EP 12 Do You Save Money Fixed Wing before Helicopter Training?

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Welcome to HOGS Daily Flight Brief. We're having a blast doing this for everybody. Please keep the likes coming, keep your comments coming down below. That's how we'll keep moving this forward. Just by. If you guys keep and girls, guys and girls keep coming back and you comment and you like and you subscribe, we'll keep them going. So we promised today, do I need a fixed wing first and does it save money doing fixed wing first? Okay, this was kind of fun for me because Chris told me, hey, I did the math on this and I said don't. He got ready to tell me, don't tell me, tell me in the helicopter after I've stated what I think. So the first question really easy, do I need fixed wing first? No, I think 40 years ago that might have been a requirement. But no, you can go straight to helicopter, no fixed wing needed. You go right up, jump in a helicopter, start taking lessons. Question solved. Okay then does it save money doing the fixed wing before doing my helicopter? This is a great question. Comes up all the time. Chris brought this one up for the list. What I before Chris tells us what he found out. Mathematically, what I've been saying for years is I don't think it really saves much. I get the argument between, oh, but you know, you do the fixed wing and you learn, you know, you learn airspace and you learn navigation and blah, blah, blah, blah. But then, you know, you got two check rides you're taking. I've just in my head have always thought, you know, I just, I can't think that you're really going to save a lot of money by doing the fixed wing first and then doing the helicopter add on. I think in the end it's probably really not going to save you much. And I always tell people if you're going for a career, you need every single ounce of helicopter time you can get. Okay, so Chris, what did you find in your math?

So just, just, just to clarify, you believe that you would save some money but just not much, or you think that you were not going to save it all and it actually might cost you more? I mean, what is the flat line? What do you, what is your.

I've just always said, without doing the math, I just always said I don't think you're going to save anything.

You're not going to save anything. So that's your answer? That's my answer.

I don't think you're going to save. Okay, and did I? I've never really thought about it. Whether it be cost Me more or cost a person more? I've just always, like, my general guesstimation is you're not going to save anything. Okay, what did you find out?

So I wanted to know because I do see this question. I've seen it on other. On other video, not on hogs, but I've seen it out there on other video, people asking about, hey, does it save me money? Because the theory is that helicopter training is they say at least three times as more expensive as airplane training. Right? That's what they say. Or that's the general rule of thumb. So if it costs you six grand to get your airplane, it's probably going to cost you 18 to get your helicopter, which we've kind of figured that part out.

Okay.

So the theory is, is that, okay, well, I'll only pay six grand to get my airplane rating. And then when I transfer over to helicopter, all I have to learn is how to fly a hel. And it's kind of like what you mentioned. I don't have to learn about airspace. I don't have to learn to talk on the radio. So that's all instruction time that you're getting charged for, right? For an instructor to teach you airspace, communications, weather, airport operations, all that stuff. So you're thinking that, oh, since I already know that, all they got to do is teach me how to fly the helicopter, right? That's right. Okay, so at Sweet Aviation, we offer two or three different kinds of airplanes. I took the cheapest one. We have a D820. We learned in a. You can learn in a diamond D820. I believe this is just going off, you know, memory from this morning. I think it's 139 an hour plus. Plus 65 an hour for the instructor. Okay, so I just did the minimum. And, you know, you still need the 40 hours. So I did 40 hours times the 139, came up with a number. I don't remember what the number is. And then I took the 65 times 30 hours for the instructor and came up with the number. And I, man, I think that was right around seven grand. 7100, something like that. Right. Okay, so you're at 7100 already. Then to do the add on, you need 20 hours of duel for the helicopter. Okay, So I took 369 times the 20, came up with a number. I can't remember what it was. I should know this. And then I took the instructor's 75. So 75 times, I believe I took it by 20 hours.

Okay.

Came up With a number, the airplane rating plus the helicopter add on, I came up with like 20,000, 21,000 somewhere in there. Right?

Okay.

Okay. Now if you just did helicopter at 369 an hour times the 40, okay. Because you need 40 hours for the, for the rating. Okay, you came up with again, I don't remember the exact number. Then I took 75 times 30 hours for the instructor and came up with a number in the end with my little math there, not including books and examiner fees and insurance and whatever else all goes into that. Doing your airplane and then the add on cost you more than just doing helicopter.

Very nice.

By, by with those numbers, it was like 3 or 4,000 more than it was to do the helicopter.

So you just debunked. Any one person could have a different.

And let me, let me asterisk this by saying that's with the G2 and a diamond DA20. If someone decided, you know, that was the cheapest airplane we had, but if someone did, you know, cheapest airplane, or maybe they decided to learn in a cirrus and then went off and flew in a, In a Robinson R22, maybe the numbers are a little bit more sure together or maybe the airplane comes out, or maybe that comes out a little bit different. But that's the numbers at Sweet Aviation. And again, like I said, I'm just recalling off. I did the math this morning. I can't remember the exact numbers, but the total was if you did your airplane and then your add on, you were spending almost, I think four grand more than if you would just go straight into helicopter.

Very nice. I'm glad you did that because I thought you were hinting that it was going to come out more once we started talking about it. That's why this morning I said, don't tell me, let me spout off what I've been saying for years. And then, and then tell me the math, right? Because hey, we all have opinions, right? And you have perceptions and there are perception of the industry that aren't always what they, you know, you hear people say this, say this, say this like people still hear, oh, I have to get my air, so I gotta get my airplane first. No, you don't. Where'd you hear that? So thanks for sitting down and figuring that out because that makes a nice argument to the question of, oh, well, I'll save money if I do airplane first.

Now again, that's just the private rating using our aircraft because we could get into another spiel about moving into commercial and how to maybe save a little bit of money trying to build commercial hours and that kind of stuff. But that's for another. This is just straight up getting your private rating. Does it save me money to do airplane first and then transition to helicopter? And I'm telling you with the numbers from Sweet Aviation, no, it does not.

Awesome. That's awesome. Let us know down below. Let's get some arguments in the comments. I'm just teasing. Put your feedback down below. We'd love to hear because this is a question that comes up all the time. So the next video coming up is experimental. Helicopter ownership is what we're gonna do for the next episode. So do us a favor, go down below. Subscribe, click the bell, give us a like on today's video. And there's a free download below for Helicopter Maneuver Guide. That's what we're promoting this week. Helicopter Maneuver Guide. It's free down below. Check it out. We will see you the next met. Peace out.

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