Dear All After a stint as Treasurer at my local club and having an interest in history, cost analysis and strategy this is my assessment of what has happened in Western Australia:
-The towplanes on average run at a loss over a long period of time -The membership annual subs are to a large degree used up subsidising the towplanes. -As clubs get more financial they spend more money on new 2 seaters -Even as clubs get bigger they do not have any more club single seaters than the smaller clubs. -Members do a lot of back seat flying to pay off the loans on the new 2 seaters. -I joined the club I did to learn gliding which had a much older double seater fleet than the club I did my AEF in. The age of the double seater fleet did not bother me....I just wanted to get into singles and go cross country. -Towplanes cost more to buy now as after the war some hand-me downs were available for gliding clubs at a very low cost. -Tow planes cost much more to operate now as maintenance must be done by LAME's and not club members. GST is added to the LAME's cost and fuel is more expensive. -Only genuine parts are used anymore and no improvision of auto and other parts is permitted. -Efficiency in sharing in gliders is lumpy ie if you consider private ownership 1 glider per person is required so that 1 pilot can always have a glider to fly. However if you share glider use over a big group then you only need a handful of gliders available to so that one will always be available when someone wants a fly.(how many clubs with a large private fleet ever have as many as 50 % of their private gliders flying on any one day ?) -Private ownership consumes lots of capital for gliders, capital for hangarage, cost for maintenance, cost for insurance and effort for Form2's, surveys etc. Not sure about others, but if my club said that it would rate me to do AEF's and the more I did it would contribute to buying a Mosquitto/LS3 etc I would put in more effort and go and get some AEF's. If it said nothing and I knew that the money was just going to fund the losses on the tow plane and pay off the loan for a new 2 seater then it would not be enough incentive to get me re prioritise my life. In summary as: -we all get older we all allow the sport to atract older people -as we all get our own single seater aircraft we all want to fly a nice double seater with our friends or other private owners once or twice a year -as we are solo pilots and aerotow is convenient for our needs we continue to fund the training by aerotow -other sports and lesure activities are competing for the time and money required for this sport: our numbers will continue to decline. Having said the above, gliding is a great sport and the setup with free instruction and the concept of sharing of aircraft is very good. Do other people see the direction the sport is heading in ? Will it affect us or future generations ? Do we, or should we care ? Michael Derry _______________________________________________ Aus-soaring mailing list [email protected] To check or change subscription details, visit: http://lists.internode.on.net/mailman/listinfo/aus-soaring
