Jeppesen. Worth the extra money?

zombie5225

New Member
I have been trying to decide weather to stay with the NOS plates, or switch over to Jepps. Everybody I talk to seems to love Jepps, but the $315 price tag is rather unnerving. I fly a lot of IFR trips and I know that this is what professional pilots use. Should I take the plunge and go for it?
 
Is that price for the whole country? I have the Northwest-OR, WA and ID for 26 dollars. I'm in the middle of my instrument training and really like them.
 
YES! $315? You must mean for a subscription, right?

I get the Jepp pack and use it with the NOS enroute chart. For me it works the best; but everyone's different. At the least, try both and decide from there.
 
Take a look at the Jepp Express packs; complete set of fresh plates and enroute charts every 56 days, no having to file updates. Might make sense unless you straddle regions frequently.
 
I agree with other posters- Just purchase a new set every 56 days and the price tag won't seem so bad. I was a Jepp. subscriber for one year, but I only paid $125 (that included postage). I thought it was awesome. However, somewhere in between the time I subscribed and the date the subscription came to an end I started working as a CFI. When the subscription came up for renewal, $125 was just waaay to much money to spend on anything in one go!

If your'e career aspirations are to become a pro. pilot, I'd strongly advise you to buy Jepp. and learn them well as soon as possible. NOS may be cheap, but no airline (well there are maybe one or two exceptions) uses them.

Jepp plates IMO are much easier to read. The NOS plates are just to, hmm, government looking for me!
 
well I have a different take.
even if you are wanting to be a pro pilot get the nos. The jepps will be SOOOOO easy to use whenever you make the switch (whenever somebody else is buting them). Sure nos are probably more dangerous, but so is flying around with 1 and a half year old jepps. Was that me? oh yeah. controller "arrow 1234 there is no such approach as the one you requested"
me "uh yeah, like could I get an alternate dude"
 
Dude! Flying with outdated charts is downright dangerous... don't be a moron use protection.
 
Re: Back to the original question....

I'd say it really depends on how much you are going to fly IFR after you get your ticket. Take me for instance, I have only done one trip under IFR since I got my ticket back in mid august. The Jepp subscription would be something of a waste on me since most of the time they'd expire before I ever got a chance to use them. It's pretty easy just to pick up some current NOAA plates and L charts from the FBO a few days before you go.....

I don't think "learning" the Jepp plates is a big issue, as the differences between NOAA and Jepp are really not that huge. The main difference seems to be the exact location and order of Specific airport inormation (frequencies, runway lengths, etc), but you get more or less the same information from both.

The Jepp's are better, but I can't see myself switching over until I get some kind of flying job where I would be using them on a regular basis.
 
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