Skidbiter2; thanks for that, great insight that I didn't have before, practical and to the point.
Heli redeye; it may drive the question from your point of view, but I am not looking at it that way right now. I hesitated to ask this question, but having spoken to various sales-people I came away even more confused, and filled with 'the other one is rubbish because....' type answers. Which often contained information that didn't answer my simple question, and because of my low hours and low experience I didn't understand.
What I didn't want to do was pop on here with many questions that you for instance may consider trivial. So I read all the relevant threads, on this and other forums, that I could find, but was just left with the title of this thread.
What I keep hearing is that Eurocopter support is not up to the support of Bell. I even e-mailed Eurocopter asking why they didn't power upgrade the Ec120, but they didn't answer.
So; heart pulls me toward the EC120 - I saw a metallic blue one static at Cambridge airport and it looked fantastic - but head is saying Bell because of the support.
I admit that I am not yet in the position that you are. I can't make instant, well-judged buying decisions about helicopters based on experience, at least not yet.
So when I've got the why's and wherefore's properly sorted in my head I'll come back with the money questions.
Thanks again for all the replys and the PM's too,
regards,
Rotormotor.