Is it possible to own a non-airworthy U.S. fighter jet as a civilian?

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Dave_A480@reddit

Fighter jets are legal. The weapons to arm them are not.
You have to be at least a hundred-millionaire to keep one airworthy though....

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theplacesyougo@reddit

So it’s not the printer but rather the ink that gets ya?

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metarinka@reddit

Yes a lot of the parts are either operated with less safety margin or more extreme specs... Or service life is shortened artificially.

The result is the same oos costs go way up. Uncle Sam isn't looking at cost per seat Mile while flying fighter jets.

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theplacesyougo@reddit

As a vet who turned wrenches and flew rotary and now is working government contracts of those same aircraft on the corporate side of things, trust me, I know.

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Why is it so expensive to maintain aircraft? I’m a complete newbie. Why is it so expensive and why does it require so much manpower? And why does it require so much maintenance? Don’t we build these things to go into combat and be ready to take on the most extreme conditions when flying at like Mach 1+?

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10tonheadofwetsand@reddit

It is the very conditions of the missions we send them into that requires such frequent maintenance.

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SuperBwahBwah@reddit

But what is being maintained? The plating? The wings? Cleaning the toilet? The wheels? The cameras and sensors? And if so, what about those things is being “maintained”?

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ScuffedBalata@reddit

Most aircraft have to be basically disassembled and inspected every so often. For a Cessna is like every 1800 hours which can be years.

For a fighter jet, it's sometimes every 100 hours

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beastpilot@reddit

This is completely untrue.

Every non-Military US aircraft has to be INSPECTED every year, if it is flown or not. These inspections can be intensive and require significant disassembly to observe parts of the plane. But this is not done on flight time, it's done on calendar time, and in no way does it represent a meaningful disassembly of the aircraft. You don't take the engine off, the wings off, drill out rivets, etc. You do what you need to inspect critical functions of the aircraft such as controls and look for structural issues.

Commercially used US aircraft require a simpler inspection every 100 hours, so ironically, they get inspections as often as you claim the military aircraft do.

The reality is that military aircraft actually break a lot and actually need service much more often than 100 hours. These are failures that don't need an inspection to identify.

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ScuffedBalata@reddit

According to a Navy Mechanic I talked to a few months ago:

on the Legacy F/A-18's (A, B, C, D) have maintenance/inspection cycles that are measured in days, filght hours, and other very specific conditions.

Hourlies are: 100, 200, 400, 600 flight hours. The 2/4/600 flight hour cycles are major inspections, requiring significant disassembly and inspection of aircraft components. They undergo Phased Maintenance cycles every 200 flight hours (see the correlation?) doing A, B, C, and D Phase inspections, so that the complete cycle is performed over an 800 flight hour cycle, then it starts over.

Day inspections, IIRC, are on a base 14 cycle: 14, 28, 42, 56, 84, etc, finishing with 364 and 728 Day inspections, and these are also repeating cycles.

There are more, but these are the core inspections for the platform. Other atforms cycles are determined by the Type Authority and the Manufacturer.

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beastpilot@reddit

You specifically said:

Most aircraft have to be basically disassembled and inspected every so often. For a Cessna is like every 1800 hours of flight time, which can be years in between major maintenance.

This is untrue. There is no 1800 hour disassemble or inspection requirement for a Cessna. There is an FAA ANNUAL requirement however, even if it flew zero hours that year.

Yes, 100 hour inspections (and they are inspections) are not as serious as an annual. But they are more than you say. Here is a 100 hour checklist for a simple single engine piston aircraft. You are looking pretty deeply at the engine and control systems:

https://zookaviation.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/SINGLEENGINEChecklist.pdf

And failures in high-performance aircraft are frequently fatal.

Ironically, in military aircraft, they aren't as they have ejection seats.

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Longjumping_Panda531@reddit

He may be referring to aircraft engines. The TBO on most general aviation aircraft is around 2000 hours, and the overhaul involves pulling the whole engine and shipping it back for a factory rebuild.

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beastpilot@reddit

For private owners, TBO's are recommendations and there is no regulation saying you have to obey them as long as you obey the manufacturer's procedures for determining airworthiness.

Commercial operations have to obey TBO's.

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Longjumping_Panda531@reddit

I cant tell if you’re being pedantic on purpose but you’re just confirming that aircraft have to be regularly inspected in an invasive fashion (maybe even requiring, say, some significant “disassembly” to do so), which is the point everyone was trying to make in the first place.

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ScuffedBalata@reddit

Yeah I totally.. man.

There ARE hourly inspections on GA.

