What a/c to buy for multi engine training?
 

I'm looking to purchase a Piper Seneca II at the moment so that I may lease it back to my flight school and profit until I am ready to commence my multi engine rating, at which point this will save me alot of money. I'm just not sure if this is the most cost effective aircraft. What is the best aircraft or aircrafts for multi engine flight training? Cost wise, maintenance, handling, etc. I wanna get the best bang for my buck! Any thoughts or comments would be GREATLY appreciated.

Thanks!

Allison High

Allison,

I'm not really sure why you would want to buy a multi-engine airplane for that reason. First of all, a Seneca is a fairly high-end, expensive multi-engine airplane to use for flight training.

The costs to rent it may be more than multi-engine students want to pay. FlightSafety Academy uses Seminoles and AriBen Aviator uses the Duchess. I did all my training and instructing in the Duchess. I hope you get a chance to talk to a flight school or FBO and explore your options.

One of my biggest concerns, besides maintenance, insurance, etc., would be whether or not the flight school could keep it flying for you. My next biggest concern would be re-selling the airplane at a later date.

Good luck though! I hope you can make it work out for you! I've known several students that had their own airplanes for flight training and it worked for them...granted they were very well off to begin with.

Jeffrey

A Seneca II is a really, really bad choice for a training aircraft. One simple reason, the turbos. A student is very likely to blow a turbo for a number of reasons - they aren't cheap. You don't get many chances to make mistakes in power management. A Seneca I is a great airplane for training/personal use, easy to fly...you can get about 9gph/side. Room for 6, it bridges the gap between training and personal use. Also stay away from 310s for flight training.

I have a nice Piper Geronimo Apache. 160 hp, so it's pretty slow. But it's about the cheapest twin you can buy and operate. I've got 70K into mine and it's probably worth about 45K. Some of the mods help the single engine performance. I've been able to hold 8K on one engine with half fuel and two people. The thing is built like a tank, old skool, and it's heavy. That's why it's not a great performer. It would be a great plane for timebuilding.

An Apache or Geronimo conversion, vintage Seminole or Duchess would be the most logical choices. Since you are not buying the airplane to go fast, you would want to keep the engines at 4 cylinders a side to save money. Apaches are about the cheapest way to go in this category, but be careful about these airplanes because they are truly old and often are worn out. Engines that claim to be have been recently overhauled may not have been. A friend of mine got burned on a used Apache with falsified logbook entries showing it was recently overhauled, he ended up spending a lot of money to get it done. Also, the gear extension systems on these airplanes can be troublesome, and they do not have counter-rotating props so they are not as easy to learn as later trainers. If you have the money go for a mid 70's Seminole that has clean damage history, or be very careful about an old Apache. IC ALL's sounds pretty good though!

I think you get what you pay for. You see some Apache's real cheap. I looked for a nice one that had been well taken care of and loved. Not the cheapest one you could find. The resale value of light twins has plummeted. I'd guess mine is worth 75% of what I paid for it, on a good day. A Seminole or a Dutchess will cost a lot more because they are more "standard" as a trainer and just flat out a lot newer. My Apache is a 58 but has 6700 hours. I bet some of these 80's vintage Seminoles have more time than that on them. Anyhow, you can get a NICE twin Comanche for the price of a clapped out Seminole. A planes background and usage history is a lot more important than it's biological age. Kinda like people.....

Some Seminoles can be close to their wing life limit (like 14k I think). The Apache/Aztec family is nice... sometimes mx is a real pain (some parts were probably not meant to come out - ever)... we just changed a prop cable on an aztec (because it was stuck solid in the shield) - one of the most frustrating things I've ever done before.

Seminole or a duchess, parts availability, they are "easier" to insure because there are tons out there, and very common trainers. If this is a plane you are looking at using in the future for traveling, a C310 is a plane I've heard of folks training in, but it'll cost a lot more to operate(trade-off is that it's very capable, but if you're not using it sooner than later, would be a bad choice).

I have a soft spot for C310's as 2000hrs of my total time is in them, but I don't know how well I'd trust zero-time folks learning in them. Trade-off being is that when they learn in a plane like a C310, they will actually appreciate critical engines, and get some solid high-perf time.

Turbo anything is not a good idea for training - much more cost to repair. Apache was a good plane for twin training - getting more difficult to get parts and costly to repair unless you are a mechanic and have a place to work. 310, Barron - travel air - all can be more dangerous for twin training - get a plane that is easy to fly - forgiving- and not as expensive to repair or operate. Keep the plane light - no observers - Don't buy cheap - the plane will be broken all the time or you will be "broke" trying to buy the parts to fix it ! Get a good plane - spend the $ - forget about all the fancy avionics - stick to basics -get the ticket - get some time- and move on to the fancy stuff later.

Flight schools use a duchess or seminloe for training because they are cheap, not because they provide good training. If you have the money to buy an airplane, you can afford better training.

We all know that an aircraft in flight is a lousy classroom. Learn the engine out drills in a simulator, so you don't waste expensive time doing so in the airplane. If you are instrument rated, definitely do engine out approaches in the sim.

Then train in a challenging airplane such as the Cessna 310 or a twin Comanche.

Joe