Learning to fly - PPL
Discussion
I was working at RIAT last week and really reignited my passion for aviation again. It has got me thinking whether I should have a go a learning to fly again. Let me give you a bit of my background.
When I was at Uni (9 years) ago I was part of the University Air Squadron and managed to get 46 hours in a Grob Tutor and 9 of those hours solo. It was great fun and really enjoyed it but when I finished Uni, I had no way to afford to fly off my own back.
I have looked at PPL's and locally (in Bournemouth) I can do the course for £8300, there are probably a number of hidden charges but at least it gives me a ball park figure. I did have a look at a Florida intensive course but they were advertising £3600 for 3 week but I'm expecting that figure to go up significantly when I send an enquiry.
Does anyone have experience in this area? Can you give me any advise?
When I was at Uni (9 years) ago I was part of the University Air Squadron and managed to get 46 hours in a Grob Tutor and 9 of those hours solo. It was great fun and really enjoyed it but when I finished Uni, I had no way to afford to fly off my own back.
I have looked at PPL's and locally (in Bournemouth) I can do the course for £8300, there are probably a number of hidden charges but at least it gives me a ball park figure. I did have a look at a Florida intensive course but they were advertising £3600 for 3 week but I'm expecting that figure to go up significantly when I send an enquiry.
Does anyone have experience in this area? Can you give me any advise?
My Dad used to fly on his PPL, I've had lots of rear-seat air miles in the back of choppers (a very lucky boy) and hence met a few chopper pilots, and both my friend and my old next-door neighbours are commercial Captains in big stuff. I've also flirted with the idea of getting my own PPL like you too - have done research, but not pulled the pin as yet.
Most of the private fixed and rotary wing guys I've met have all done the US Eastern Seaboard training route, on account of it's less than half price cost, as you've seen.
As far as I know, none of them has had the price quoted increase once they've gone over and committed to it. As far as I also gather, it does give you a US FAA licence as opposed to our CAA, but this is basically the same thing.
They all went over, had a ball staying in the US and training every day, and all came home with a licence.
With regard to the two Captains I know - one was lucky enough to secure a scholarship with BA and got commercial for free - the other re-mortgaged his house and spent £70k at the ATC in Oxford, was then lucky enough to get a First Officer position with Monarch, and get Captain eventually. Took him 10 years though...
Most of the private fixed and rotary wing guys I've met have all done the US Eastern Seaboard training route, on account of it's less than half price cost, as you've seen.
As far as I know, none of them has had the price quoted increase once they've gone over and committed to it. As far as I also gather, it does give you a US FAA licence as opposed to our CAA, but this is basically the same thing.
They all went over, had a ball staying in the US and training every day, and all came home with a licence.
With regard to the two Captains I know - one was lucky enough to secure a scholarship with BA and got commercial for free - the other re-mortgaged his house and spent £70k at the ATC in Oxford, was then lucky enough to get a First Officer position with Monarch, and get Captain eventually. Took him 10 years though...
The intensive courses are good if you want/need to do your PPL in a hurry, but don't forget that flying in the UK differs from the big, open, friendly skies and airfields in the US!
Do not ever, pay any up-front fees to a flying school, they have a nasty habit of going bust and leaving students out of pocket!
In the UK you have the choice of learning to fly at a big airport that will give you lots of good, disciplined experience but is likely to be more expensive. On the other side learning at a smaller airfield will be more relaxed and clubby, a bit cheaper (no landing fees on circuit bashing for instance) and more flexible.
You would be best to visit a few local clubs and decide which culture suits you best, and also go and have a look/register in the Studes section of the Flyer Forum:
http://forums.flyer.co.uk/viewforum.php?f=5
and read Leia Fee's guide to learning to fly, and above all enjoy it!
Do not ever, pay any up-front fees to a flying school, they have a nasty habit of going bust and leaving students out of pocket!
In the UK you have the choice of learning to fly at a big airport that will give you lots of good, disciplined experience but is likely to be more expensive. On the other side learning at a smaller airfield will be more relaxed and clubby, a bit cheaper (no landing fees on circuit bashing for instance) and more flexible.
You would be best to visit a few local clubs and decide which culture suits you best, and also go and have a look/register in the Studes section of the Flyer Forum:
http://forums.flyer.co.uk/viewforum.php?f=5
and read Leia Fee's guide to learning to fly, and above all enjoy it!