There ARE 100/200 hour "inspections" on fighter jets that are significantly beyond anything a GA craft would have to do except the major annual or multi-thousand hour inspections.

The actual count of hours and specifics of the checklist is hyper-pedantic.

A Cessna will have an order of magnitude less maintenance and inspection than a fighter jet for each period of flight hours.

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10tonheadofwetsand@reddit

Mostly the engine, but also the avionics, and also the control surfaces, and also everything you listed.

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SuperBwahBwah@reddit

What’s wrong with the engine after using it? It is because it gets super hot for long periods of time? Is it because of how hot it gets? What do you do to maintain it? Swap the entire engine out with a new one?

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10tonheadofwetsand@reddit

Other people in this sub are far more qualified to describe in detail what is required than I am.

But engines literally have millions of parts, many of which must be lubricated, clean of debris, and inspected for any signs of wear.

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SuperBwahBwah@reddit

We need to lubricate engines? Why? What is moving that requires lubrication? And wouldn’t that lubrication evaporate off instantly the moment the engines turn on?

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ThorCoolguy@reddit

Sorry for all the assholes downvoting you for asking a question. Ignore them - asking a question means you're intelligent enough to be curious. Stupidity isn't a lack of knowledge, it's a lack of curiosity.

Others explained how jet engines work, but none answered your question - why does it need to be lubricated? It's actually a great question, because in everyday life, objects that feel smooth - like metal, which jet engines are made out of - seem to slide more easily, so you'd think they need less lubrication.

But at the microscopic level, metal is actually not smooth at all - it's a bunch of chaotic fractures pointing in every direction as bits of it have flaked off during the machining. It looks like sandpaper under a microscope. Get two surfaces of sandpaper and spin them against each other at extremely high speeds - they'll tear each other to shreds, and that's what metal does.

So instead, we inject a viscous liquid at high pressure that will sit between the two metal surfaces. This is oil. In a high-speed machine like a jet engine, the metal parts never actually touch; they're always riding on a thin ribbon of oil, which serves a secondary function of absorbing heat and carrying it somewhere else (and in a jet engine, there's a LOT of heat to carry away before the engine melts).

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SuperBwahBwah@reddit

Yea I don’t understand why I’m being downvoted for not knowing and asking… I just wanna learn but then again… It is Reddit. And thank you for explaining it so well. Everything you said makes sense. And I didn’t know that’s why we lubricate things like metal when yea, they look smooth and feel smooth but, that sand paper analogy is really really helpful. Thank you for explaining it instead of patronizing me and a lot of people have been really helpful but, some people are just weird, downvoting me asking for help.

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10tonheadofwetsand@reddit

Uhh, literally all the moving parts running against each other?

All engines need lubrication. Do you know what an oil change for your car is for?

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SuperBwahBwah@reddit

Like I said, I’m a complete newbie. I’m just trying to learn.

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10tonheadofwetsand@reddit

I’ll try to ELI5.

The thrust of a jet engine comes from extreme amounts of very hot air being expelled out the back. Newton’s third law. Push air backwards, jet moves forwards.

It does this in a process called, I kid you not, suck squeeze bang blow.

Air is sucked in from the opening of the engine facing forward. It does this with a series of fans, spinning super fast.

These fans squeeze tons of air together inside the engine.

Fuel is then injected and ignited, so you have highly pressurized gas that explodes. Bang.

This gas can only go out the back. Blow.

Each of these stages has tons of moving parts, precision engineered to infinitesimally small tolerances, and they all must perform their job flawlessly, over and over again, in extreme temperatures.

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SuperBwahBwah@reddit

Ah okay… So that’s why the engine needs constant maintenance. Because basically a bomb is going off constantly to create thrust, which would obviously do a fair bit of damage or wear and tear. Okay. So what stops the engine from blowing up? It comes out the engine yes but why doesn’t it, instead of coming out, just blow up the entire engine in one big explosion?

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flyboy731@reddit

Mixing in non-compressed close to ambient temp air known as cooling air in short, check out agentjayz on Youtube if you want some real nerd details about how jet turbines work. Also another reason fighters are far more maintenance intensive is the constant large changes in throttle they tend to see in maneuvers. Passenger airlines effectively make 1 slow power reduction through flight from takeoff power to Continuous climb to cruise to idle for descent save for a few adjustments on short final. Fighters can be going from max afterburner to idle and back several times a minute and those thermal cycles are really what determine the lifecycle of parts subject to thermal stress and fatigue such as in the hot section of a turbine. See the development woes of the F100 engine (on Wikipedia) for the F15 to see how this can wreak havoc.

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bozoconnors@reddit

Because basically a bomb is going off constantly to create thrust, which would obviously do a fair bit of damage or wear and tear.

