With a newer plane, unless you are out of luck, you should get a machine that gives you much less downtime.
How much that matters to you, depends.
I know people (many many of them) who just accept an Annual taking 4-8 weeks. I would regard that as absolutely unacceptable and outrageous. I get mine done in 3-4 days.
I think a lot of people have poor maintenance arrangements and get bent over a barrel every time something goes. And if you buy a 30 year old plane, it’s a fair bet a lot of things will need fixing – simply because most people sell planes the same way they sell cars i.e. when they get fed up fixing the bloody thing!
To be fair, where I am based, the maintenance arrangements are well short of what I would accept, but being N-reg and pro-active, I get the stuff done and I get it done well. But if you rely on the local Part M, and you have a 30 year old plane, there is a fair chance of a lot of downtime. Also some of the stories I hear about how some firms propose to source parts are just laughable.
I dont entirely agree.
When people buy older anything it is at least partly because of the price. They are often reluctant to spend whats really needed to return whatever to as new condition. So follows a cycle of always being behind the maintenance curve and hence the perception of unreliability. Infact pitch it right and reckon to spend a lot on bring it back to A1 and you will have a superb reliable aircraft. The trouble is most people spend x on the aircraft and then only want to spend another 10% putting it right when they should be spending say 40%, because they spent to near their budget on purchase.
As a fact buy a good twin for £70k and spend £100k on it and you have an aircraft close to the new version thats priced at £800k, but its cost you less than a quarter. Ok it might not smell quite the same, and it may not have all the latest bells whistles and trim features but my goodness it will be a good’un. I say as a fact because i know the exact owner and in another field another owner who have both done exactly this.
To counter the “new planes make no financial sense” argument, I would point out that in general the most profitable airlines have the youngest average fleet age. Maybe there is more to it than that but the despatch reliability is far higher, enabling the low cost carriers to work their assets harder and charge less, whilst still making money.
I know private aviation is not the same, a reliable 30 minute turn-round is not exactly an issue for us, but there is definitely a benefit in being able to use your expensive asset when you want to. You will also notice that in the business aviation market the new equipment is what sells. That’s in part because people want despatch reliability, and also maintenance costs and running expenses that are predictable. The popularity of Engine plans like MSP Gold and TAP is evidence of this, similarly plans like Proparts for Citations make a great deal of sense.
Neil, As far as my understanding of airline economics goes, that’s mainly because there has been great advancements made in fuel consumption on newer airliners. They fly so much that they get taken apart all the time anyway, I’m not sure an older airline fleet is any less reliable (and one could throw in Norwegian’s sour experience with the Dreamliners that seems to be sitting on the ground a lot)
If the fuel price keeps declining and lending rates go up, it could turn in the favor of the older fleets….but there is a world of difference between operating a private GA for fun and an airline fleet (as someone should point out to EASA at some point)
The definition of New in aviation is not age but flight hours and cycles..I think older planes can be reliable, everything depends on the owner and the pampering the bird got..
Look at the air forces around the world they are all flying old birds (tanker, transport, etc..) kept in premium condition with upgraded avionics…e.g Orion doing the Search on the lost MH 777..IMHO all major aerodynamic improvements where already developed shortly after WWII, is there so huge difference performance wise btw a 60’s SEP and a modern SR22?
Of my three aircraft I owned I went from 1986 to 1979 and now I am on a 66 Bird…;-). The 86 bird gave the most night mares for maintenance..;-). After 69 when the first men walked on the moon it all went downhill in structural engineering (Just joking… 
)..
Its all relative, people owning older aircraft are maybe more passionate flyers, owners as they know there budget is limited and still want to get the best out of there property which maybe was only achieved after half a century of dreaming on it…. 
PS I am looking for a old Fiat 126 or Polski great Fun..;-)
Neil, As far as my understanding of airline economics goes, that’s mainly because there has been great advancements made in fuel consumption on newer airliners.
I did say that maybe there is more to it than the fleet age, but young aircraft being cheaper to run(of course not to buy) ties in with my own experience of managing corporate aircraft.
Look at the air forces around the world they are all flying old birds (tanker, transport, etc..) kept in premium condition with upgraded avionics…e.g Orion doing the Search on the lost MH 777..
If anyone is prepared to put in the maintenance hours it’s the military. I would suggest these old aircraft have many times more maintenance hours than flying hours, and I am not certain the avionics are really so new.
But having owned a 1960’s aircraft, and a 1946 glider I am not necessarily wedded to the opinion that new is the only way to go for private aircraft, I’m just adding to the debate, but I am definitely in the “newer is better” camp for the more complex and expensive corporate types.
