I am sometimes a bit flummoxed when a relatively antique aircraft gets an ‘upgrade’ of around 30amus in avionics, and when you check the airframe out the paint is peeling, cracked and the dreaded filiform is growing like Japanese knotweed.
There should be a hierarchy of needs in expenditure with airframe, powerplant coming at the top of the food chain?
@RobertL18C, completely agree, I don’t get that either. That said, it depends a bit if the paint is a cosmetic issue or corrosion issue.
172driver wrote:
1) is, IMO, mostly due to the fact that the generation who saw GA as a hobby, IOW largely the Baby Boomers, are slowly but surely aging out of aviation. Either by losing the medical or simply not having the funds anymore to fly, or a combination of both plus family pressures.2) is a different beast entirely. First of all, glass has become much cheaper in recent years. Second, the younger generation of pilots have all grown up with computers and simply don’t want to deal with crappy steam gauges anymore. I can see that clearly by the dynamics in our club. Thirdly, while you may not get back the full cost of the avionics, selling an airplane with steam gauges demands a steep discount, tendency increasing. Therefore, if you want to sell, you almost have to do at least some upgrade, even if you don’t plan on flying the plane anymore. I think this is what you may be seeing. Lastly, I would certainly not call glass avionics eye candy. It’s really a world of difference and I know what I prefer.
+1 on that post 172driver
@Peter, where is that like button again?
Peter wrote:
That has not been the case for all the years – until a year or two ago with today’s silly prices. I can’t see it being sustained, with all the long term high-mileage flyers who have packed it all up in the last year or two.
Actually I see a similar trend as William does. In practice, lots of planes with inadequate or old avionics simply don’t sell at all or at a much lower price. There are great airframes with zero or low time engines and props but with original 1960ties avionics. An upgrade to get it to todays standard including installation will go anywhere from 50k to 100k. So people are looking for “fly away” planes, particularly in the travel cathegory. That means, low time engine and prop, good paint, decent interior and up to date avionics. VFR this means (for Europe) 8.33 com and Mode S transponder or (for the US) ADSB, which will be augmented with Ipads or similar moving maps. For IFR however, it will realistically mean WAAS GPS, a reasonable Moving Map, 2 axis AP, 8.33, Mode S and in most cases basic EFIS.
If 2 planes are available with identical hours and condition but old vs new avionics the price difference will be significant.
Prior to Covid the whole used airplane market was in a depression with no buyers but lots of planes. Right now, there are few planes but lots of buyers. It will most probably regulate itself somewhere in between. What are realistic prices is highly debatable. For most types, there are expert valuations available which give a good indication of what should be realistic or not. 2-3 years ago, airplanes were practically given away, today finding a good “ready to fly” airplane is expensive. Both situations are not ideal but I much prefer todays slightly inflated market than the notion that airplanes being thrown on the rubbish once they reach TBO as it is not possible to even recover the revision prices. I know some very nice Senecas which got given away for that reason and even then did not find takers, so they were scrapped for parts. This thankfully does not happen anymore.
172driver wrote:
1) is, IMO, mostly due to the fact that the generation who saw GA as a hobby, IOW largely the Baby Boomers, are slowly but surely aging out of aviation. Either by losing the medical or simply not having the funds anymore to fly, or a combination of both plus family pressures.
In Europe I’d add the increasingly existential problem with outpricing of GA out of IFR airports as well as PPR/PNR and Slottery which has taken a lot of utility out of the upper end of small GA (i.e. IFR, serious travelling). Lots of people simply call it quits when they loose their homebase due to outpricing (it may happen to me in ZRH as they plan a 10 fold price increase for parking in 2024) and would have to station their travel machine on a grass runway which is bogged down 3-4 months per year e.t.c.
But yes, family and time pressures are the most likely killers for giving up flying. That much I can fully support as it is exactly that which has kept me from flying in recent years.
What may however turn this trend slightly is exploding airline ticket prices. To take a family of 3 on a simple European (necessary) trip today costs up to 5x what it cost 2-3 years ago, particularly if you are bound by school vaccations dates (which are the highest cost dates throughout the year). While before I would not have seriously considered flying with our plane for cost reasons as well as dispatch rate, we have been discussing doing exactly that due to the really massive price increases on the airlines.
And if you need an airplane with a relatively high dispatch reliability, IFR is a total must. And therefore, IFR avionics which allow a relaxed type of travel and open up all available approaches require upgrades.
RobertL18C wrote:
There should be a hierarchy of needs in expenditure with airframe, powerplant coming at the top of the food chain?
Powerplant first, all things mechanical and electronical 2nd, paint and cosmetics last. That is at least from the safety point of view what my priorities have been.
Repainting a plane costs upwards of 30k CHF, which is a huge investment. I have really not been able to source this kind of money. Clearly, it can be done cheaper in some places, but some of those require ferry flights which eat up another 10k in total expense, so it’s not really worth it.
Good analysis Mooney Driver.