That's a great understanding of internal combustion (/car) engines. (hence - internal combustion!)

Turbines / jets are a bit more complicated (yet simpler in some ways), but it's a similar principal. Here's a great vid on those.

So what stops the engine from blowing up?

The 'combustion' is limited to the combustion chamber. They're engineered to withstand the pressures / temperatures created in order to drive the piston (or turbine).

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10tonheadofwetsand@reddit

Precision engineering. The engine is built to withstand the extreme forces taking place within it. Unless you stop maintaining it, at which point any number of things could fail, which could result in an explosion.

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pedrop1985@reddit

I honestly don’t think this is the right answer. The benefit of turbines (vs reciprocating) engines is the relatively low friction that allows long sustained operation. So it cannot be inspection. Inspecting something is not that expensive. Something hard to manufacture must be damaged/worn during regular operation.

Think about those 1/4 dragster cars that need engine rebuild every race or whatever. So something must be wearing down dramatically that needs constant replacement, perhaps?

Worked with gas turbine blades refurb. Insane engineering in those super alloys. A lot of processing with expensive 5-axis machines, chemicals, ovens, etc. If you need to replace them often, then there’s the cost.

I think I remember something about the f16 needing liquid nitrogen; perhaps for something like targeting/radar/IR systems. As you might know, liquid nitrogen is cryogenic and a PIA to maintain. Not expensive, but you can’t just park the plane and come back in a month for a drive. The nitrogen thing would be all gone.

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10tonheadofwetsand@reddit

I’m honestly struggling to follow what your comment is trying to say.

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pedrop1985@reddit

Fair comment. My point is (and coming from industrial/commercial engines) costs typically come from wear/tear replacements, not from inspections. And the replacement part carries a huge cost as it requires a lot of technology, materials and labor to produce. So replacement/installation of a blade might (and does) seem like an extremely simple procedure; but getting said blade is already expensive.

So, again, I know you are right in your response; but like the OP, it would be good to understand better what is checked/replaced trying to understand the cost. Or, if it’s just the inspection but requires 50 hours of inspection overall, and because it’s crazy special skilled techs, each labor hour costs $1000, then that’s $50k

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AbruptMango@reddit

Your car needs an oil change after X miles. Jet engines need inspections and replacement of some parts after X hours. A qualified tech is going to cost a lot more than the kid at Jiffy Lube, and Pratt & Whitney charges more than Rock Auto.

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slamallama@reddit

Everything. Literally all of it must be maintained. Modern jets push the limits of physics and materials in every component in order to do all the crazy stuff they do.

Some stupid rivet that has done too many load cycles and started to fatigue can kill you if it's not caught.

You can fly a jet on way less maintenance. But the risk goes from "calculated but acceptable" to "unknown"

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Awalawal@reddit

I have read that for some military aircraft the guideline is 25 hours of maintenance for every flight hour.

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Silent-Wonder6546@reddit

If you are an A&P you can save labor costs at least (assuming you even know how to work on that specific aircraft)

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Wooden_Customer_318@reddit

It’s because they’re such high performance aircraft that it’s so expensive. The forces wearing on the components are incredible.

You simply can’t make something light and small enough to fulfill the role of these aircraft and also overbuild it enough to survive the paces for long. Furthermore, these aircraft are so complex that the failure of even the most minute component makes them unflyable.

Of course there are exceptions. The A10 is notoriously survivable for example. But no one in the cockpit wants to take those chances.

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SuperBwahBwah@reddit

So do we swap out entire sections of the aircraft constantly or how does the maintenance work?

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TASTY_BALLSACK_@reddit

That would be too expensive. Engines have thousands of parts* not millions. Military engines have metals operating at temperatures 2000 degrees above their melting point to give you an idea of why maintenance is so important. If a high pressure turbine blade fails, I actually don’t know if it would cause the engine to fail, but I know you wouldn’t want to operate that engine for long! These engines are some of the most highly engineered objects on earth. Stuff like this doesn’t simply keep working day after day without lots of care.

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SuperBwahBwah@reddit

What stops the metal from just completely melting after a few hours or even just minutes of operation? Like with fusion reactors, we have super duper strong magnetic fields keeping the energy from touching the surface of the reactor, and we pull a vacuum. What stops the engines of a fighter jet from melting?

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LordTungsten@reddit

Ah something I can help with! Over the decades, the design of high temperature turbine blades has gradually incorporated diverse improvements to operate at ever increasing temperatures. These include the alloy composition, the casting technology, the introduction of cooling both internal and film, and the application of protective coatings. Addressing your question directly, cooling + coatings is what allows your blade to survive being in contact with a gas stream hotter than the alloy's melting point, but all those other improvements are also required.

