Good old days.
Thread Starter
Joined: Oct 2001
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From: Vancouver Island
Good old days.
I see a lot of posts referring to " The good old days "
What time frame does that refer to, the nineties, the eighties , the seventies or earlier than that?
Is it in the days before they put training wheels on the front of airplanes?
What time frame does that refer to, the nineties, the eighties , the seventies or earlier than that?
Is it in the days before they put training wheels on the front of airplanes?
Joined: Mar 2005
Aviation Qualifications: Military
Posts: 6,563
Likes: 953
From: Aus
It's when engines smoked, coughed and farted. None of your Gen ??? whining.when you pressed the starter - except for the lovely whine of an inertia starter that is. Something you have a great deal of experience with Chuck (the smoking, coughing and farting engines part I mean). 
Joined: Dec 2007
Posts: 3
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From: depends on when you ask
Good old days.
When cigars and FAs were up front, a pilot made CA at the legacy carrier after a couple of years, CA salary could buy a brand new Cadillac every month, the meal choice was prime rib & lobster or some French chicken dish, the pax we're classy, FC really was FIRST class, and the flight crew was NEVER seated in coach!
Joined: Mar 2014
Posts: 1,270
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From: The World
"The good old days" timeframe is easy - so young that there are survivors, so old that only a very few opponents could correct bull!!!! statements. As my old science teacher told on his 100th birthday: "I am right, because everybody else attending my story is dead".
Joined: Oct 1999
Posts: 3,325
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From: UK
Here in UK at least the 'golden years' for me were from first flying in the late '70s up until probably about the turn of the century. It was just so much more free and lacking over-legislation back then.
The many, many increases in bureaucratic ruling and security and elfin safety and increase in reliance on the radio (some of today's GA pilots think the radio a primary flight control) and concentration on GA as a training ground for commercial rather than a fun thing to do in its own right has been death by a thousand cuts.
Also everyone has a video camera in their pocket now (on their phone), so those beat-up fun flights and impromptu fly-bys at a strip have a good chance these days of featuring on YouTube with the inevitable consequences.
It's quite simply not the fun it once was. And I suspect that it was even more fun prior to my 'golden years'.
The many, many increases in bureaucratic ruling and security and elfin safety and increase in reliance on the radio (some of today's GA pilots think the radio a primary flight control) and concentration on GA as a training ground for commercial rather than a fun thing to do in its own right has been death by a thousand cuts.
Also everyone has a video camera in their pocket now (on their phone), so those beat-up fun flights and impromptu fly-bys at a strip have a good chance these days of featuring on YouTube with the inevitable consequences.
It's quite simply not the fun it once was. And I suspect that it was even more fun prior to my 'golden years'.
Joined: Apr 2014
Posts: 125
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From: London
good old days, when I started flying in 1988
in the early 90's the closest dwelling to 26 on the private strip I used was 3 miles straight down the centre line with nothing a 1000m either side. All approaches to 26 made very good use of the 500 ft rule
if I still flew there today what with all the camera's phones etc I don't think I'd dare skim over the tree tops at 135kt...
I have my chart from 1990 somewhere.... I should imagine one from the 1970s would be even more depressing to look at!
in the early 90's the closest dwelling to 26 on the private strip I used was 3 miles straight down the centre line with nothing a 1000m either side. All approaches to 26 made very good use of the 500 ft rule
if I still flew there today what with all the camera's phones etc I don't think I'd dare skim over the tree tops at 135kt...
I have my chart from 1990 somewhere.... I should imagine one from the 1970s would be even more depressing to look at!
Joined: Sep 2006
Posts: 1,434
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From: Scotland
In the early 50s our school was on the top of a hill at the edge of the village. A low flyby of two Spitfires disrupting the class enraged our headmaster, a Quaker, he telephoned Tangmere to complain. Next day we got the best air display you could wish for! Today none of it would happen. Sonic bangs were common, now they have people crying in terror.
We could walk home from a village hall dance at midnight with no worries, girls included could walk miles home along country lanes by themselves!
ATC summer camps, gliding, with proper keen instructors. Model aircraft that required a bit of skill to build. Learned a lot in them days.
Good old days, yes they were.
We could walk home from a village hall dance at midnight with no worries, girls included could walk miles home along country lanes by themselves!
ATC summer camps, gliding, with proper keen instructors. Model aircraft that required a bit of skill to build. Learned a lot in them days.
Good old days, yes they were.
Avoid imitations
Joined: Nov 2000
Aviation Qualifications: ATPL
Posts: 15,115
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From: Wandering the FIR and cyberspace often at highly unsociable times
Ah, yes...bring back the "good old days". I remember trying to fly under so-called "VFR" around the LFAs in choking smog after the farmers had been burning corn stubble for weeks, followed by thousands of coal fires being lit up.
British Rail, British Leyland, power workers and the dustmen; more often on strike than working.
Not to mention the added bonus of rickets, TB, polio.
British Rail, British Leyland, power workers and the dustmen; more often on strike than working.
Not to mention the added bonus of rickets, TB, polio.
Joined: Feb 2007
Posts: 1,291
Likes: 2
From: GLASGOW
Aeromaritime Super Constellations.
Spantax DC-7.
British Air Ferries Bristol 170
Argosys, Vanguards, Viscounts.
BAC1-11
Coronado
Super VC-10
Douglas DC-8-73
Boeing 707
The nostalgia of it all, none of
6' fences around GA airfields
Security codes
25 G4S, security, "persons".
Lo Co
Holidays of the packaged kind.
Endless barriers to travel in extremely uncomfortable aeroplanes.
Yes, there was a day when it was all very beautiful, still is, if you can hark back and reminisce to the way it was.....
Spantax DC-7.
British Air Ferries Bristol 170
Argosys, Vanguards, Viscounts.
BAC1-11
Coronado
Super VC-10
Douglas DC-8-73
Boeing 707
The nostalgia of it all, none of
6' fences around GA airfields
Security codes
25 G4S, security, "persons".
Lo Co
Holidays of the packaged kind.
Endless barriers to travel in extremely uncomfortable aeroplanes.
Yes, there was a day when it was all very beautiful, still is, if you can hark back and reminisce to the way it was.....
Avoid imitations
Joined: Nov 2000
Aviation Qualifications: ATPL
Posts: 15,115
Likes: 1,091
From: Wandering the FIR and cyberspace often at highly unsociable times
Rickets? Polio? Lots of domestic coal fires? Crikey Shy, didn't have you down as that old!
Joined: Jun 2013
Posts: 25
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From: Brighton Sussex
Im proud to say my grandad was chief fire officer at croydon airfield during the war and as a young kid (well after the war) i used to see searchlight practice at croydon before it closed in around 56.
Joined: Oct 1999
Posts: 3,325
Likes: 2
From: UK
But thankfully never got desperate enough to own a BL car...
Those were the days - off to Barton with the top down, jump into the Chippy (no 6 foot security fences or gates then) and go flying. Beat up Southport beach maybe, or go chasing the sheep over the moors. And often even without a radio in the aeroplane.
Happy days!