I know what you mean about the costs rising in this hobby. I dropped $72 yesterday for 4 stroke fuel and a tach. I bought a Saito 56 just the other day, so might as well get the tach too. Anyway, all of the startup items will last a long time and make flying go better in the end. I am hoping though that this will be the end of the start up gear for a while.

As to heli or chopper...I was a helicopter pilot in the Army until I retired. We never called them helis or helos. It was mostly rotary wing or helicopter or 'the aircraft'. Some people called them birds, as in, "let's get in the bird and go." You never said that you flew choppers....well, you could say it maybe once and hope to live it down on day. Mostly, we said that we flew rotary wing. In the cockpit you always called it "the aircraft."