There is a local airfield that is only half an hours drive from where I live that does PPL/night only but is quite cheap and would be a place I could build up the majority of my hours but it doesn't do IRR/IMC, CBIR/MEP/MEIR. I would have to do an hours drive to get that.

Would it be better to just do the whole lot in one place but drive further or concentrate on the hour building locally but do the bits when needed at the flying school that is further away? Obviously the split will be a bit cheaper but doing it all at one place will most likely get myself done quicker?

Afternoon guys, I stay in Nigeria, started my PPL training already, got stuck with my exams, so i the school stopped my training, it's been roughly 7months I've flown last, in total spent about 4yrs here. Contemplating changing flight schools, but then I still don't know how or what select for modular.

Congrats on landing that job offer, I'm guessing you applied through the BA SSP scheme?

The payment schedules of all the Integrated schools seem to be like that. Even those offering "payment plans". £10k to secure a place, £23k, 1 month before course. So £33k before I've even step foot there, not even cracked open a book, let alone even seen a plane. Be £86k deep before you'd even finished ground school, then another £23k. Mess up those exams and might as well have blown that cash on strippers and blow.

My other concerns with integrated schools right now is what seems to be the massive delays being reported at all the big name integrated schools CAE, L3, LEA once you reach the flying phases. And with them already holding all your money you're really hostage to them. Some of the start dates are well into 2025/2026

I know its a tough choice with that offer in hand... but with BA now announcing 200 spots for the next SPA scheme they're clearly forecasting some demand, you considered going modular and re-applying for the Post-IR scheme?

I am going modular. I have an airfield within an hour of me that can do everything bar CPL. I have my Class 1 medical 1st August then will hope to get my PPL done before the winter comes which is when I will do my theory. As I am in the East Midlands availability is great so should be able to just crack on. I only work 3.5 days a week so should be able to basically do it full time.

When I need to do my CPL I will try and do it at one of the big places to get it all checked off in one go using all my holidays. In fact if it is true and these places are struggling to get pilots through the gates it might even help me get in as I would have done all the leg work bar the CPL.

That's not a bad idea. A lot of people put value in having a big name on their CV. The advantage of modular training is that you can get 80% of your flying somewhere else and still get that 'big name' on the modules that count. I would suggest PPL, night, SEIR and MEP pretty much in that order, finishing off with a 5 hour MEIR and 15 hour CPL CPL at the place you want to name drop. If you can get in.

Yes that is my plan . Although I need to still contact them first but will do when I have my medical out of the way. They will do everything at their place up to SEIR/MEIR.. Just as long as they will do me a conversion and not try and sell me both individually .

Hi guys


I’m 28 years old, the past 4 years I have worked at BRU airport and in the past two years I became a pushback operator, gradually I felt more and more ambition to become an airline pilot.. actually I always wanted to be one but because of financial and educational choices I never chased that dream untill I finally thought let’s just jump the ship


I found CAE, applied for selection process, passed and got selected to join the integrated ATPL that CAE offers for €116K. Now the bank is willing to loan me that money of I want to put my fathers house on this bet. But ofcourse anyone with a sober mind wouldn’t bet his own home. I felt at lost because I come from a middle class family and I can’t get a sponsership to join that overpriced flight training.

for the past 48 hours I have been reading the forums ON this very website about modular vs. integrated.. post from the 2010’s, pre and post covid.. and looks like the sentiment is best choice is to go for modular..


okay.. I found a nice flight school here in antwerp that has all the license trainings from PPL all the way to CPL.. and if i remember correctly they also had ATPL courses and fixed base sim where lufthansa group cadets went for it.. I believe that other ATO was called EAT.. so it’s best for me to stick to one school. Eventually

however.. I also read posts and comments that says that people doing MPL’s or integrated have more chance to get an interview with airlines especially in today economy.

now i’m a little bit scared.. who wants to burst my bubble, and get foot on the ground.. and tell me what the reality is.. is modular the way to go? And integrated is just an overkill?

