2 minutes ago, brabus said:

My only comparison to heavies is the airlines, which I know isn’t apples to apples, but I don’t think it’s far off much of the time. These styles of flying allow for significant decay of stick/rudder skills and dealing with EPs/abnormals/unintended events that require them (vs. manipulating automation/simply pushing buttons). It is a disservice to young pilots especially not having ACE - the mil is holding them back on advancing their skills/maintaining solid proficiency.
 

There’s a lot of airline pilots who could really use some GA time for this reason, and the ones who don’t care and rest on their 6900 airline hours don’t seem to realize they don’t really have 6900 hrs of flying, they have 6900 hrs of managing computers and rinse/repeating the same taxi flows/departures/arrivals (over generalization a bit, but point remains).   

You are not far off the target, my time in tankers 01-05 had a LOT of one to a full stop at the Died flying essentially the same mission 2-3 days in a row.

Complacency and expectation bias was a real CRM / ORM issue.

Variety is the spice of life and necessary in the development of a military aviator 

Break break from previous post:

Has anyone here put their airplane in an LLC and leased to a flight school? A good friend owns the school and is very meticulous with aircraft mx, cleanliness, etc…he likes nice things and does everything possible to keep them nice. I’m not really worried about the wear/tear - someone jacks it up, that’s what insurance is for. So I’m good with that part of the conversation, more interested in what ways have you seen agreements work well vs. don’t recommend. Things like who pays for what (directly vs. reimbursed), how does money flow between the customer/flight school/your LLC, etc.

If you have any firsthand data on this subject, please DM me (or put it here if you think everyone else wants to read it).

 

On 11/9/2025 at 6:59 AM, Clark Griswold said:

recapitalize UPT with PC-21s, T-6Cs or M-345s… or this training aircraft offered by Grob
https://gaf-aerospace.com/tpx-cobra-en.html#:~:text=The TPX is a low-wing%2C side-by-side%2C two-seater,turboprop engine with 750 HP%2C 7-blade propeller.

As long as we're swinging for the fence, don't forget the fleet of Super Cubs that studs need to solo before they can move on to a turboprop.

On 11/9/2025 at 7:24 AM, brabus said:

There’s a lot of airline pilots who could really use some GA time for this reason

Unfortuantely, there are experience and recency blind spots no matter where you find yourself in the aviation industry.

When bringing guys in to fly the B-24 and B-29, I am looking for a mix of:

- Multi-pilot, multiengine, "professional" flying

- Day/VFR GA flying

- Tailwheel experience

There are a lot of other desirable traits, but these are the ones that keep the airplanes from getting wrecked.

5 hours ago, Hacker said:

As long as we're swinging for the fence, don't forget the fleet of Super Cubs that studs need to solo before they can move on to a turboprop.

Deal

Carbon Cubs for TW training then the T-6, if Bobs balked at repurposing the T-6 fleet I’d want Game Bird GB1s 

 

Edited November 11, 2025Nov 11 by Clark Griswold

On 11/10/2025 at 1:38 PM, Hacker said:

Unfortuantely, there are experience and recency blind spots no matter where you find yourself in the aviation industry.

When bringing guys in to fly the B-24 and B-29, I am looking for a mix of:

- Multi-pilot, multiengine, "professional" flying

- Day/VFR GA flying

- Tailwheel experience

There are a lot of other desirable traits, but these are the ones that keep the airplanes from getting wrecked.

somehow I missed that you fly FiFi and Doc! Guess I've been sleeping under a rock... LMK next time you're in northern Utah! I think KOGD has hosted y'all a couple times in the last couple years and that's 10 minutes from my house...

@brabus from your Nov 9 post:

I own a T-28S, but actually the LLC owns the airplane. This plane is available for rent to anyone actually qualified to fly it. There has only been one person who has PIC’d this aircraft for the last 5 years of the LLC’s ownership

I also own an LLC for pilot services, and other things, for the past 8 years. These two LLC work together as a monetary transfer structure.