I would add though, that whilst you can go out and buy a turbo engined variety or one ready equipped with anti/driving and providing you keep it maintained it will still probably not be very different from newer aircraft in 30 years time. However, we have no idea what will happen to certified avionics over those 30years.
I have a friend who runs an ATO with 2 DA42 and several DA 40s. When he bought them the 2 DA42 and 2 of the DA40s came equipped with what was, at the time, the avionics to have, ie Garmin 1000 with Line replaceable units which were supposed to be future proof.
My friend is aware that he will have to add WAAS soon. He knows it is going to be expensive, but at the moment it is just not possible. And when it is the aircraft hourly rental price will have to rise to cover the cost.
This same friend also has a TBM 700. Not an old aircraft in the scheme of things. But updating the avionics for that is staggeringly expensive.
So I think it is perfectly understandable for owners to buy something older and cheaper which meets their mission requirements and to add the “eye candy” as needed to keep up with the continuously moving goalposts.
I still think people would best spend their money fixing essential avionics (including the autopilot) and spending the vast amount of money thus saved on avgas 
The US was far less hit by CV19 than Europe. The US (Trump) was criticised by the European champagne socialists for being callous with peoples’ lives by not doing severe lockdowns, but history will show they actually did the right thing (probably accidentally; nobody really knew what they were doing). Here, a lot of people were hard hit – financially or emotionally. Many people gave up working and retired early, or got “simple” low paid jobs (e.g. instead of commuting to London) accepting a drop in their standard of living as a price worth paying. Houses in the countryside are selling same-day. Apartments are being rented unseen! Many businessmen lost their livelihoods as large chunks of the economy were destroyed. Of course many also gained; a large % of the £50k UK govt loans will never be repaid and there was a fantastic amount of fraud in compensation claims. Many long term pilots gave up flying… try to organise a meet-up and see who is de facto out of the picture.
The psychological effects are seen everywhere. They led to the panic buying across the board, both at retail level and in B2B, driving the panic buying and totally mad over-stocking and hoarding of electronic components. I see signs at work of a collapse around the corner on that one. It probably kicked off the occupation of Ukraine (via Putin being isolated for months). Customer service is crap across the board, due to “people working from home” (i.e. skiving) so you can’t get stuff which is available. And it is driving vast spending on avionics, which is not matched by people using their planes for anything rewarding, because they have lost interest in flying (or are unable to due to family etc factors) but can’t face getting rid of the plane so they throw 5 figures at it because it makes them feel good. Then the plane ends up for sale at a price which is historically way too high but it will sell because right now (historically you never recovered any upgrade cost) so many others are doing the same.
gallois wrote:
So I think it is perfectly understandable for owners to buy something older and cheaper which meets their mission requirements and to add the “eye candy” as needed to keep up with the continuously moving goalposts.
Absolutely. The G1000 WAAS trap is one which did catch my attention when several Mooney owners failed to upgrade theirs for lack of parts and the enormeous upgrade prices of 30k or more. The same goes for many G1000 Cirrus owners, while the Avidyne owners simply upgraded their 430’s to WAAS or, more recently, put in a set of IFD440’ties.
As a private owner, I would never buy a G1000 airplane for that reason. You are at the “mercy” of Garmin 100%, whereas with non-integrated systems you have the choice at least to some extent. This is why I regard the Aspen or Garmin G5 or even the Garmin 500 EFIS solutions as optimal for this kind of purpose. You can more or less add whatever navigator you please (not that there is a lot of choice) and even more so any sort of Com or Nav equipment and most legacy AP’s will work just fine with those.
I see no signs of pilots throwing money on anything they don’t need here. We are pretty much back to normal but with a larger than expected increase in PPL students and a slightly smaller increase in ULM students.
The majority of the PPL students are young, in fact, very young and are passionate about flying spending every penny they get on an a lesson just as soon as they get it. What will happen after they get their PPLs we don’t know and that does cause a problem for club presidents when it comes to forward planning. Our demographic at the moment in this category shows a growing proportion of the membership from 17 to 22 years old and then a gap to 45years plus.
On the ULM side many of the new students are still in college or Lycée 14 to 16 years old and then again a gap to the older group, getting the ULM licence to fly locally but mainly as a hedge against losing the class2 medical.
The only costs avionics wise recently has been to change worn out DIs for Garmin G5 on 2 DA40s.
The membership of club attached to the ATO I mentioned before, is more than 50% made up of would be or already are professional pilots. I wrote in my previous post of how the avionics needs upgrading due to changing airspace, PBN etc. But this is a business decision not a case of throwing money at eye candy.
Finally, very few of the owners here are throwing money at anything. The only ones who have upgraded their aircraft are two pilots who share a M20K. They have done it by each trading in their own M20J and M20K and buying a better one, together, with updated avionics. But then each of these guys do 150hrs a year and have IRs. The other is the owner of a Seneca 5 who upgraded for more PBN capability, but then again he flies all over Europe, IR and is an instructor and examiner.
Most owners here are trying to spend as little as possible to do what they want to do.
Throwing money at eye candy other than perhaps the odd pattisery is an anathema to the French. And even then it has to taste good as well.
