Category: Frugal Pilot Flight Guides

Flying can be expensive! Flight schools typically charge about $10,000 for instruction required to become a Private Pilot. The Sport Pilot certificate […]

Hopefully, you won’t have any unexpected costs. But you might. Like what? Typically, major maintenance or a repair that isn’t covered by […]

It would be inconvenient; not to mention dangerous; to run a long, weighted string out the aircraft window to see how far […]

So you now have your sport-pilot certificate and you’re itching to go flying. Any old excuse will do. I’ll cover the most […]

For most of the past century, the entry level for new pilots was the FAA private-pilot certificate. Then came the ill-fated recreational-pilot […]

If your plane is excessively worn or damaged making it no longer airworthy, chances are you’ll need to hire an A&P mechanic […]

Class A airspace starts at 18,000 feet MSL and goes up to 60,000 feet MSL. Who flies here? Commercial and business jets […]

The magnetic compass is about as simple as an instrument gets. A magnetized metal bar is balanced on a pivot point and […]

So what’s it going to take to earn your sport-pilot certificate? Just like earning anything worthwhile, it’s going to take some effort […]

The airplane’s rudder is a vertical control surface that’s part of the tail section. The trailing edge is movable from the cockpit. […]

Other flight guides on this site go deeper into navigation and communication radios, sometimes called nav-com. For now, be aware that sectional […]

This website is presented in a very logical structure to make it easy to find things when you need them. Let’s take […]

Let’s get back down to earth for a moment. Before you get too far into spending money on flying, consider what you […]

For obvious reasons, you need to know what the weather will be like when and where you fly your cross-country trip. Fortunately, […]

Look for common flying goals and interests. Make sure your finances approximate each other so that one partner isn’t carrying the burden […]

You may be surprised to learn that currently more than 20,000 amateur-built or experimental aircraft are licensed in the United States. And […]

The FAA (and, prior, the Civil Aviation Authority [CAA]) has regulated aircraft manufacturing for more than 50 years, working hard toward making […]

Due to recent rule changes and clarifications, some aircraft kits can be constructed using quick-build kits while still complying with the 51-percent […]