Chronologically, first there was a switch in the chemical composition of the metal itself. Stainless steel was discarded very early in favour of nickel alloys. Then nickel superalloys, which are able to keep their mechanical properties at temperatures very close to their melting point. This is still ongoing, depending on what you read, some publications talk about the 5th generation of nickel superalloys. And there is a switch away from metals to ceramic matrix composites (mainly SiC-SiC) for static parts, although they are still some ways away to be used in rotating parts, perhaps they'll never will.

Let's stay with the metal alloys for the moment. For reasons it would take too long to explain, how you produce the blades makes a difference on their mechanical properties. From the beginning, casting was the method of choice, improved soon with directional solidification and currently casting single crystals. This is because metals are normally composed of millions of tiny crystals, each with their atoms arranged in planes that are orientated differently to their neighbours, but what you really want at high temperatures is something more like a diamond: a single crystalline orientation thorough the whole blade. There is some interesting work on having different materials for different parts of the blade, but that is very difficult to pull out for the hotter sections.

Then there is the obvious choice of adding air cooling passages for internal cooling, which evolved to adding little external holes for some air to escape and form a cool film on the blade surface.

Coatings are the cherry on top, they have been applied to blades since the late 70s/early 80s or so. Initially they just prevented oxidation, but over time they gained in complexity and, today, the hotter parts have multiple coating layers, basically an oxidation barrier on the blade surface with a ceramic layer above, what is known as a thermal barrier coating.

And I must say this is not only for fighter jets, if you fly in a commercial plane with engines built after the 90s, I can almost guarantee the high temperature turbine blades are cooled single crystal superalloys with ceramic thermal barrier coatings.

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ScuffedBalata@reddit

Fusion reactors are a great example. Those things work fine with all that containment, but the "neutron flux" starts to embrittle the containment vessel.

Every couple dozen hours of operation, they have to strip it down and inspect the whole thing for damage, pitting and brittleness of the metals.

The entire containment housing needs replaced frequently because of the neutron flux and how brittle that makes the metals. This is a ton of the research going on in fusion is how to make that better.

But like a jet engine, those things operate right at the edge of their material capability and need frequent inspection, part replacement, etc or something will fail during operation, which would likely result in destruction of the entire unit and possibly injury to people/buildings around them.

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SuperBwahBwah@reddit

But… Lord have mercy… Tasty Ballsack, said that they operate almost 2000 degrees above the metal’s melting point for the engines. How do fighter jet engines deal with that heat that would otherwise completely melt it?

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ScuffedBalata@reddit

They use ceramics... tricks of the airflow, sometimes injecting fuel along the walls of the combustion chamber. It's all ways to isolate heat from the parts, but can fail if things aren't in good shape.

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Corey250@reddit

Thermal coatings on the turbine blades. But these coatings can fail and spall off. These are the types of things they would look for.

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vasilescur@reddit

Speaking about commercial jet engines here. High pressure turbine blades are manufactured with cooling holes/channels drilled into the blade. Air runs through the inside of each blade during operation, to keep it from melting.

Source: worked on an industrial inspection system for these.

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Travelingexec2000@reddit

Go verify your claims again. The max temp with afterburner is about 1500 C or 2700 F. Melting point of Aluminium (not used in the hot sections) is about 1250 F and melting point of nickel alloys is about 1600, but those have cooling to prevent melting. Def not getting to 2000 over any component's melting point

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Dave_A480@reddit

We build fighter jets to have a 24/7 'pit crew' supporting them at the airbase they fly out of... If you're an actual fighter pilot, you park your plane & the enlisted troops take over making sure it's perfectly ready-to-go before the next flight...

On the civilian side, there are a massive number of regulations that govern what bits and pieces can be plugged into an airplane and how this must be done... That makes the work expensive...

Also, jet engines wear themselves out & require a massive amount of repetitive inspections & servicing to keep working...

No toilet onboard, but other than that - everything is critical... Even the paint matters for preventing corrosion & the destruction of critical parts like control surfaces.....

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iseriouslycouldnt@reddit

Even cheap planes are expensive to maintain. Nearly everything is a tracked, safety critical part. There are often two or three of everything. And if something fails at high speed, it can cause cascades of damage.

I was an aircraft maintainer back in the day. The full set of maintenance manuals for 1 plane would fill a pickup, easily.

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SuperBwahBwah@reddit

Do you have to know everything from every manual? For every part of the craft? Or is one guy in charge of the tail and another for the right wing and left wing and cockpit etc

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iseriouslycouldnt@reddit

...depends...

