The seven hours is one-up, hence my remark "Weight is an issue, and with full tanks I have to leave one passenger seat empty."
Since I'm quite light I can take 130 litres of fuel and at 18 lph that gives me 7 hours.
Top-end microlights are certainly more expensive than many second-hand A Group machines, but the running costs are much lower, and there is some appeal in having a new machine. The ability to do serious touring and yet still be able to get in and out of very short strips is what I like, but then I also have access to GA aircraft as well if I want to take passengers, go IFR in IMC etc.
If I could only fly one aircraft I'd go for a second-hand CofA machine in order to have the flexibilty to fly at night and in IMC, but at the moment I feel I have the best of both worlds.
Another point worth noting is that with the NPPL, your microlight experiance is now accepted in converting to a group A. You only have to do sufficient training to pass the skills test to go from NPPL ML to NPPL SEP and pass the JAR exams.
There is a bit of a 'gotcha' here if you want to go beyond the NPPL. While you only have to do a minimum of three hours to convert from microlight to NPPL SEP you will still need to do at least 35 training hours to upgrade to a JAR PPL no matter how many microlight hours you have, unless you happened to do all your microlight NPPL training with a JAR instructor at a registered facility - fairly unlikely.
ozplane, yes, NZ is very generous with their weights! 450Kg is restrictive, but I tend to fly the microlight solo almost all the time and use GA aircraft if I have passengers.
And no, the police didn't find the culprits and didn't seem to exhibit a lot of enthusiasm for doing so either