Having done all the PPL syllabus and most of the written exams my three pieces of advice would be:
1. You won't complete the PPL in the 45 hour minimum, especially not in the UK. The weather means that you may have a longer than desirable gap between lessons and you will be a bit rusty / your instructor may be a bit rusty on your progress, so you end up covering some old ground again. No harm in this as its good experience under your belt, but it means you will rack up the hours above 45.
2. Do not pay all the money up front for the entire course to a flight training organisation. They have a horrible habit of going bust. Make sure you pay for everything with a credit card.
3. When you are budgeting for lessons make sure you understand what is and is not included. Some hourly rates include landings/t+gs, some don't. When you get to doing circuits you can easily rack up over half a dozen touch and go's in an hour's lesson. Other costs include your medical (about £100) and you will probably want to get your own headset, books, whizzy wheel, high vis, knee board, chart, chinographpencils etc
Hope that helps, best of luck!
1. You won't complete the PPL in the 45 hour minimum, especially not in the UK. The weather means that you may have a longer than desirable gap between lessons and you will be a bit rusty / your instructor may be a bit rusty on your progress, so you end up covering some old ground again. No harm in this as its good experience under your belt, but it means you will rack up the hours above 45.
2. Do not pay all the money up front for the entire course to a flight training organisation. They have a horrible habit of going bust. Make sure you pay for everything with a credit card.
3. When you are budgeting for lessons make sure you understand what is and is not included. Some hourly rates include landings/t+gs, some don't. When you get to doing circuits you can easily rack up over half a dozen touch and go's in an hour's lesson. Other costs include your medical (about £100) and you will probably want to get your own headset, books, whizzy wheel, high vis, knee board, chart, chinographpencils etc
Hope that helps, best of luck!
Edited by mattdaniels on Friday 13th July 17:31
EdBarrett said:
speedtwelve said:
crapper
Have you still got your logbook with your UAS flying in it? EFT flying can count in part towards a PPL.
Don't think any of these will count, was over 9 years he says in his post, isn't it all hours have to be done in a 5 year period, I may be wrong... Have you still got your logbook with your UAS flying in it? EFT flying can count in part towards a PPL.
mattdaniels said:
There's no time period for the flying hours to be valid. It's the exams that have a time period on them - you have to finish all 8 within 2 years of passing the first one.
Going to make it a whole lot cheaper for hi9m in that case then =]I recently finished a 12HR scholarship, made it weay more manageable financially
mattdaniels said:
Having done all the PPL syllabus and most of the written exams my three pieces of advice would be:
1. You won't complete the PPL in the 45 hour minimum, especially not in the UK. The weather means that you may have a longer than desirable gap between lessons and you will be a bit rusty / your instructor may be a bit rusty on your progress, so you end up covering some old ground again. No harm in this as its good experience under your belt, but it means you will rack up the hours above 45.
2. Do not pay all the money up front for the entire course to a flight training organisation. They have a horrible habit of going bust. Make sure you pay for everything with a credit card.
3. When you are budgeting for lessons make sure you understand what is and is not included. Some hourly rates include landings/t+gs, some don't. When you get to doing circuits you can easily rack up over half a dozen touch and go's in an hour's lesson. Other costs include your medical (about £100) and you will probably want to get your own headset, books, whizzy wheel, high vis, knee board, chart, chinographpencils etc
Hope that helps, best of luck!
Did mine in 43 hrs at Sywell ;-)1. You won't complete the PPL in the 45 hour minimum, especially not in the UK. The weather means that you may have a longer than desirable gap between lessons and you will be a bit rusty / your instructor may be a bit rusty on your progress, so you end up covering some old ground again. No harm in this as its good experience under your belt, but it means you will rack up the hours above 45.
2. Do not pay all the money up front for the entire course to a flight training organisation. They have a horrible habit of going bust. Make sure you pay for everything with a credit card.
3. When you are budgeting for lessons make sure you understand what is and is not included. Some hourly rates include landings/t+gs, some don't. When you get to doing circuits you can easily rack up over half a dozen touch and go's in an hour's lesson. Other costs include your medical (about £100) and you will probably want to get your own headset, books, whizzy wheel, high vis, knee board, chart, chinographpencils etc
Hope that helps, best of luck!
