Fly with master switch off to save money?

[MultiMediaWill]

My FBO charges for the airplane by the hobbs meter. If I turn off the master switch during flight do you think that would be an effective way to save money? Of course I would have a transceiver to do my radio calls.

EDIT: I'm not actually going to do this (it's a dumb idea). Just entertaining the idea.

 

[Jim Logajan]

If they fly an aircraft with a mandatory AD for inspections at certain hours, for one...

Interesting, though, that while the 91.205 of the regs require a tachometer, it doesn't define whether a tachometer is supposed to show anything more than RPM, such as whether it is also supposed to show total revolutions to date.

And of course no requirement (that I can see) of anything like a Hobbs meter - at least in section 91. Not sure if any of the aircraft related sections have more to say.

 

[Jim Logajan]

Want more flight time per dollar? Fly a glider, get good at finding lift.

Or fly a balloon or an ultralight that doesn't have any usage recording devices.

 

[Jim Logajan]

The two men were running on the treadmill discussing matters of God, country and apple pie [...] He was mentally reviewing procedures that could potentially bypass the Hobbs meter on one of her airplanes, thereby cheating her of revenue.

I call BS on that story. No way can any human walk on a treadmill, talk about god, country, apple pie, and think of Hobbs meter bypassing all at the same time.

Some of us have trouble just chewing gum and walking at the same time.

 

[Jim Logajan]

What is the reason you hate thieves?

If I may... my modest tale on thieves and hate:

Oregon has an estate/inheritance tax (a.k.a. "death tax"). An attempt to repeal it was on the ballot this month - it did not pass. There was one commercial that was repeated constantly on television for why it shouldn't be repealed (and pretty much summarized the entirety of the argument to keep the tax): repealing it only helped 2% of the people. Oh - and that 2% were rich. And the state needs the money.

So the morality and ethics of taking part of an estate precisely because the owner had the misfortune to die never came into it - or if it did, it came in under the dictum that a collective action is moral and ethical so long as it is good for the majority. The impact on the minority is of no consequence.

I don't hate the majority that voted that way (who would be considered thieves if they personally grabbed part of an estate) - I'm just terribly disappointed and sad for them. Humanity can be noble at times - but those moments seem so rare these days.

 

[Jim Logajan]

You're afraid to circle to 10'000 over an airport and glide to the runway? What kind of glide ratio would you consider required to make this into a non scary event?

Glide ratio doesn't matter (much) to me but the difference between gliders and power airplanes in this case is one has adjustable air brakes or spoilers and the other one doesn't. Both can be slipped, but a spoiler is the rough equivalent of a throttle and it does make life easier on approach - at least it did for me when I was training in gliders.