Very nice of you to remember, FNG. ;)

No, it's not easy studying full-time as well as doing a PPL, but in some ways it's easier than working full-time and doing same. Why? Because if the weather's good and you have no lectures/lab work, you can escape to the airfield for a few hours. :ok:

How to pay for it? There are no short cuts. If you try and save a few pounds during your training, you will pay for it many times over later. I was fairly lucky in that my university has a temping agency on campus, so I was able to work for ca. 10 hours a week at £6-7 an hour, and fly almost every other weekend. There wasn't always work available, so I also ate very cheaply and didn't socialise every night. I seriously lived pretty much on Tescos value pasta, value tomatoes, cheap veg from the local greengrocer and the occasional bit of meat when it was reduced. I limited myself to one night out a week & took say £10 with me in my pocket and left my wallet at home. It sounds terribly boring, but: a) you soon get used to it; and b) you forget all about it when you get airborn.

It took me about (not having my logbook to hand) 18 months and 55 hours to get my licence.

Good luck. :)

MASF

A point worth considering is the state of the aircraft and the accord to maintenance. MASF obviously has its supporters here and I would like to add myself to that group.

I have been there several times over the last couple of years and have flown their -181 G-MASF. This is a very well equipped aircraft with all the bells and whistles and in excellent condition.

If anyone has a complaint address it to the management, they do listen, and the ops manager who is around on Thursdays and Fridays makes a nice cup of tea.

And they do a very good T-shirt, subtle, not in your face, and it shows you fly.

As for learning to fly in a Tiger Moth, people who preach that probably recommend learning to drive in a Ford Model T.

A genuine question, Sultan Ismail. Have you tried a Tiger Moth, or any other non spam can type?

FNG

An interesting question that had me looking back through 35 years PPL flying.

De Havilland Rapide - pax

Percival Provost – the one with the Alvis Leonides engine. LHS as a cadet

Avro Anson (do twins count?) – RHS as a cadet

Fairchild Argus with the inline Franklin engine – RHS offered by the owner who then took me up in his Turbo Stationair (C206)

Bucher Jungmann – Front seat or back seat can’t remember.

Auster 5 with Lycoming 150hp conversion

Cessna 140 – Is this a spam can?

The point I was making, somewhat obliquely, in today’s world of FBW and Glass cockpits, the aspirant pilot wants to be exposed to modern “systems”. The more knobs and whistles the better. Just look at the discussions here on GPS, is it a no-go item.

I don’t believe that a Tiger Moth really offers any advantage to the aspirant pilot whether it is technical or spiritual.

I am not knocking Tiger Moths, in fact a long time ago there was an Air Raid Shelter just outside the Marshalls perimeter fence not 50 yards from the Tiger Moth hangar and I spent many a weekend sitting on the concrete roof looking at those same aircraft that fly today. And dreaming of the day I would fly….

And that was many, very many years later in a PA28-140, far away from Cambridge, in the arid Karoo of South Africa. But in a spam can no less.

What to fly? It comes down to personal choice, thank goodness.

That's an interesting list, Sultan. My point about a Moth is that it will inculcate fundamental flying skills superior to those provided by, say, a Cessna 152. The Moth requires co-ordinated use of the controls and lots of liveliness with the feet. Landing it requires precision (no floating along five knots too fast). Learning how to operate cockpit systems is easy, and can be done later. To be honest, a Tiger Moth is not the ideal trainer, as it is quite tiring to fly, but it's a lot better as a basic trainer than the average spam can. A Chipmunk would be better (a Chipmunk is, after all, an improved monoplane Moth) but I do not know of anywhere offering Chipmunk ab initio courses.

I suppose it does come down to personal choice.
I learnt on Moths not because I thought they'd give me better handling skills (although it has) but because I knew I'd have a lot more fun that way. It also meant I could go straight onto aeros when I got my license.

Learn on whatever you think you'd enjoy most. If you're not sure, maybe have a trial flight on each.