Thoughts of Parting with an Old Friend

Recently I started thinking about selling our Mooney. For the past few months I have been bandying about giving her an avionics upgrade,  and sprucing up the interior.  However, the cost of addressing those items is a twenty thousand dollar commitment after which the plane still requires new paint, glass and reupholstering. Conversely, I’ve watched five of my clients purchase new or different airplanes since December and after seeing the value they received for the price they paid put my thoughts in motion.

My thinking is to take the net proceeds from the sale of the airplane and adding in the twenty thousand we would need to spend to get 58 Victor up to speed would amount to a 20% down payment on an aircraft up to $150,000.   

I started by looking around the web and found a few suitable airplanes that meet our mission; one in particular was worth emailing an inquiry about. When the seller presented me with a sight unseen offer for my airplane on trade, I started scanning 58Victor’s log books for his review. Looking at 35 years of maintenance records was a real eye opener and realizing that the last eleven years of ‘records’ were on my dime I start reminiscing about our time as her keeper.

We bought N7458V from Jim M. in May of 2000. At the time I was working for a consulting firm in Boston which was just a half hour too far away  to commute by car daily (3 hours one way) so I ended up spending Monday thru Thursday nights living at the Dedham Hilton. I regularly found myself with nothing to do after five so I started hanging at Norwood Memorial Airport where I began working to get current with a local instructor.

Having been out of aviation aside from flight reviews since selling our 1977 Grumman Tiger  N28331 in 1991, I would fly every two years for the ten some odd hours it would take me to get proficient enough for an instructor to sign me off. Once you’ve owned an airplane renting airplanes becomes a non-option as its real appealing to fly whenever you like without scheduling conflicts. So when Judy commented about how she’d like to have her husband around more than two days a week, I sensed opportunity-and started pitching her on purchasing an airplane.

I started looking for another Tiger but they were so much more expensive than the $28,000 that we had sold ours for.  I had always been interested in Mooney’s so when I found N7458V in Marshfield I drove down there a few times at lunch and after work to look at it.

Things progressed, and I received preapproval from MBNA bank for up to $100,000 financed. I had Augie at Swift Aviation in Norwood perform our pre-buy inspection and remember him telling me that the airplane was in pretty good shape for the price. Judy was apprehensive about spending so much money on an airplane but our thoughts were that I would be able to come home from work a few more nights a week.

We paid $69000 for “Vicky” which had 35 hours on the engine since a Penn Yan major overhaul. Having that warrantee gave us piece of mind which clinched the deal. The airplane was equipped as a “Slant Alpha” and was a quantum leap over the gear that was in Tiger 331. I was impressed that it had a DME, Mode C, and two KX170B’s with the Mac 1700 digital conversions and an ADF. I couldn’t fly her until I received 25 hours of dual instruction so I hired Drew Thwaits who I had met when I was renting 172’s at Hammer Aviation at Norwood.

After taking possession of the airplane I couldn’t find tie down space at home in Danbury as the airport was completely sold out, so I rented a tie down at Norwood for $50 per month.

Naturally I got very busy with work right after closing on the airplane so getting 25 hours of dual took from about three months.  Drew was accommodating and my first solo flight in the new airplane was to Danbury to give Judy a ride.

Judy loved the airplane and was happy that I was flying again. It was around my birthday and she presented me a new pair of David Clark 20-10 Headsets.  Without speaking to her I had also bought her the same pair before our flight so we surprised each other new headsets. I surprised myself with a Garman GPSMap 195 shortly after that.

Our first trip in the airplane together was to Reagan National Airport in Washington DC (DCA) where we landed VFR. That trip is worthy of its own posting so I’ll save that story for later.  

Since then we added in 2002 a KLN89B, (2) KX155 NavComs, a Mid Continent MD41 Annunciator. In 2003 we added a JPI EDM 700 and FS450 and replaced the airspeed indicator and attitude gyro with new units. In 2007 I added a STEC 20 Autopilot, replaced the DG,  and removed the KR86 ADF and put a Garmin 396 in its real estate. Aside from upgrades we’ve spent an average of $6000 per year on maintenance.  The three upgrades totaled about 36 grand. So excluding fuel we’ve put about $96,000 of real money making her into the airplane she is today.  Adding in the loan payments puts another $78,500 on top. 

We've put 920 hours on the engine and figure 11 gallons of 100LL AvGas an hour equates to 10,120 gallons of fuel and which has varied from $1.99 a gallon to the current $5.00. I'd add in insurance and tie down but I'm getting overwhelmed by the scale of this and need to stop else I'll get depressed.  

Eleven years have passed since we’ve considered buying an airplane. We really don’t have to sell but when Steve at Reliant changed the oil last month he commented on how we had only flown the airplane sixty hours in the eight months since our last annual. t that point I realized that for me to own an airplane it would have to work some to pay its keep. When presented with the price of the upgrades versus purchasing a different plane the choice seems logical and unemotional.

But considering the memories and friendships we’ve made since owning Vicky  the decision becomes less clear. Neil Young’s song “This Old Guitar” describes how I feel about aircraft ownership. Neil writes how he doesn’t own “this old guitar” rather he’s its caretaker.  To me my “relationship” with the Mooney is very much like that. Yes, someone always buys the airplane new but, at some point, it goes to new people who fly and maintain it until they feel the need to part ways. This process repeats itself until the airplane is either restored, consumed by hours or accident.   I’ve been Vicky’s fourth caretaker in the thirty five years she’s been here, and we’ve flown it to every state east of the Mississippi , six to the west, a few Canadian Provinces and a couple Bahamian Islands. I’ve doubled my time in her and trained for my Instrument, Commercial, CFI, CFII, and recently flew her to and from my ATP check ride.

If we end up selling and moving on, it will be tough to say good bye to what has been a big part of my life for the past eleven years. That little airplane has survived a lot of its caretaker’s lifestyle changes and I’ve grown as a pilot by having the privilege to share time with her.

Here are the lyrics to Neil’s song. See how many places you can substitute airplane for guitar.

This old guitar ain't mine to keep
Just taking care of it now
It's been around for years and years
Just waiting in its old case
It's been up and down the country roads
It's brought a tear and a smile
It's seen its share of dreams and hopes
And never went out of style
The more I play it, the better it sounds
It cries when I leave it alone
Silently it waits for me
Or someone else I suppose

This old guitar
This old guitar
This old guitar

This old guitar has caught some breaks
But it never searched for gold
It can't be blamed for my mistakes
It only does what it's told

This old guitar ain't mine to keep
It's mine to play for a while
This old guitar ain't mine to keep
It's only mine for a while