Piper Warrior II — Training Aircraft, Van Nuys
Where most of a private pilot certificate gets flown
Four seats, low wing, fixed gear, and manners predictable enough that the airplane rarely does anything you did not ask for. Enrolled, you fly it for $179 the hour, wet.
| Type | Piper Warrior II (PA-28) |
| Configuration | Four seats, low wing, single engine, fixed gear |
| Rate inside an enrolled program | $179 an hour, wet |
| What the rate covers | The airplane and its fuel. Instruction sits in the program price. |
| Programs it appears in | The private pilot programs — Standard at $10,900, Comprehensive at $15,900 — and the instrument rating at $11,700 |
| Ownership | Owned by the school and maintained in-house |
| Field | Van Nuys Airport (KVNY), Van Nuys, CA 91406 |
Why this is the default airframe
Because it is unremarkable, and that is a compliment. The PA-28 family has been training pilots for decades, it behaves the same way on the fortieth flight as it did on the first, and it has four seats, which means a newly certificated pilot can take people somewhere without changing type.
Forty hours of aeronautical experience, as 14 CFR 61.109 phrases it, means hours in an airplane rather than hours in one specific airplane, and there is a strong argument for spending most of them in the one you will actually fly afterward.
What flying it here involves
The airspace here is Class D, immediately below the Class B wrapped around Los Angeles International. Radio work is constant, the pattern carries jets, and the departures look nothing like the diagram in a textbook. A student who becomes comfortable operating a Warrior out of this field is a student who will not be intimidated by a quieter airport.
The field sits at 802 ft and performs like roughly 4,100 ft on a hot September afternoon, which is exactly the condition in which a four-seat single with people and fuel aboard needs the performance calculation that 14 CFR 91.103 requires of the pilot in command.
The honest limitation
It is not fast and it is not exciting. If you want either of those, the answer is a different airplane and a larger bill. What this one does is turn hours into competence at a predictable rate, which is what a training airframe is really for.
A trainer earns its place by surprising you least.
How this airplane is operated
- Every type in the fleet is school property, serviced on site. Instruction for hire triggers the 100-hour interval written into 14 CFR 91.409(b), and we would rather carry that cost than argue about it with an owner.
- Eleven instructors, matched to students one at a time and changeable if the pairing is wrong. Each holds a CFI alongside a commercial certificate or an ATP.
- A Redbird MCX lives on the field. It is enclosed, it sits on a motion base, it holds FAA approval, and a standalone booking is $189.
- The flyable-days figure for this field is 355, counted from NOAA ASOS records over the year to 1 August 2026 rather than estimated from a brochure.
- Enrolled students fly singles at $179 an hour, wet. It is not a walk-up rate and it does not include an instructor.
- Fixed prices, published in full. The figure you agree at the start is the figure at the end, which is the point of buying a program rather than hours.