As with everything, it depends.
Find out what your target airline prefers re cadets/modular/MPL/integrated. You do have a choice of many airlines being an EU citizen and you can probably speak a few languages very well. (I know my Belgian colleagues can).
You are right to be cautious re betting your father's house. A lot can go wrong and you're right to be mindful of it.
There's less risk if you go integrated on a tagged course. That is, you've done the selection for an airline and now you need to fund the ATPL. Personally, that would be the only time I'd bet the house - when you're on a tagged scheme. "White tail" or speculative integrated ATPL/MPLs carry more risk.
If you can find a good reputable school that does modular training, great. Ask them about their employment success rate post course, that'll give you a clue about the likelihood of a job post training. Timing also plays an enormous part in getting hired.

I’ve discovered that this school is actually a sister company of a well-established corporate jet company. Most students end up flying on their fleet. In the last training session, someone went to KLM, and currently, a student is in an assessment at Lufthansa. This modular training program is designed for anyone who wants to fly as a hobby or pursue a full modular path up to CPL, and then continue their ATPL at one of their partners, eventually returning to fly for the company serving wealthy clients.

In this thread, everyone is talking about max £50K for full modular training.



Can someone please tell me if the following is expensive?

Here’s a rough estimate from the examiner:

• €18,000 PPL
• €2,000 Night Rating
• €14,000 90-hour Building
• €15,000 IR
• €8,000 MEP Land
• €6,000 ME IR
• €2,500 A-UPRT (extern)
• €7,000 CPL
• €4,500 MCC (extern)

Total: €77,000

We still need to do ATPL and type rating.

I know that when I train with them, Benelux airlines will see this as high-quality training. But am I being ripped off?

On another note, here in Belgium there are not many flight training schools. The rest are small, mom-and-pop hobby PPL schools that don’t even offer an IR. If I do modular training somewhere, I NEED to do it at one flight school to ensure a standard and high-quality training “culture.”

€20k for your first 50 hours (PPL+Night) does seem a bit expensive. It equates to €400 per hour, rolling in exams and fees etc. For a single engine!
Hour building is closer to €150 per hour which seems reasonable. €15k for an IR (and I assume this is an SEIR as you mentioned MEIR later on) - does seem very expensive - back up to the €350-€400 per hour range. Do the instructors all drive Bentleys by any chance? MEP: Does €1000 per hour seem reasonable? No. Same for the MEIR - technically you only need 2 hours in the aircraft but it's always good to budget more. CPL if you've got an MEIR is just 10 hours in an SEP and 5 hours in a complex SEP. Overall it sounds like they have reasonable solo rates and extortionate training rates.

Hi, first time poster here. Does anyone have any first hand experience of Ravenair's modular offering? I have tried the search function but they don't seem to have been the subject of much discussion / appraisal.

Hi everyone
I literally discovered this forum today and I can not believe the ammount of useful info that there is here.
Before I ask anything i would like to state a bit of my background. I wanted to be a pilot for four years now and I am planning to try a modular training in Dublin as soon as possible.
Getting to my questions, my first is how can i do my hour building?. I am planning to get a job to help me with the costs, but it will be hard for me to pay. I was wondering where to do it (it is impossible for me to leave ireland to do hour building, though i might be able to do a bit in Argentina).

The cheapest PPL that i found was 8000 in an flightschool outside of Dublin, and the modular seems very convenient to me. But it has a MEIR for 19000 euro, which is the most expensive of all of the frozen ATPL course. Am i getting ripped off here?

Another question which is crucial is that is it possible to be a pilot in Europe? Aren't there too many pilots with no kob at the moment? Or is thete a good chance?

Thanks to whoever answers, it would help me a lot.

I assume you're talking about National Flight Centre just outside of Dublin?

Hour building - if you can't leave Ireland your options are limited, Waterford Aero Club has a 40 hour package for €7470 (maybe do look outside Ireland though as you could even be able to do it a few blocks at a time if it saves you a lot of money)

MEIR - if it is NFC the price is a bit closer to 20k, I tried to see how much AFTA in Cork charge but they don't list a price, I looked a competitively priced flight school in Spain that charges 16,450 though. Keeping in mind that Ireland is a more expensive place to learn how to fly in general, 19k or 20k doesn't seem too outrageous.

