Welcome Guest. Sign in or Signup

1 Answers

How long can a small GA plane sit unused between flights?

Asked by: 4239 views General Aviation, Light Sport Aircraft, Private Pilot

I rent from a place where a handful of the less popular aircraft (C152, C172) sit unused in the hangar for up to a month at a time. (usually 3-4 weeks) It concerns me since I know they're not doing any sort of storage prep. Am I way off on this, should I be concerned?

Ace Any FAA Written Test!
Actual FAA Questions / Free Lifetime Updates
The best explanations in the business
Fast, efficient study.
Pass Your Checkride With Confidence!
FAA Practical Test prep that reflects actual checkrides.
Any checkride: Airplane, Helicopter, Glider, etc.
Written and maintained by actual pilot examiners and master CFIs.
The World's Most Trusted eLogbook
Be Organized, Current, Professional, and Safe.
Highly customizable - for student pilots through pros.
Free Transition Service for users of other eLogs.
Our sincere thanks to pilots such as yourself who support AskACFI while helping themselves by using the awesome PC, Mac, iPhone/iPad, and Android aviation apps of our sponsors.

1 Answers



  1. David R on Jan 17, 2013

    I would not be too concerned. I have owned several aircrafts and it is quite common for an owned (as opposed to rented) aircraft to be used only monthly, particularly during the winter months. When I have purchased an aircraft that has sat for extended periods — say flown only every three months or so — you do see problems that will appear during inspections that could be caused by disuse, but those go away pretty quickly once they are flown regularly, at least monthly. However, I would recommend that you pay a bit more attention to pests in your preflight routine as that can be an issue with inactive airplanes. That means looking carefully where birds can get into nesting areas in the spring, and making sure nothing has crawled up the pitot tube which will be easily caught when taxiing or on a takeoff roll.

    And just to be complete, ideally you are using the airplane more as leaving an airplane even for a month can harm the engine somewhat, but not in a way that I would worry on any particular flight so much as you are likely shortening the life of your engine between TBO.

    0 Votes Thumb up 0 Votes Thumb down 0 Votes


The following terms have been auto-detected the question above and any answers or discussion provided. Click on a term to see its definition from the Dauntless Aviation JargonBuster Glossary.

Answer Question

Our sincere thanks to all who contribute constructively to this forum in answering flight training questions. If you are a flight instructor or represent a flight school / FBO offering flight instruction, you are welcome to include links to your site and related contact information as it pertains to offering local flight instruction in a specific geographic area. Additionally, direct links to FAA and related official government sources of information are welcome. However we thank you for your understanding that links to other sites or text that may be construed as explicit or implicit advertising of other business, sites, or goods/services are not permitted even if such links nominally are relevant to the question asked.