Edited by mattdaniels on Friday 13th July 17:31
mrloudly said:
mattdaniels said:
Having done all the PPL syllabus and most of the written exams my three pieces of advice would be:
1. You won't complete the PPL in the 45 hour minimum, especially not in the UK. The weather means that you may have a longer than desirable gap between lessons and you will be a bit rusty / your instructor may be a bit rusty on your progress, so you end up covering some old ground again. No harm in this as its good experience under your belt, but it means you will rack up the hours above 45.
2. Do not pay all the money up front for the entire course to a flight training organisation. They have a horrible habit of going bust. Make sure you pay for everything with a credit card.
3. When you are budgeting for lessons make sure you understand what is and is not included. Some hourly rates include landings/t+gs, some don't. When you get to doing circuits you can easily rack up over half a dozen touch and go's in an hour's lesson. Other costs include your medical (about £100) and you will probably want to get your own headset, books, whizzy wheel, high vis, knee board, chart, chinographpencils etc
Hope that helps, best of luck!
Did mine in 43 hrs at Sywell ;-)1. You won't complete the PPL in the 45 hour minimum, especially not in the UK. The weather means that you may have a longer than desirable gap between lessons and you will be a bit rusty / your instructor may be a bit rusty on your progress, so you end up covering some old ground again. No harm in this as its good experience under your belt, but it means you will rack up the hours above 45.
2. Do not pay all the money up front for the entire course to a flight training organisation. They have a horrible habit of going bust. Make sure you pay for everything with a credit card.
3. When you are budgeting for lessons make sure you understand what is and is not included. Some hourly rates include landings/t+gs, some don't. When you get to doing circuits you can easily rack up over half a dozen touch and go's in an hour's lesson. Other costs include your medical (about £100) and you will probably want to get your own headset, books, whizzy wheel, high vis, knee board, chart, chinographpencils etc
Hope that helps, best of luck!
Edited by mattdaniels on Friday 13th July 17:31
Wow fantastic advice guys, really useful. I`m really surprised that my flying hours may be able to assist with my flying training as I thought that 9 years later it would not mean anything. I think I could get back into it pretty well, an area I didn`t cover in my course was navigation so would need to cover that in full. From the chat going on, I would be happy to fly in the US with the `easier` airspace, the airport I used to fly out of had a lot of traffic and a number of fast jets so I am used to crazy circuits! I`ll take a look at that flyer.co.uk and see what I can get from there. One question I do have is how many hours a year do you need to do to maintain a PPL once qualified?
If you're looking into doing it in the USA then you should be able to use your University Air Squadron logged hours to count towards a Part 61 PPL. It'll be an FAA issued one but the conversion process to JAA should be a paperwork exercise (it certainly is if you go to the States with a JAA PPL).
mattdaniels said:
mrloudly said:
mattdaniels said:
Having done all the PPL syllabus and most of the written exams my three pieces of advice would be:
1. You won't complete the PPL in the 45 hour minimum, especially not in the UK. The weather means that you may have a longer than desirable gap between lessons and you will be a bit rusty / your instructor may be a bit rusty on your progress, so you end up covering some old ground again. No harm in this as its good experience under your belt, but it means you will rack up the hours above 45.
2. Do not pay all the money up front for the entire course to a flight training organisation. They have a horrible habit of going bust. Make sure you pay for everything with a credit card.
3. When you are budgeting for lessons make sure you understand what is and is not included. Some hourly rates include landings/t+gs, some don't. When you get to doing circuits you can easily rack up over half a dozen touch and go's in an hour's lesson. Other costs include your medical (about £100) and you will probably want to get your own headset, books, whizzy wheel, high vis, knee board, chart, chinographpencils etc
Hope that helps, best of luck!
Did mine in 43 hrs at Sywell ;-)1. You won't complete the PPL in the 45 hour minimum, especially not in the UK. The weather means that you may have a longer than desirable gap between lessons and you will be a bit rusty / your instructor may be a bit rusty on your progress, so you end up covering some old ground again. No harm in this as its good experience under your belt, but it means you will rack up the hours above 45.
2. Do not pay all the money up front for the entire course to a flight training organisation. They have a horrible habit of going bust. Make sure you pay for everything with a credit card.
3. When you are budgeting for lessons make sure you understand what is and is not included. Some hourly rates include landings/t+gs, some don't. When you get to doing circuits you can easily rack up over half a dozen touch and go's in an hour's lesson. Other costs include your medical (about £100) and you will probably want to get your own headset, books, whizzy wheel, high vis, knee board, chart, chinographpencils etc
Hope that helps, best of luck!