To counter the “new planes make no financial sense” argument, I would point out that in general the most profitable airlines have the youngest average fleet age. Maybe there is more to it than that but the despatch reliability is far higher, enabling the low cost carriers to work their assets harder and charge less, whilst still making money.
I suspect this has more to do with the operating cost of newer aircraft. BA (are they one of the most profitable airlines) still operate a very ageing fleet of 747s but they will all be gone within ten years. The main reason is the fuel inefficiency. Just compare the fuel of burn of hauling the same cargo from A to B with there “modern” replacement. In commercial ops fuel cost is the most significant above the line operating expense so it doesnt make much sense to refurbish old iron because you cant refurbish inefficient engines. With GA nothing has changed – the pistons of 20 years ago as still just as inefficient as today unless you go diesel.
The definition of New in aviation is not age but flight hours and cycles..I think older planes can be reliable, everything depends on the owner and the pampering the bird got..
Yes, and I think that other than outrageous fuel price/tax etc. the problem in Europe is (1) a relatively large proportion of planes have been in group ownership or clubs and have seen a lot of use and (2) the difficulty owners face in maintaining their planes, mostly as a result of over regulation of maintenance but also because of shared hangars that can’t be used for individual owner maintenance.
My main-use certified plane is over 40 years old but has around 1000 hrs TT, having been with one careful owner for most of that period, mostly kept at his home hangar. The other plane has about double that time in operation but has been flying (on and off!) for almost 70 years. The first 500 hrs of its operational life were in the first year, training students. Much later (about 15 years ago) it was restored by the owner in his hangar, to the extent that the fuselage was deriveted into three large pieces. After a few years it was airborne again and winning awards. The only paperwork was a couple of 337s filed for some mods done plus logbook entries done by the owner’s A&P friends. By comparison the costs for anything new are in another universe, and older planes are fun. Nothing wrong with new planes either, quite the contrary, but the suggestion that that a new plane is intrinsically cheaper is possible mainly because of artificial, punitive costs imposed on older aircraft and their owners.
What I see happening now is planes being bought for the purpose of restoration, where the original purchase price is known at the outset to be only the price of entry. The paradigm of investing money in a plane in proportion to the price paid is going by the wayside, because a project starting with a good example of an older plane is a good way to get the plane wanted, at reasonable cost. As with Experimental Category planes for travel and IFR, European aviation is to some extent barred from joining the trend by obstructive regulation. But in this case, with certified planes, there’s no legal reason it can’t be done on N-registration.
The definition of New in aviation is not age but flight hours and cycles..I think older planes can be reliable, everything depends on the owner and the pampering the bird got..
To some extent, but mostly because GA still lives in the 1950s and 60s regarding technology (with some notable exceptions).
Then there is the recreation factor. When including that factor new and old becomes largely irrelevant, but also flight hours and cycles. Everything can be fixed. Things can be taken apart, rebuilt, entire sections can be changed (wings, fuselage …) This also includes entire airplanes.
Still, new is new. A newly built aircraft that also is technologically “fresh” will always be in higher demand than a newly built older type aircraft, because from a pure objective (as well as subjective) point of view, more up to date technology is better than older technology (without looking too much into eventualities).
It is therefore interesting to look at the statistics for the GA market in 2014.
SEP, market share (total 710):
Cirrus 20/22 30 %
Diamond DA40 18 %
Cessna 172 14 %
The rest
Obviously modern aircraft are more in demand than older Piper and Cessna.
Twin piston is even more obvious (total 96):
Diamond DA42 40 %
Piper 34/44 21 %
Baron B58 20 %
Tecnam 19 %
This means 59% of piston twins sold in 2014 have either Austro turbodiesels or Rotax 912 and 40% are carbon composite airframe with turbo diesels. That is something to think about.
That the majority (in numbers) of new GA/recreational aviation is not even in this statistics, European ultralight and experimental, is also something to think about.
That the majority (in numbers) of new GA/recreational aviation is not even in this statistics, European ultralight and experimental, is also something to think about.
Nor sales of existing aircraft, which is where the market volume is. I’m not sure that current sales of new production aircraft mean much in relation to the GA industry as a whole – the trends in that market only indicate that the very small number of people motivated to buy new factory production aircraft buy them because that small number of people want something that existing aircraft and kit builts don’t offer.
Friends in the (new) aircraft components business do sell some parts for new certified production planes, but they’d go broke if that was their main business. The only way they can absorb the cost of the paperwork involved with manufacturing parts for certified planes (either new production or existing planes) is because they’re building on a bigger business selling uncertified parts. Interestingly, they tell me that most of the FAA manufacturing inspectors understand that the financial backbone of the industry is uncertified parts, and that its in their interest to leave that cash cow completely alone.