I was a crew chief and then a phase inspector.it also varies by airframe.

As a CC, I needed to know where every assembly is located and what it does. Not necessarily in detail. I needed to be able to tell, either visually or based on pilot reports if a component or structure has failed or might fail soon (leaking, cracked, on fire) and either remove for depot replacement or service locally.

There are specialists for everything... Avionics, engine, structral (sheet metal/airframe), wheel and tire, the ejection system, fuel system. Flight control rigging.

Military aircraft have a maintenance hours pee flight hour metric. An F-16 is 16 maintenance hours per flight hour, the jet I worked on (F-111) was closer to 30.

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spurcap29@reddit

Need an engineer to explain WHY but as far as legal flying is concerned you need to do everything the manufacturer says needs to be done in order to maintain airworthiness whether it's needed or not. A bird designed for combat likely has a more extensive maintance schedule that would be needed for civilian applications but because they arent designed for civilian pleasure flying there isn't an alternative civilian maintance schedule to follow.

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SeaManaenamah@reddit

They're race cars vs. commuter cars. High performance anything = more maintenance. No matter when it was built.

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-burnr-@reddit

This ☝️

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Sea_Dust895@reddit

1970 strikebird USD$97k. Probably cost you that annually to keep it flying

https://www.trade-a-plane.com/search?make=BAC&model_group=NO+MODEL+GROUP&model=STRIKEMASTER&listing_id=2419134&s-type=aircraft

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CptSandbag73@reddit

I’d fly it till the (wings fell off!)[https://rnzaf.proboards.com/thread/15183?page=1]

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Super_Tangerine_660@reddit

Keep is legally flying*

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ShantyUpp@reddit

That one front shot of it loaded out with the drop tanks looks sexy af 😍

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QuiickLime@reddit

I'd probably go for this 1964 Saab Draken for only $150k more https://www.trade-a-plane.com/search?category_level1=Jets&make=SAAB&model=J35+DRAKEN&listing_id=2403981&s-type=aircraft

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poetic-crumb@reddit

Man that's cool, how much would it cost to fuel up that beast?

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Unlucky_Geologist@reddit

20k per flight hour last time I did the math.

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NightMgr@reddit

I think Star Trek actor Michael Dorn owns at least one and is not a hundred millionaire. But it’s a 1950s model.

https://www.avbuyer.com/articles/aircraft-ownership/from-the-star-trek-set-to-flying-jets-113675

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SayNoTo-Communism@reddit

Technically each individual bomb and unguided rocket could be registered as a destructive device however the autocannon assuming it’s a post 86 manufactured piece would require you to have your Class 3/SOT to possess. Guided missiles however are an absolute no without a special permit which is only given to civilian contractors manufacturing for the military. The most difficult part would be getting a FAA inspector to sign off on weapon mounts. However it has been done before on helicopters for private use and commercial use

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Dave_A480@reddit

True... That gets expensive at $200 a round though...
At least the approval times are down....

That said, even when weapons don't require DD registration (50cal and under on WWII birds) it's rare to see them....

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SayNoTo-Communism@reddit

Weapon mounts for firearms shouldn’t be an issue however carrying rockets and bombs might. Rockets and bombs by themselves are expensive so the $200 stamp for each might not be a huge portion of the cost.

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Chumbag_love@reddit

Yeah, a dude owns 4 Harriers

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nasadowsk@reddit

That's a lot of Pepsi points.

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remuspilot@reddit

You can own a real fighter jet, too. They’re just airplanes after all.

There’s civilian MiG-29s in the US, and there were Su-27s but I think the dude ran out of money.

MiG-21s and various trainer jets are more common.

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Taxus_Calyx@reddit

The person is asking about an American plane for display.

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dpaanlka@reddit

Why wouldn’t this be allowed but a flyable one is allowed?

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Taxus_Calyx@reddit

What is 2+2?

3+3 is 6.

I asked what 2+2 was.

Why wouldn't 2+2 be 4 if 3+3 is 6?

Thanks.

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W33b3l@reddit

And if you can own a perfectly functional and flying fighter jet (minus the weapons).....

Of course you can own one and out it on display air worthy or not. His answer covers the guys question, just expands on it.

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DirkBabypunch@reddit

If I got the money, I'm buying a gutted one, filling the internals full of computer parts, and turning it into a flight same to play with.

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JoshuaStarAuthor@reddit

More like my kids new pinewood derby car

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MrBanditOne@reddit

The two privately owned Flankers are heavily speculated to have been purchased by the US government and used as adversary aircraft at Groom Lake. One likely crashed in an incident a few years back, the other has since been put on display at the National Museum of the US Air Force.

