What's your sign?

FSE and PE make for a powerful combination
Marcus Becker
Posts: 982
Joined: Fri Feb 08, 2013 5:12 pm

Re: What's your sign?

Post by Marcus Becker »

wmburns wrote:
Marcus Becker wrote:My biggest purchase (turned out to be the biggest money pit) was the Jetstream41. I had to get creative with getting some return on my investment. I wasn't flying it and neither was anybody else. I dropped the rental rate to where I was breaking even and posted an advertisement in the FSE forums with no takers. Then I thought of the idea of holding an auction for a short term lease. It brought some interest and income. I think I'm going to do it again as the lease expires in a couple weeks.
Just wondering if N534RM currently at 2CA3 is yours? Are you aware that it is down for maintenance? How does that work on a lease return?

When I first started flying on FSE my main aircraft was the JS41. I made a TON of v$'s running a routes around KCLT. At the time that was the only location I could find that had enough jobs to fill the JS41 (29 PAX). Even then it was a lot of work to find the right route and PAX combinations to make it work. My goal was to earn enough v$'s to buy my own JS41.

Of course at the time I thought 800k was a ton of v$'s. However, it would seem that anyone with 7 aircraft included a very expensive airplane, 800k doesn't really seem like a ton compared to others.

Fast forward to today. Almost never fly the JS41 anymore. The reasons are varied. Some home sim set up related. Some X-plane vs FSE related. Some stability related. Some personal goals related.

It's too bad there isn't a high quality X-Plane version of the JS41. I'm spoiled by PMDG quality.

The X-Plane JS32 just doesn't do it for me. Seems like there are just too many "issues" with how it alters the X-plane axis.

FSE really is a desert with islands of activity.
That one isn't mine. I try to make sure all my aircraft are up and operational.

Trust me when I say that buying that JS41 took every v-penny I had and then some. I took out a loan and flew that thing a ton to pay it off. I got burned out on it and started renting it out and the thing hasn't been rented more than a half dozen times in over a year. Oh well. I don't even have 1/4 of the cash in hand that it took to purchase. I'll get back there some day.
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Geoff
Posts: 127
Joined: Fri Mar 13, 2015 12:53 pm

Re: What's your sign?

Post by Geoff »

Marcus and wmburns, why is the Jet Stream 41 a "money pit"? Is it fuel costs, or repair costs, or both?

wmburns, I'm also curious what you mean about FSE being a desert with islands of activity. You mean, I think, that many airports have lousy jobs, and a few have a steady stream of great jobs?
Marcus Becker
Posts: 982
Joined: Fri Feb 08, 2013 5:12 pm

Re: What's your sign?

Post by Marcus Becker »

For me, it feels as thought the JS41 has been a money pit (incorrect usage as I don't have to keep throwing money into other than normal maintenance) because it cost an incredible amount of money but hasn't shown a return on the investment as quickly as I would have liked. Nobody rents the thing. If you can fly the plane full, there is some big money to be made. I just don't care to fly it much anymore for a couple of reasons. Mainly, I have migrated to X-Plane primarily.
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Keith Smith
Posts: 9939
Joined: Sat Oct 09, 2010 8:38 pm
Location: Pompton Plains, NJ
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Re: What's your sign?

Post by Keith Smith »

When I was a student pilot, I'd fly one of 4-5 different DA-20's on the line, so I got used to juggling callsigns on a frequent basis. It was easy to refer to the callsign placard on the panel. X-Plane does have a 'tail number' feature for aircraft, and it can even be altered via plugin. In fact, the Windows PE plugin actually writes to that dataref now (this was a feature added for the FlyThisSim which actually reads the tail number dataref and dynamically renders the callsign placard accordingly).

The only issue is, there are very xplane aircraft which use this 'instrument'. Instead, the callsign placard is typically baked into a texture on the panel and can't be altered at run-time.

Since I don't have post-it notes lying around the PC, I basically fly with the same N-number all the time (not the same as my real world tail number, it just feels weird saying it in the sim). The tail number I use is the same as the DA-40 that I used to rent in California when I got my private.

Regarding King Airs for X-Plane, the Carenado models are nice. I simply alter the x-plane FSE alias for the Carenado King Air B-200 so I can fly it as a 200 or 350, whatever the situation calls for. It's quite interesting to fly the King Air 200 with a 350 max payload!

Regarding FSE being a series of small islands, I partially agree, if you're talking about filling 20-30 seat aircraft. However, if you take an eight-seater or less, the opportunities to fill up the plane are nearly endless. I usually decide what plane I want to fly in X-Plane for fun, THEN find the jobs to suit the plane, not the other way around. As has been said many times in many places, chasing money in FSE gets old pretty quickly. You soon end up flying offline, direct, starting with engines running on the runway, making kamikaze approaches into fields (I've done this for restocking a FBO when I just need to get it out of the way). When I see ERJ-145's parked at 2000-3000ft dirt strips I often wonder what they were thinking, then I figure it was probably a means to an end. Last minute restocking flights aside, I much prefer to have my FSE flights be extensions of normal sim flights, rather than having it drive all aspects of how I conduct the flight.
gavink42
Posts: 171
Joined: Mon Apr 16, 2012 7:08 pm
Location: KMEM

Re: What's your sign?

Post by gavink42 »

I own a Cessna 206 and a Cherokee 180 that are based at 46CA.

On a good week, they get rented once or twice for short hops. But I've got all the v$ that I need, so leave them there to expand the rental options.

I generally fly with the N-number whatever aircraft I rent. Since I mostly fly my own planes, it tends to be just those 2 numbers.

- Gavin
- PP ASEL, instrument, complex, high performance
- Member AOPA, EAA, IMC Club, Piper Owner Society
- Cherokee 180C owner
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