Edited by mattdaniels on Friday 13th July 17:31
Just checking my old old logbook 2 hours of mine were non essential aerobatic joy rides ;-))
Mine was a CAA PPL and 38 hrs was the minimum in 1986
When you pass your test you will be issued with an SEP (Single Engine Piston)rating that is valid for 2 years
In the second year, if you have done 12 hours of which one is an hour with an instructor within the last 3 months of that year, you can ask that instructor to sign off your SEP renewal.
if you don't achieve the 12 hours or let the rating lapse then you have to do a revalidation test, which lasts an hour and is a cut-down version of the PPL skills test.
My SEP rating has lapsed due to the weather and the aircraft's extended annual so i will have to do my test later this month, it's nothing to worry about and I think it is good to have to prove yourself every couple of years, always good to get some feedback from the examiner
When you pass your test you will be issued with an SEP (Single Engine Piston)rating that is valid for 2 years
In the second year, if you have done 12 hours of which one is an hour with an instructor within the last 3 months of that year, you can ask that instructor to sign off your SEP renewal.
if you don't achieve the 12 hours or let the rating lapse then you have to do a revalidation test, which lasts an hour and is a cut-down version of the PPL skills test.
My SEP rating has lapsed due to the weather and the aircraft's extended annual so i will have to do my test later this month, it's nothing to worry about and I think it is good to have to prove yourself every couple of years, always good to get some feedback from the examiner
I've had a PPL for 10 years, and I start my CPL on Mon (gulp!)
Some good advice here.
Firstly - it's worth saying again: DO NOT PAY UP FRONT. USA, UK, Anywhere. No matter what special deals are offered.
UAS will count, but you will need a signed log book and I believe the UAS have latterly issued certificates to authenticate hours. Bear in mind that however many UAS hours you have, if they are years ago they will only be of so much value. Especially consider that within the PPL syllabus there are certain requirements in terms of solo circuits, a qualifying cross country flight and so on. UAS flying doesn't necessarily prepare you for these.
Regarding the USA PPL option, bear in mind the cost of flights and accomodation. Completing in 3 weeks is likely to be a challenge, 4 is more realistic and would be aided by completing the groundschool (7 exams) before you go. There are plenty of places that offer the groundschool packages. Also, bear in mind that is you get a PPL in the USA, you will almost certainly need another few hours with an instructor before a club will let you fly their aircraft. As said, flying from a grass strip with cross winds is a little different to the long hard runways in Florida.
Some good advice here.
Firstly - it's worth saying again: DO NOT PAY UP FRONT. USA, UK, Anywhere. No matter what special deals are offered.
UAS will count, but you will need a signed log book and I believe the UAS have latterly issued certificates to authenticate hours. Bear in mind that however many UAS hours you have, if they are years ago they will only be of so much value. Especially consider that within the PPL syllabus there are certain requirements in terms of solo circuits, a qualifying cross country flight and so on. UAS flying doesn't necessarily prepare you for these.
Regarding the USA PPL option, bear in mind the cost of flights and accomodation. Completing in 3 weeks is likely to be a challenge, 4 is more realistic and would be aided by completing the groundschool (7 exams) before you go. There are plenty of places that offer the groundschool packages. Also, bear in mind that is you get a PPL in the USA, you will almost certainly need another few hours with an instructor before a club will let you fly their aircraft. As said, flying from a grass strip with cross winds is a little different to the long hard runways in Florida.
Lots of good advice here. I'd give CAA flight-crew licensing a phone at Gatwick regarding the outstanding requirements for a PPL in relation to your hours logged on the Grob. Of course you'll be rusty etc, but no point in paying for hours that you may not need.
I'll echo the posts saying not to pay up-front for flying training. Regardless of the history and provenance of a flying school, they can (and do) fold literally overnight. I instructed for a school with a proud 60-year history that went completely tits-up in very short order, thankfully without any student money in the bank as they didn't have an up-front 'discount' scheme in place.
Good luck, have fun!
I'll echo the posts saying not to pay up-front for flying training. Regardless of the history and provenance of a flying school, they can (and do) fold literally overnight. I instructed for a school with a proud 60-year history that went completely tits-up in very short order, thankfully without any student money in the bank as they didn't have an up-front 'discount' scheme in place.
Good luck, have fun!
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