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DrVinylScratch@reddit

Airworthy is very expensive with high up keep.

Static display is much much more affordable with less upkeep.

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AirportNo6558@reddit

You will need 700,000,000 Pepsi Points

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CodeMonkeyPhoto@reddit

There are people that took just the cockpits and turned them into flight sims.

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Ice_Chemist22@reddit (OP)

This was also what I was maybe thinking, if I gather the right skills over the years, maybe having a static display fighter jet with a flight sim would be absolutely killer, too

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CptSandbag73@reddit

Hope you can afford to keep it indoors and air conditioned if you have it as a flight sim, because jets get crazy hot in the sun.

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Longjumping_Panda531@reddit

Someone was selling an non-airworthy F-4 for $750k last week on controller. It’s possible.

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Throwaway84A63@reddit

Someone bought a prototype experimental f16 non airworthy for like $20k at a govt auction. It even had an engine in it

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DeadAreaF1@reddit

This one? link

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Longjumping_Panda531@reddit

Yeah that’s it. Looks like I was off on the price but still under a million at 950k

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Travelingexec2000@reddit

notes on it say it needs another $1.5 to get airworthy

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Longjumping_Panda531@reddit

OP specifically asked about buying a non-airworthy jet without engines to use as a static display.

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KRed75@reddit

Sure. You can also own and fly an air-worthy one.

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DeadAreaF1@reddit

Absolutely. There are a lot of fighter jets in private hands. There are even privately owned F-15s and F-16s out there.

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Merker6@reddit

There are no privately owned F-15s, only a handful of F-16s

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DeadAreaF1@reddit

This dude is using an original F-15 cockpit for his flightsim, also I recall seeing a second F-15 in private hands.

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Travelingexec2000@reddit

Interesting that he's been working on that F-15 since 2000 and it is still a work in progress. Weird that he's uploaded so much data about the project, but none of the links I clicked had any photos

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DeadAreaF1@reddit

Weird, I have photos almost everywhere.

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Merker6@reddit

Ahh, I missed the caveat of “non-airworthy”. That definitely changes stuff

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flume@reddit

Are they allowed to be airworthy? I wonder what maintenance and fuel costs for such a toy.

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Wonderful_Key770@reddit

I know a guy who has an old (I believe Checz) fighter yet. He told he it costs him about $5,000/hr to operate. He was so happy because it's very cheap...

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MattCW1701@reddit

Is that just the fuel cost? Or the actual "take the maintenance cost since last maintenance and divide by the flight hours since last maintenance" cost?

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Wonderful_Key770@reddit

I understood it as all in.

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isellJetparts@reddit

Im guessing an L-39 Albatros. Closest thing to a true fighter jet that are owned in any real numbers by civilians.

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elkab0ng@reddit

Yep! There’s a couple of them based near me. Privately owned, though they mostly contract out to the dod. And yes, definitely mid four figures per hour.

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te_anau@reddit

Aren't they supposed to be closer to $2k/hr to run?

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Wonderful_Key770@reddit

I think you are right.

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Potential_Wish4943@reddit

C-Z-E-C-H

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Murpydoo@reddit

Planes are planes until you put weapons on them. Then they are military.

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Billybob509@reddit

Yes

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Bad_Karma19@reddit

The Navy and Air Force have requirements for any entity to maintain a retired aircraft. They only loan them out. Unlikely they let a civilian borrow one.

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ProfileTime2274@reddit

If you're a museum you may even be able get one donated to you.

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Neat-Internet9682@reddit

Look at controller.com and see how many air worthy military planes are on there.

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iseriouslycouldnt@reddit

...depends...

I was a crew chief and then a phase inspector.it also varies by airframe.

As a CC, I needed to know where every assembly is located and what it does. Not necessarily in detail. I needed to be able to tell, either visually or based on pilot reports if a component or structure has failed or might fail soon (leaking, cracked, on fire) and either remove for depot replacement or service locally.

There are specialists for everything... Avionics, engine, structral (sheet metal/airframe), wheel and tire, the ejection system, fuel system. Flight control rigging.

Military aircraft have a maintenance hours pee flight hour metric. An F-16 is 16 maintenance hours per flight hour, the jet I worked on (F-111) was closer to 30.

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juangutip@reddit

It was some time ago but my grandfather used to have a Hispano Aviación HA-200 Saeta and fly it over Mexico city... he brought it from Spain in the 70's.

It's nowhere near a modern fighter jet but it is a really nice family story.

