The Big Move
Check out their line of headsets, camera cables, and LED lighting today!
Ok, since I like to mix it up on the blog occasionally you’ll see some stories about my personal flying life. Since this is one of those stories, I am giving you permission to move on until you see something of interest. If you are so inclined to give up :10 of your life, continue reading…
If you follow the blog, you’ll know that I own an airplane that I built and dearly love, but I don’t fly it nearly as much as I’d like. One of the stumbling blocks has been fitting in flying time that meshes with my family and work life. There’s just not enough time to drive out to the airport, preflight, go flying, postflight, and drive home on a cadence that satisfies my cravings.
THE HISTORY:
My airplane’s maiden voyage was August 13, 2011 from the second closest airport from my house, a private field :26 minutes due East. So over the course of the last 22 months, I have made that drive countless times, many of them in my V10 powered F-250 – more on that in a moment. My good friend Rick has been begging me to move my airplane to Port Columbus (KCMH), a bustling Class Charlie, where he’s based. I have been seriously considering it since KCMH is only :13 minutes door-to-door from my residence.
FRAMING THE PROBLEM:
The hitch is, KCMH hangars are more expensive and I calculate everything in my flying budget in terms of “fuel-bucks.” An extra $85.00 a month in hangar rent = 1.4 hours of flight time each month (@ $6.00 a gallon and 10 gph)!
Thinking I would be giving up precious flight time, I endured the annoying drive.
SOLUTIONING:
Now with gasoline staying very near $4.00 a gallon in this area, my 10mpg Ford pickup is creating a compelling argument to move my airplane closer – 5.2 gallons burned driving the round trip just once weekly costs me $83 a month, which offsets 2/3 of the hangar cost (remember I still have to drive 9 miles to the new hangar which is 1/3 of the distance as before). So now, the hangar is really only costing me $31 a month. Like my logic? Can you tell I’m married?
But it gets better. I actually work 900 yards from my new hangar so many times I’ll actually won’t have any additional driving expenses at all! Bonus!
Isn’t KCMH a complicated, traffic laden, nightmare to operate from? Not really, they think they are busy, but in reality from my location on the field I can be airborne before the airplane even gets a chance to warm up and it cruises at a speed that gets me out of the class Charlie five-mile ring in about two minutes.
So what have I been waiting for all this time? I have no idea. Maybe it was laziness? I loth moving and I’ve acquired an impressive array of hangar junk in those 22 months. Or it could be some attachment to my quiet little private airport that sits in a picturesque valley of gently rolling hills? No. Most likely, it was the great folks that were based there, even though I rarely saw them.
POTENTIAL BLISS:
The new hangar sets next to my buddy’s hangar, who has been the instigator in this from the beginning.
Now I plan to hop in my bird and take a joy-flights on nice days before and/or after work or even during my lunch hour!
I hope my new “man cave” is everything I want it to be and more. I know I’ll see my airplane on a more regular basis, so how can that be a bad thing? I’m not moved in yet, so I’ll let you know how it goes.
VISIT OUR SPONSOR for Training DVD's, affordable headsets, cable adapters, headset parts, LED strobes and lights, and more! They cover ALL EXPENSES for iFLYblog.com to keep it coming FREE to you FOREVER!
Subscribe to the iFlyBLOG Mailing List to get the latest blog posts and news to your E-Mail instantly! PLUS TWO FREE eBooks!
Congratulations on the move! Speaking as someone who also just changed airports for similar reasons, the gamut of calculations you ran through looked very familiar. Enjoy!
Thanks Chris! I how the theoretical mirrors reality.
Brent
Years ago I was like that. I used to keep extensive records on what I bought and installed in my bird, even kept gas receipts, all in a 3 ring binder….until my wife found it. Now I shred everything with numbers. On a logical point however, when I moved airports to one I had to drive by on the way home everyday, I stopped to fly more often resulting in a much greater avgas bill!
John,
That’s certainly likely in my case. Flying is almost certainly going to be more expensive, but more of the expense will go to stick time versus steering wheel time – I hope.
Brent
Congrats Brent! Please don’t hesitate to give me a shout if you need any help moving, or if you need some dead weight in the back seat when you fly the RV8 over 😉
Sounds good Sri!
We need to go up again!
Thanks!
Congratulations! Great move!!
Thanks!
I’m sure people in the airliners will enjoy seeing your plane come into land as they taxi in or out!
I hope. Should be fun!
Thanks Lenny!
Brent, this is a GREAT move. Sometimes we just have to say why not and go for it. You made a great point. I need to find a hangar to keep my plane. I don’t have it yet, but I will. And then we’ll have a hangar party to Christen the new bird. Excellent move. Remember… time is money!
Yes indeed! Good luck on your search. That is one of the good things about the economy being down, hangars are more plentiful – not a good trade though.
Can’t wait to hear about your acquisition!
Brent