Cessna 205 ?
 

Thought about purchasing one. Anyone familiar
with the "cost of ownership" on these aircraft? Don't hear much or read much about them.

I have owned a 205 for the last two years. I have found that it is a most desireable airplane. The useful load is about 1450lbs. as configured and it loves the weight. You have to run it alittle rich or else the cylinders run to hot.I find that I run it about 2 gallons an hour over what the book says. Now the positive side is that I am consistantly 15knots over what the book says.I have added speed mods and it has helped tremenously.With just four people there is a great luggage area with the 5th and 6th seat removed. By the way I consistantly fly at 140knots burning 14 gallons at 4,500 ft. At 7,500 ft typicaly its 145 to 150 knots at about the same fuel burn. They are getting harder to find and more expensive. They are not allot of money to maintain just buy one thats got it all.

Thanks for the info. How has powerplant reliability been. Isn't the TBO arounf 1500
hrs. Can you approximate your cost per hour excluding tie down and insurance fees?
Thanks

You are right about the TBO, 1500 hrs is it.Insurance for me last year was 1250.00 at 73,500 value. This year I have upped it to 100,000.00 because of all I have done to it and now the cost is 1500.00 per year.My tie down was 27.00 per month but now I just got into a hanger for 175.00 per month. What interested you in this particular model? What are you looking for?
The 205 fly's very nice. I have auto pilot without altitude hold but it really does'nt need it.Its very easy to fly and does'nt take long to get used to.
If you buy one do not over lean, do not buy one with overhauled cylinders, buy one with new ones! Other than that If you buy one with a newer engine, paint, interior, and all the avionic's you want you may pay 75,000. to 100,000.00 but you will save money in the long run. With every thing new there is only oil changes and cleaning the plugs. 10 quarts of oil and a filter if you have one and you want one. So to sum this up the basic's are 1500.ins,27.00 tie down,I think about 13.00 for engine reserve per hour, oil chage is 50.00 if you do it yourself with 10 quarts and filter shell expensive stuff.

On engine longevity, If you buy an engine with new cylinders you will get a thousand hours out of them typically before top maybe more.If you do not over lean you will get more than less. I would prefer and io540 but it wasn't offered. I think that it is a better engine but it is on the cherokee 6 300

I have read a couple of articles about them
and it appears that you get a good load hauler with a decent cruise for the money.
You don't have to worry about the landing gear like a 210 or the extra insurance that
goes along with it. However I don't see many
adds for 205's for sale.

If you look at the ntsb reports you will see lots of problems with gear retaction problems and failure to put down the gear resulting in statistics. Up at 7000 ft. to get 140 to 150 knots is close to what a normaly aspirated 210 would get. Yes you are right you do not see many of them advertised just because there were only about 500 or so built and there are only about 350 still flying around out there. I like it better than the 206 because its faster in the real world it has the co-pilot door and a large baggage door on the rear pilot side. What interests you about the 205?