Sport Pilot Talk

Good morning all! I'm just getting started on my sport pilot license (I'm afraid PPL is not an option) and am very new to all this. I'm wondering about access to planes. Do most flyers buy a plane (sounds expensive!)? Are rentals available (most places seem to only have Cessna 172s)? Are there a lot of flying clubs? Do people share aircraft? Or rent from private parties?

Anyway, looking forward to being part of the community.

Eric

Good morning to you as well.

First off if share your location someone might be able to direct you to a LSA in your area.

Some people are lucky enough to be able to rent. Others buy their own aircraft, and yes some can be expensive, and others more reasonable. There are a few flying clubs but they seem more rare. Leasing from an individual is even less likely.

One other thing about LSA being light weight aircraft pilot weight and size can be an issue.

Thanks for the info. I live in northern Maryland

Maryland has a pretty long northern boarder. I'm not sure what is close, but there is light sport training available in Lancaster PA. There could be something closer depending on what kind of airplanes you are willing to fly. Think older Piper Cub, ect.. Another option rather than jumping right into airplanes is getting a glider private pilot rating, and adding sport pilot airplane privileges to it. Mid Atlantic Soaring is located in Fairfield PA. After learning to fly gliders the transition to a LSA would be a fairly easy process.

Basically unless you're lucky you're going to have to buy, but you can buy used!

Rentals of LSAs are pretty rare. Hopefully the MOSAIC ruling will expand what aircraft a sport pilot can rent, but this is the FAA we're talking about so it's always a possibility that they'll screw us just for the sake of it.

What's your budget? And what kind of flying are you looking for? If you simply want to be in the air you can access the very light under-87 knot LSAs ("fat ultralights") which can be quite cheap even new, if you're fine with an open cockpit and two stroke engine. If you want something that does good cross-country then you're looking for a bigger and somewhat more expensive LSA. But you can get a used LSA pretty cheaply depending on your mission. Look at some Trade-A-Plane listings to get a good idea. Just stay away from the REALLY cheap ones because they're usually cheap for a reason (like hard to come by parts or a poor useful load. I'm looking at you, Cessna 162!).

Some people share aircraft but you have to be lucky to find someone who will do that (I was lucky enough that my father also wanted to be a pilot so we bought a plane together). Most people have a hard time finding someone who they are willing to go into a partnership. Flying clubs that have LSAs or partnerships for a single LSA can be hard to come by.

Two flight schools in MD

https://www.flyrv12.com/flight-schools/