That pilot is and those LLCs are owned by the same person, me. One LLC pays the other LLC to rent the aircraft in exchange for pilot proficiency. One transaction benefits both LLCs. Somewhat complicated of a tax scheme, but my accountant swears it is legit, 5 years experience to agree.

BL: An aircraft owned by an LLC can be used for tax benefit to deduct all expenses of Maintenace, hangar, insurance, fuel as an offset compared to owning outright as an individual where nothing is “deductible” as when it comes to taxes. As my marginal tax rate is 32%, owning a warbird, or any plane, can be accomplished at a “reduced” cost.

DM if you want more info, or others are welcomed to chime in.

It has been a great experience.

On 12/26/2025 at 6:50 PM, stract said:

somehow I missed that you fly FiFi and Doc! Guess I've been sleeping under a rock... LMK next time you're in northern Utah! I think KOGD has hosted y'all a couple times in the last couple years and that's 10 minutes from my house...

Wendover is a former B-29 base, too, so we have been looking at that.

I was in New Zealand recently and on a whim, I managed to go out and fly a Pacific Aerospace CT/4 trainer.

Fairly unknown in the US... I don't believe any are airworthy here.

This one was the first of two prototypes, before it went into production in NZ. It was built in 1972.

The pilot I flew with was one of the handful of former NZAF A-4K pilots (only 168 total), and is a pretty accomplished warbird pilot. We did some sightseeing, AHC, and light aerobatics. It was "different". Really enjoyed getting to fly a piece of NZ aviation history.

Edited February 6Feb 6 by HuggyU2

Found this in the store for you Huggy

11 hours ago, RegularJoe said:

Found this in the store for you Huggy

Is that Vietnamese subtitling? Appropriate.

13 hours ago, FourFans said:

Is that Vietnamese subtitling? Appropriate.

Japanese, I believe.

I'm sure very few care, but the Vietnamese jets never had the air refueling probes on their jets, as far as I know.

FYI: that's the South Vietnamese roundel on the fuselage of both of our jets

We are hoping to have a cool A-37 surprise for the warbird world later in 2026. We shall see.

Edited February 11Feb 11 by HuggyU2

On 2/9/2026 at 8:27 PM, RegularJoe said:

Found this in the store for you Huggy

What, you didn't purchase it for Huggy? I was going to send Huggy my $200 Philippine Dragonfly model but it augured in from the top shelf of my closet. I did give my painter's kid my helmet complete with the O2 mask a couple of weeks ago. Looked better on him than sitting on my "I love Me" shelf.

I heard a horrible situation unfold in real time today that ended in a crash, I tried to help but everyone overwhelmed the kid and he crashed...fortunately the he survived, but made some epic mistakes along the way.

I was flying from Huntsville back to Florida when I heard what sounded like a young guy come up on guard and you could hear the fear in his voice:

"N85RW I don't think I have enough gas to make it."

Several people chimed asking him to repeat, this time he said "N85RW I don't think I have enough gas to make it back to Murpheesboro."

We asked him where was and he replied, "I don't know and now I show I have no gas, someone tell me what to do."

Everyone on guard jumped in, "LAND, Squawk 7700!, LAND, LAND!"

I have Starlink in my plane so I pulled him up on Flightaware and he was 14 miles west of Murpheesboro. On my map I could see he was 5 miles from a restricted (Private), airfield and he was at 5,000' AGL. Before I could get that out someone told him to switch to Nashville approach freq 118.4 because they had him on radar. I switched over but could not get a word in, felt like I was the only one with SA.

Seven minutes later he was down in the trees. He passed multiple roads and empty fields and ended up in the trees...you can see one of the fields in the background of the crash pic.

I hate to judge pilots after the fact but damn...

Nice looking Piper.

"Someone tell me what to do."... I would sure like to know more about his flight training. Wow.