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CheerCoachHouse@reddit

Generally speaking, for US aircraft the answer is going to be No. Aircraft are generally covered as part of Arms Control policy after the late 60's (1968 I think?) and as such the military doesn't surplus them. Even foreign built, but American designed aircraft are covered (ie: Dutch or Israeli built F-16s).

There are absolutely ways to make it happen, and foreign aircraft aren't covered. That's why you see many L-39's, MIGs, etc in private hands, as compared to F-15's, F-16's, F/A-18's, etc.

In this thread there's a link to an F-4 phantom... That's a perfect example since it's an early model and was before the policy date (again 1968 I think?).

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Ice_Chemist22@reddit (OP)

Thanks for the info on the legality of this, I figured there had to be some sort of “grandfather clause” as owning old warbirds like P-51s has little issue in legality. I guess I was being a little pessimistic about more recent fighter jets as I read online that no civilian will ever be allowed to own an F-14 but it appears from this thread that that’s more of a just specifically an F-14 sort of thing

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SubarcticFarmer@reddit

It's more that the military won't surplus the planes intact than anything else. When they are surplused now you have to cut them up. There's no legal restrictions otherwise from owning a demilitarized fighter jet.

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shockadin1337@reddit

someone should fr design an experimental “fighter” jet so u could own and fly one without having multi million dollar annuals lol

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CrimsonTightwad@reddit

Non air worthy? You can own the real thing.

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JobobTexan@reddit

An acquaintance of mine rebuilds Mig 23 Floggers in a hanger at an airport down the road from me (GGG). He had one air worthy and flew it here and at air shows. Unfortunately he had an engine issue at an air show in Michigan. His back seater panicked and punched out. He had to punch out after that. It crashed into a parking lot of a nearby apartment complex. Luckily no one was injured. He and the back seater parachuted into a nearby lake. You might have read about it. Last I heard he was working on making another one air worthy.

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TheEndDaysAreNow@reddit

Yes, one guy cobbled together an engineless F-104 and stripped out every non-essential system, borrowed an engine from the manufacturer, and set some speed and altitude records. Much lighter without the radar.

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st96badboy@reddit

Yes, it's possible to buy one for a static display. Expensive to move. You're late to the party for F-4 from a government auction. There are VFW Halls around that have military planes. There's a guy that owns quite a few in Bristol, Wisconsin. Russell Military Museum. Satellite view. You can see quite a few of them. A-10, F-16, F-15, A-7, T-33, T-38. Probably all government auctions.. piece by piece or whole. Depends on the plane.

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Quarterscale@reddit

The US military does not sell fighter jets to civilians. American civilians can buy them from foreign governments though. Any fighter jet in private ownership was previously exported.

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Ice_Chemist22@reddit (OP)

What are the main foreign governments private citizens have looked to for getting their hands on old fighter jets?

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Quarterscale@reddit

I don't know. I am not an expert. I just remember the information from previous posts in aviation groups. I cannot substantiate my statement.

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TimeSpacePilot@reddit

He’s basically looking for a plane that would be in a museum, not one that would be breaking the speed of sound. At least that’s what I think “non-airworthy” would mean.

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Ice_Chemist22@reddit (OP)

Yeah that’s pretty much it, like a fighter jet without even an engine would be preferable as I know that even non-functional engines would be expensive

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Traditional-Magician@reddit

You aren't going to trick me Kim Jong Un!

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Ice_Chemist22@reddit (OP)

I pinky promise, I’m not Kim Jong Un (I make no guarantees for Vladimir Putin)

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Talkie123@reddit

Yea, these people placed an A-4 above their pool. I don't know the airworthiness of it before it became a yard decoration, though. https://villapark.co/a-4-skyhawk-infinity-pool/

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StruckbyaHolyWhatnot@reddit

I have seen a few private ex-military jets flying, most of them seem to be trainers. I always wondered if they had operational ejection seats, or if this was even a requirement?

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TaskForceCausality@reddit

I always wondered if they had operational ejection seats

Most do. It’s a known pain point to keeping older jet warbirds flying, as some companies don’t support the seats anymore & the explosive charges /rocket motors time out. (example- Martin Baker doesn’t support their F-104 ejection seat anymore, and fixing this problem’s temporarily grounded the Norwegian TF-104G restoration)

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RhinoIA@reddit

They have ejection seats, but most of the L-39 owners in the US don't keep the seats "hot" from what I've understood talking to some of them.

