I was on the first course of students to train on the Tucano. The rest of the station were on JPs & we received a great deal of 'banter' about being a 'slow prop', even from those on the JP3 which to be frank couldn't really share the circuit with the Tucano as it took an age to climb before it could turn downwind. We could clear the MATZ by the end of the runway if we really tried so could fly 2 circuits inside one of theirs. The JP5 was roughly similar in terms of climb performance & were obviously faster than us, even the JP3 could go quite fast downhill with the wind behind it, but both types had very short legs. Guys on the senior courses were always talking about how 'they'd run out of time for MRTs' on a sortie whereas the Tucano could do 2 sorties off a tank of gas. We could also do proper mixed profile sorties so in my opinion it was a better & more flexible training aircraft, helped by fairly decent avionics & the tandem seating. We were accused by our JP peers of 'not being fuel aware' in the way that they were, but as I recall a criticism of Valley's output by the TWUs was that they weren't fuel aware so what ever they'd learnt at BFTS was soon forgotten on the Hawk.
I did think at the time that it was a mistake to make the new aircraft 'Hawk-like' in its cockpit rather than give it a really modern one & upgrade the older aircraft. I had a trip in a Tucano a few years ago & my impression then was of a cramped cockpit with a really old-fashioned layout, but that's probably just in comparison to my usual mount. At the time it seemed spacious & very advanced, at least after the Bulldog. When I refreshed on the Tucano after flying the Hawk it did seem rather slow & I seemed to have loads of time to fill between events, though that could have reflected an improvement in my ability rather than anything to do with the aircraft as the only real difference is how far apart the minute marks are.
It has lasted well though & spent nearly as long in service as its predecessor. I shall be sad to see it go, it was a blast to fly as a student on BFT.