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IMHO retractable are too complicated for a beginner
How on earth did those young pilots ever fly combat in Spitfires during the last war on such low hours ?
Or the young women WAFs who were thrown a set of keys to an aircraft they had never flown and told to position it ?
I think its more to do with your bank balance. I can remember having keys thrown at me by AA at Bournemouth it was a matter of sitting down with the POH note the differences and off you go.
one a Trinidad had a tiny switch near my knee for the weeping wing anti ice.
Climbing into cloud low level it took me some time to work out what the chemical smell was after I had inadvertently knocked it on with my knee
Pace