"Which Helicopter Should I Purchase?"

How would you buy your first helicopter? Oh, this is a big topic I have made. I've done this video or this topic on YouTube many, many, many times over the years. And it's a good. It's a great question, right? So I'm not complaining. It's just I answer this a lot. You want to think very long and hard before you go out and purchase an aircraft, right? They're going to be more expensive than what you think. You know, you see a helicopter for sale somewhere. Like the other day I saw one pop up in R44. $88,000. Wow. And you go, oh, wow, $88,000 for, for a pretty R44 like that. Wow, that's not that bad. And then when you find out that the thing's almost timed out and the money that you're going to spend to have to do the rebuild on it or the, the overhaul on it, you go, oh, that's why it's only for sale for 88,000. Or any helicopter out there, maybe you're looking at an Enstrom and you see an instrument for sale for 120,000. Hey, wow, that was a great price. Well, the engines probably close to being needing an overhaul or a gearbox, whatever the case is. So helicopters, hands down, are super expensive. If you want to get past that, right? Like, just be prepared that this thing is going to cost you no matter what somebody tells you. And what you figure on paper, it's going to cost you more. The manufacturer says it costs $165 an hour to operate that helicopter. Figure it's going to be double. Because you can figure, insurance, you can figure, you can guess on maintenance, you'll know you have annuals and 100 hours and all those inspections. But it's the breakdowns throughout the year or it's you run the rotor blade into the side of the hanger going out the door and you got to replace a rotor blade for 40 grand. It's the things that pop up that you're not prepared for that really kills operators. So get past the money part. Money for, let's say, for any individual, the money is no problem. You should start in a smaller aircraft like the typical training helicopters. R22, R44, a Schweitzer, a Cabaret, an Enstrom. All good helicopters, right? If you're gonna fly by one for yourself, you would need to go fly them, right? Like, if you're gonna put that kind of investment into it, I would go sample them, you know, go get some intro flights. Go actually get in them, right? And See how they fly, how do you fit in them? For example, the R22 doesn't work for a larger frame person or a really tall person. They just may not fit well in the R22 and they may be overweight by what the limitation is. And that doesn't mean you're fat. It means the R22 is built to haul like two, let's say medium sized people. You know, like the training that we do, we always have to ask the question first. Well, what do you weigh? Right, right. Because depending on who's going to fly with you, the person that can get in, because I'm not about a small guy and Hauser's kind of a brute, he weighs a little less than me. But we, there's a limit to how much a person can weigh and get in and be legal in the aircraft. And then you have options like say if you're going to be a, you're going to be flying for as a private individual, you're just going to be flying for fun. An instrument is a great choice because of that fully articulated rotor system, nice and stable. It has a nice baggage compartment on it where you could put in a small suitcase. You could almost fit golf clubs in there. But it might not be quite deep enough. But an instrument has, it's a little more fancy, it's a little more comfortable. Looks a little more like a real helicopter. I mean they're all real, but you know, there would be advantages to an instrument. Switzers are cool little helicopters, great trainers, but there's no baggage on those either, and they're slow. Cadbury's pretty popular. Getting popular now. Another good choice, fully articulated system. They're cool little helicopters. Has a small baggage area but very, very, very handy to give you advice on what you should buy. If I was going to say pick one, I'd pick an R44. And the reason I say that is if you just wanted my opinion for the smaller piston powered helicopters, with an R44 you can take three people with you when you go to fly somewhere. If you're limited to only one person, that's kind of bummer. If you want to take up a couple people and you want to go fly somewhere for lunch or whatever the case is. And then the R44 also opens up that ability of using it for commercial operations. Maybe you want to buy a helicopter and lease it to a flight school they might want to use to do flight rides on the weekends to make extra money. Not that I would advise somebody else taking your helicopter and Using it, but it's an option. So there are many, many choices for you. If you're wanting to buy one privately or just one for your personal use, I would just caution you to understand that it's going to cost you a lot more money than what they tell you it is. When you read about it and start talking to people, they're super expensive. So I would spend the time to really take a look at them and figure out what's right for you. You know, a lot of people will tell you, don't fly this helicopter, don't fly that helicopter, don't fly that one. But this is the one, this is the one that you need, right? Eh, baloney. Right? It's. It's what? Rights for you? What, what's right for you? What do you, how do you like the look of them? How do you like the comfort level of it? If you're gonna spend that kind of money, get something that you're gonna be comfortable in. And the biggest thing about buying one is what is the maintenance history on it? Who did that maintenance? Maintenance is such a big deal. That's why if money's no object, buy a new one. Because then you're getting a brand new aircraft and you can pick the people that you want to maintain it. You know, you're not getting something that's been wrecked and beat up, been used in training, has log books that maybe may or may not be on the up and up. Because there's a lot of shady stuff that goes on in our industry, unfortunately. But it's the world we live in. So I would just take the time to research, pick what's best for you. But my number one choice would be R44 will be the way to go. And our clone is located@askhogs.com you can go below and click on the link to go check it out. 24 hours a day, seven days a week, you can ask training related questions. Flight and ground. 14 years of my contents loaded in this thing. Blogs, podcasts, videos, paid content, free content. There's over 6 million words piped into my clone. It's amazing. Go down below. Ask Hogs.com the clone is free to everyone and the clone is also inside of our HOG site on every video, every page. So you can be in viewing videos. And you can always ask the clone a question while you're at it so you can get an immediate answer first. Right here is free free PDF private pilot 101 helicopter training blueprint. That's why we created this. And let me cover what's in the first chapter? Since you ask and you're at the beginning. That's why we created this. The first chapter are questions that we've. We took like the top 10 questions that we get all the time. Like is learning how to fly a helicopter difficult? How long will it take to become a private pilot? How much will it cost to become a private pilot? What is the best approach to selecting a flight school? What are the key differences between helicopters and fixed wing aircraft? How many tests will I have to take? 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