Cessna Cardinal 177 RG II v. Piper Arrow III (70s) v. Piper Arrow III (brand new)

If you couldn't do the 200,000 in operating costs on a 300,000 plane
(how many years would that take you to use up?), then how could you
convince a bank to lend you half a mil for a new Arrow? I'd like to
talk to your banker, I have some ideas too.

I can put $150,000 down. I'm going to use the plane to fly to work and
while I'm at work I wouldn't mind having it flown. Also I can't exactly
take a club plane and go home with it, then not show up at work for a
week when I take a vacation etc. etc. I would be clocking in about 400
hours a year which would make ownership more economical than rental.

Any plane I buy I
will be putting an AVIDYNE avionics twin LCD system into

Why that particular one? For Hawaii flying, it seems all you need is
the wide screen HRPD.

Personal taste, the entire system retails at about 35,000, which I
wouldn't mind given the advantages of having both that I'll go into
below.

Why is the new Arrow even in the mix? It would be hard for maintanance
expenses to reach half a mil for the other airplanes you were considering.

My "daily" routine would be Moloka'i to Honolulu (47 NM cross country)
don't let that fool you, between Moloka'i and O'ahu is the Kaiwi
Channel, the best weather I've ever flown in and the worst, as well as
the sneakiest, hence a pristine avionics set up would be nice, it would
also get the plane rented more.

As to short island hops, a higher performance plane will take you across
the entire chain faster. Where do you intend to go?

Like I said 47NM usually, while the longest flight (from Lihue to Hilo,
which will probably never happen) takes about a 3.0. It's a general
consensus amongst pilots here than a personal plane should be a
reliable durable single (retract preferable), which leads to an
enormous popularity here for the Cessna Cardinal. The consensus is also
that any commuter inter island flying (Part 135) can only be done
economically in Navajos or Chieftains, any other plane (inclucing
Cessna Twins) are uneconomical here, due to our environment.... Salt
Water (propellers last half as long here as on the mainland), humid,
low spread between temperature and dewpoint, daily moderate turbulence
(Airmet Tango was ineffect for 328 days last year), as well as the fact
that the plane needs to be "simple", the "simpler" the better as
getting parts out here for more complex airplans is known to have taken
months (getting an exhaust manifold for the Cardinal took 5 weeks last
year after a crack developed).

I can put $150,000 down.

That buys a lot of airplane, especially for your missions.

If this is your first time buying, I wouldn't go whole hog. Learn on
the first one, and then step up if necessary.

As for reliability (in the avionics, for example), you are better off in
some ways having two systems with 95% reliability than one system with
99% reliability. So, money spent for the "super reliable" may be better
spent on a simple backup system. But personal taste counts for
something (otherwise we'd all be flying other people's airplanes). I've
never owned a plane, but I certainly would not buy the very expensive
new plane as my first one. I'd learn (ownership) on a less expensive
one, make my mistakes where they don't cost as much, and once I know a
lot more than I know now, I'd trade up appropriately (or not - it may
turn out that I had already hit the sweet spot).

Jose
--
There are more ways to skin a cat than there are cats.
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