Jobs market - there's a thread on this in the Interviews, jobs & sponsorship forums that makes for interesting reading. As I'm still a student pilot I don't have first hand information, sorry.

Tomasiskfranco The job question is a perennial one. If I knew the answer to that, I would be sitting in the back of the jet, not flying it.
The industry is cyclical and very sensitive to economic swings, particularly so for modular students. When it's booming, there's a good chance you'll be hired reasonably quickly - assuming no glaring personality defects and the ability to fly a sim profile. Note, we have just had a boom hiring time. If you can keep your costs under control, that leaves you with options to take lower paying jobs to gain experience and contacts. The beauty of modular is you can delay doing the Instrument Rating (the most expensive part of the whole thing, with the exception of a type rating) until there's a clear upturn in hiring.

Low houred pilots are always at a disadvantage when it comes to hiring. The competition is fierce.
Getting the timing right is paramount if you're not flush with cash. The ATPLs have a clear time limit otherwise you need to do them again if you haven't got an CPL licence with an IFR (aka "frozen" ATPL).

I should say the ATPL exams have a time limit before they expire.

This is an important point. The ATPL exams will eat up the bulk of your time. You (can) get a PPL in a month and CPL/IR in two months, but the exams will take take you 6-12 months realistically which is about 80% time wise. You really don't want to have to do them again just because you ran out of money and timed out. You can mitigate this by getting your CBIR then CPL. A single engine IR will still freeze the ATPL.

Hi,

Could you tell me the name of the school near Dublin?

Thanks,

Leo

I'd be surprised if he isn't talking about the National Flight Centre out near Leixlip.

For anyone who has actually completed a full time integrated course from any flight school, would you be able to advise how long it took you in total to complete the course?

I ask because most integrated courses sell it as between 14 - 18 months, but from discussions with different cadets it seems like the total duration is much longer than this. I wonder if this is specific to certain FTOs or if this is just an industry thing.

€19,000 for an MEIR sounds crazy to me.

I don’t know what it is that’s tying you to doing your hour building in Ireland but if you can be a bit more flexible with where you do the training then you can get a MEP, MEIR and CPL for almost the same price as you are quoting for just doing MEIR. There’s a few good schools in Poland.

I’ve seen Rudestuff advising that you can save a bit by doing SEIR first so maybe read back on some of his posts.

You can do your PPL and hour building in a local flying club and do your ATPL theory here in Ireland or by distance learning with a foreign school. That only means you would have to go abroad for the time it takes to do MEP, MEIR and CPL (less than three months I would think).

Hello all. Having spent a good time reading through this very useful forum I’ve done some research and put together a plan. However I’d appreciate any advice on this and if I’m way out…

PPL - 45hrs, £7k.
(Over next 18mths fly x4/mth while doing ATPL)
ATPLs - £3k.
Night rating - 5hrs @£195 instructed, £1k.
UPTR - 5hrs, £1.4k.
IR(r) - 15hrs @£195, £3.5k.
Fly solo IFR - 15hrs @£160, £2.4k
SEIR ‘top up’ course - 10hrs @£225 instructed £2.3k. (I now have SEIR)

(18mths later total 65hrs over weekends (£4k) & total 160hrs flight time)
MEP - 6hrs @£500, £3.5k.
MEIR ‘top-up’ course - 5hrs @£500, £2.5k. (MEIR now achieved).
Solo hour build - 24hrs @£160, £4k. (Now at 195hrs).
CPL - 25hrs @£225 instructed, £8k.
APSMCC - £5k.

A grand total of 220 hrs & £47,600.

To clarify the PPL is only £7k due to scholarships. My club has cheap rental of £160 solo hire and £195 with instructor. £225/hr is with another school as my club doesn’t offer some ratings. The numbers might be a bit out due to rounding.

To get a MEIR, am I correct in thinking that I can get an IR(r) doing 15hrs instructed. Then fly solo 15hrs under IFR and then doing 10hrs instructed training to get a full SEIR? After this, doing a MEP (6hrs) and then doing a 5hrs ‘top up’ course instructed to convert SEIR to MEIR?

Thanks in advance to any responses.