Keef
My point was that while I accept the present training situation is all that is possible in the "PPL market" as it currently stands in its utterly decrepit form, if it is left to continue (which I am sure it will be) there will fairly soon be not much left to discuss because not a lot of people will be flying. On present trends, the situation will be pretty dire indeed just 10 years from now.
Obviously one needs to learn basic handling but there is no rational case for doing navigation with a piece of string. This is why anyone who has a PPL and is off flying on their own should use the best technology available to them. If the batteries go flat, etc, etc, you've still got your plog and you can fly headings, call up some radar unit, 121.50, etc. Or plug in spare batteries.
But this isn't a solution to the wider issue I refer to above; the number of people who are interested in proving their manhood by spending 60hrs in a decrepit C150 and twiddling a circular slide rule, is going down all the time.
A GNS430 is not a good example; it is the very last thing I would put in a mainly-VFR plane; it is overly complex and the screen is much too small to work as a useful moving map. The main reason it is so popular is that it is efficient on panel space (contains a radio/VOR/ILS) which in many cases makes it the only option, and the avionics shop makes a load of money on the supply and fitting. Something like a KMD150 would be a much better bet, a big colour screen and it takes just one glance to see everything.