God, I wish this stupid argument would go away!
Having flown both the bulldog and the tutor for approximately the same number of hours, I hopefully will provide an unbiased view on the subject.
Firstly, the Grob is better. MILES better. Now im not going to make a statement like that without justifying it, otherwise i would get shot down, like many others in this forum seem to for expressing an educated opinion. My justifications for this are as follows.
1) the training package supplied with the A/C are second to none. Try and say that about the Bulldog. the bulldog flight manual was lets face it, something to keep on the bookshelf to fill it up. The Tutor manual on the other hand, is comprehensive and extremely useful.
2) The navigation/radio suite is more in-line with what the air force requires for upcoming aircraft (training and front-line). It hasnt got an NDB reciever. So what? be honest, when was the last time you used an NDB? The GPS NEAR AIRPORT does exactly the same function, and gives you a range. The aircraft is restricted VFR NOT due to a design flaw (lets be honest guys, I feel much happier flying IF on the Tutor than I ever did the Bulldog, especially ILS's. Those bennedix king jobs the Bulldog had were a piece of crap), but due to beaurocracy and translation difficulties between the German and British flight manuals. It certainly has nothing to do with "different power sources" for the AI's, which it actually has.
3) The Tutor is far more reliable in terms of number of aircraft available on the line, there were days I can remember there were only two out of a total fleet of six available.
4) Roll rate. The aircraft does have a lower roll rate than the Bulldog, however the Bulldog couldnt throw a 540 flick roll in a cuban either! The decision to not allow flick manoevers recently, in a large number of peoples opinions is ludicrous. The aircraft has been CLEARED in its flight testing to ensure this, otherwise it would have not been certified safe to do so.
5) aerobatics - Grob climbs in aerobatics. The Bulldog fell like a brick. Nuff said.
6) Climb Rate from takeoff, spin package is generally complete in 5-6 minutes. you were lucky to do it in 10-15 in the Bulldog.
6) The Grob does not have in irrecoverable spin. The Bulldog, apparently did, and caught out a fair few very experienced instructors. The spin recovery if it all gets pear-shaped simply involves removing your hands from the controls.
These opinions are not formed due to loyalty to the aircraft, purely due to the fact the Grob meets the training requirements of the EFT sylabus, and in fact exceeds it (GPS navigation can be introduced for example whenever EFT fancy, DGPS ILS is fantastic for practasing approaches to airfields without the kit (most!).
[ 28 November 2001: Message edited by: UAM ]