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DankVectorz@reddit

Earlier this year at an air show the pilot and passenger had to eject from a properly owned MiG-23

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=U6_kC1ntlng

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StruckbyaHolyWhatnot@reddit

Did a bit of low level research if you're interested. Private operation of ejection seats in the US is legal and subject to few regulations/certification. Totally banned in Germany. Successful ejection rates were quoted at 15% privately, compared to 75% for the military. Biggest issue for private maintenance of ejection seats in most countries is the severe restrictions imposed on importing explosives and rocket propellants. Take this info at face value because it's vague and no original sources quoted.

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StruckbyaHolyWhatnot@reddit

Yes, I saw that, thank you! I was just wondering if it was common for them to be functional, as maintenance and re-arming would be a story, surely it's very specialized?

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ohioman1004@reddit

https://www.hangar67.com/aircraft-for-sale/warbird-military

https://www.hangar67.com/aircraft/1951-lockheed-t33/30201

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apost8n8@reddit

Yes there several real life private air forces.

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gnowbot@reddit

I once saw a 1hr ride in a cold-war era MIG go for $500 on a silent auction (the minimum bid). I still have regrets for not nabbing that ride. I learned and taught at the MIG’s home airport and every takeoff was “request smoke off, unrestricted climb” and it was awesome

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Liamnacuac@reddit

There was a chevy dealer in western Washington that used a MIG 21 for Advertising, but I think they sold it to a museum.

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Travelingexec2000@reddit

check out controller.com for mostly airworthy aircraft. Occasionally you'll find stuff listed for parts

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InsertUsernameInArse@reddit

Damn there's a RAAF PC9 on there. They only just got that back into the air. Also L39's are going cheap.

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pattern_altitude@reddit

“Cheap.”

Could you afford it?

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InsertUsernameInArse@reddit

Don't need to. I get paid to fly already.

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duggatron@reddit

Yes, easily. They're selling for a fraction of what houses cost where I live.

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InsertUsernameInArse@reddit

Yup I could buy two for the cost of a house where I live. Or one and be able to keep up with maintenance.

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GreenNeonCactus@reddit

There are civilian companies that own F-16s, F-5's and Dassault Mirages, and that's just a subset. They're contracted by the USAF to do tactical training, though I'm aware of individuals owning airworthy jets, including from our adversaries.

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striple@reddit

Jared Isaacman not only owns and flys us-military jets, he owns an entire private air force. Wikipedia tells me they have 13 A-4s, 23 L-159s, 21 Mirages 12 Cheetahs and 25 MiG-21s.

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supernaut_707@reddit

An AC/heating company near me has an F 101 Voodoo in front of its offices.

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ConversationUpset589@reddit

It’s possible to own just about anything with the right amount of money.

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Walo00@reddit

If there’s any existing airframes of the specific model you want for display and the airframe doesn’t have any parts or features that are considered military or secret then it would be all about money.

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Phantom_sidewinder@reddit

The L-29 Delfin is an old Czech trainer jet that you can buy for $60K - $80K. I want to buy one someday.

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DutchMitchell@reddit

Remind me in 60 years

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Tac_Bac@reddit

I believe there is a guy in Texas that owns a bunch of mirage fighters, so yes

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CriticismTop@reddit

Anything is possible with enough money.

Jeremy Clarkson had an old English Electric Lightning for a while. As a "leaf blower".

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CyberSoldat21@reddit

There’s been harriers for sale, F-16s are now coming to market as well

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newphonedammit@reddit

Lots of people / organisations own ex military jets , airworthy or not in Australia , I'm pretty sure you are fine in the States.

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zneave@reddit

Yeah you could buy an F4 right now but it costs 1 million bucks and will probably need that much more to restore it and another million to run it.

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HF_Martini6@reddit

AFAIK
it really depends on which bird it is, some can be bought as long as they're completely de-Militarised (I think there's one civi F-16 that was converted and delivered?) and some can't even be had as scrap (like the F-14).

The issue with the F-5 is that they're still used for training and some of them are deemed structurally unsafe (cracks behind the rear cockpit bulkhead, Swiss Air Force).

The biggest issue, I think, would be getting the plane shipped to your country and getting all the paperwork and certifications done.

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Deadlyeagle917@reddit

ome of them are deemed structurally unsafe (cracks behind the rear cockpit bulkhead, Swiss Air Force).

Do you have some more information on this? First time hearing it and would like to learn more. Thanks.

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cpteric@reddit

some early ones also used semi-textile asbestos lining as insulation, which is kinda not great.

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HF_Martini6@reddit

the article unfortunately isn't available in English but you could use Google Translate or something:

https://www.admin.ch/gov/de/start/dokumentation/medienmitteilungen.msg-id-56855.html

There is some technical documentation on this too but that's in German as well. The repairs were done at Pilatus and/or RUAG if I remember that right and did run up to 1.4 Million USD (adjusted and converted)

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