spoke with a pilot on my airfield who was contemplating joining the Aeroclub of Air France at Entzheim because of their C182R . From what he said, the plane is IFR, but I couldn’t verify that information on their website. I suppose as a controller on the field you must know the club, but wouldn’t that be an option for you?

Peter wrote:

This is what I did 2002-2006. The issue seems to be that people tend to value stuff according to how much they paid for it. No investment = no taking care of it. Well, obviously that is a generalisation, but it reduces the pool of quality customers.

Also, in the UK, there are tax issues with Benefit in Kind, especially in a non-shareholder syndicate. BIK and its rules is a UK thing but every modern country must have an equivalent otherwise every businessman would get his business to finance his private life.

Also no investment = minimal incentive to fly the plane – because you pay only for flying time.

The partly successful SR22 groups which existed (some still do?) in the UK operated a “zero equity” system but got people committed to a large degree by making them pay for a block of hours. It was quite a lot, too – a few k a year IIRC. N147KA was one of these, based at my base. That sort of hour-block purchase keeps people coming back to fly because they feel they need to get value out of their purchase, whereas with a zero committment they will cancel a flight for any small reason.

Some good points here.

I think that sole owners rarely tell the truth about the true operating costs. Yes, there is the propensity for more unnecessary maintenance on a poorly operated group aircraft, but large catastrophies aside, by not a lot. On the face of it the high rental costs for a complex aircraft may seem expensive, but I bet in many cases they are not significantly different from a sole owner operating the same aircraft, and may even be less when the fixed costs are spread over many more hours.

It does make it that much more important to select the “right” aircraft. I can think of more than a few aircraft that might be considered “delicate” or with which you are far more likely to run into problems. The perfect group aircraft is one which has proved itself in the field, perhaps aircraft that have proved popular for light air taxi work etc are likely to be reliable, almost bult proof, and have parts readily available.

I dont think the BIK issues are a problem as long as the group is structured in the correct way.

Zero investment can mean pilots take less care, but, that is why it is so important to vet the pilots carefully and the more complex the aircraft the more likely it is to attract the more mature and sensible pilot in my experience.

I dont agree that the investment or lack of reduces the incentive to fly. If anything I think it can work in the opposite direction where sole owners feel the need to use the aircraft in priority to all else which means other interests suffer and the time is not such quality time. In the end they or their families start to resent the committment and of course the susbstantial fixed costs until they end up selling the aircraft and giving up flying. With a balanced small group there are times some will be very enthusiastic, and times others will be, so it averages out, good for the aircraft and good for availability with no one feeling they have to fly all the time. Also, sole owners rarely want to sell their aircraft because they have made such an investment in time and money and cant bring themselves to starting out again. Of course that is fine, but in consequence they end up in the same rut, whereas they might well have enjoyed moving on to something more complex, interesting and challenging. Small groups avoid this predicament.

As ever, of course these are general observations from my experience over a number of groups and sole owners, and therefore there will of course be some exceptions.

Specific to the poster, perhaps think about a twin. Twins get so much bad publicity but I think it can be very misplaced. They can represent exceptional value for money, they will challenge you far more than almost any single, and because on the whole they were made for the professional market they are built to stand up to day to day use.

frequent_flyer wrote:

I confirm, there is indeed a well equiped and TR182 (GNS500 and ASPEN1000 PFD) based at Entzheim : 180 euros/h.
I am already using it, to train my IR, but I am concerned they may be selling it in the future because it is really not flying a lot.

Wow ! that is quite cheap, make it fly and they’l keep it
Here it costs closer to 300 EUR/h with a GTN 650 “only”

As for the M20J I was more worried about the grass and quality of the runway as it seems to be the main concern of Mooney owners with grass strips. I’d say 800m should be enough for most operations with the M20J but I don’t own one and therefore do not know the POH by heart…

@Piotr_Szut wrote:

I certainly would be a client. I’m now looking for a twin around Paris (where I live now) that would be available for periods of one week or one month. A DA42 would be fine but all of them seem to be operated by flight schools and hence not available for renting.

Actually I would be interested in buying a DA42 to be based at LFPT or LFPN provided I had a partner. I am currently renting a DA42 (NG) at LFPN which I have taken away for a couple of weeks during the winter. During summer the owner uses it every weekend, but it is available on weekdays.

PM me if interested

Trying to understand how this equation would work:

IFR is for traveling
Traveling is for going places (and staying?)
Many people prefer to go places in summer
With so many pilots, how do you achieve fair availability without becoming yet another conventional aero club?

In other words: If I take the plane for an extended week-end, every one else is grounded?

I can’t see the scheme working for more than 3-4 pilots. Any more and the plane can only be a “daytrip” thing.

Yes, those UK-style, 10-or-more-shareholder-syndicates only “work” if most of them do no or virtually no trips. If several people want to travel, it doesn’t work.

In Germany, 95% of all syndicates are two, three or sometimes 4 shareholders.

I don’t know the % distribution here (maybe someone who hangs out in the UK scene might drop in a view) but we have syndicates of all sizes, from 2 to about 30.

The IFR tourer types tend to have small syndicates – 2-4 members, fairly obviously because it is hard to find IFR qualified people who don’t already own their own plane. I know of syndicates around TBMs of 2 or 3 and one similar sized one around a KA90.

The big syndicates are invariably around the PA28/C150/152/172/182 types. I am more familiar with those because I fly with some of the members. Yes; access is poor but if you are paying 25 quid a month retainer you are happy to get to fly once a month and that’s why you are in it. However, weekday access can be good and that suits self employed people e.g. electricians etc. The maintenance costs are massive (one C150 was 8k-10k at the Annual so pretty well the entire value of the plane was spent every year) because the planes are for ever in a poor condition.

And yes it is true that a lot of members of the bigger syndicates don’t fly. The problem is that they eventually want to get out, and stop paying their monthly fees…

I don’t think a syndicate will work if somebody wants to take the plane away for say a week, unless it is a very small and very friendly one.

I say “friendly” because a large % of syndicates suffers from somebody taking the p1ss and e.g. pocketing the fuel duty drawback, and nobody has the courage to take that person on. I hear this stuff behind the scenes all the time.

So, yeah, start with the right people.

And make sure everybody has a compatible attitude to maintenance and generally doing stuff right.

If there is to be pilot maintenance involved (you can do the 50hr checks and that saves a lot of money over using a company) then one needs to straighten out who will do that and what the compensation for that will be. If one person ends up doing it, he will eventually get fed up with it. This is a bigger problem on uncertified types which make very little sense unless all the maintenance is done by the owner(s).

I had a booking website, custom written in Perl, but nowadays one would use some ready-made website.

The typical well operated large syndicate (limit of 20?) around a 172/PA28, usually has an FI as an administrator/shareholder and the average utilisation might be around 10-15 hours per member a year. Some members might fly 30 or 40 hours, but beyond that these syndicates don’t really work.

Social events help keep everybody rubbing along. I think the admin/secretary role is largely a labor of love and requires a person who will do a proper job.

My only experience has been with a nicely run outfit around a 1974 172M, and for occasional access to a well maintained aircraft it is a good set up.