Yeep, afraid the residency thing just kicked in the last 6 or so months about car ownership. Bloody nuisance as you can get a half decent banger down here for a few hundred Euros. Wouldn´t want to cross Spain in one but fine for getting to the beach etc.

Right now though the advice is bring your own and make sure your insurance is good for as much of 12 months from your start date here as you can get.

Just back from another glorious spin in the sun on the bike out Ronda direction. You´re right WWW, empty roads all the way there and back :). Well apart from a dozen or so other bikers. Would you believe it is 20+ degrees today. I´m sure my calendar said it was December. Plus the sun doesn´t go down until 6 ish.

Mind you when it rains here it absolutely bloody pours down.

Can any of you who are out enjoying the place please tell me how you found the aptitude tests and if you have any advice.

Thanks.

jock - long and hard, I refer to the aptitude tests of course!

Let me see, this was over a year ago so a more recent candidate might be more useful. Took about 3 hours to complete. The tests I remember:

1. ILS type test chasing two needles with a joystick for about 2 minutes. You get 2 or 3 goes and your score will improve.

2. Strange orientation type test where you had to figure left from right and upside down from right way up really quick.

3. Another ILS type test but 3D-ish. Very like the old Flight Sim 98 with a succession of red boxes in the sky you had to follow. Bit faster though. Again 2 or 3 goes.

4. Rows and columns of colours and shapes to be matched quickly. Hard to describe but remember making a total **** of the first go and got 10/10 on the second.

Then there was verbal reasoning. Given a passage of text about anything - could be political or historical or management stuff - and you had to agree, disagree or could not say if certain statements were true about that passage. Leave all your own beliefs at home for this one and use only logic based on the text.

Then numerical reasoning. Bit of a bastard this one. Given a pile of information (pie charts, bar charts, huge columns of figures) calculate in your head (no calculators allowed) the number of trees chopped down in Denmark on December 10th for the Copenhagen branch of IKEA. Do able but only just I found.

Then the personality test. I think this test is really trying to weed out the uncommunicative nerdy loner. 100 questions or so that ask about the same 25 things in different ways.

I was given the detailed results afterwards.

D McQuire
 

Since as of October this year nothing has changed! It is same old test.

I decided to go for the blast through as quickly as possible method. Done in 2 hours and the other guy with me took 4 and 1/2!!!!
But, then again what ever suits you. Some like it fast and some like it slow with a cig between.

N.B- Make sure the calculator works before starting. I had a dodgy one! It piled the pressure on at the end.

As for the car advice, I think I will drive my car down after all then.

cheers

Gook luck to the next who take the test;)

I'm gonna be starting training in Jerez next year and thought about taking my car. However I though it was only possible to get European cover on your insurance for 3 months max? Does anybody know of insurance companies that'll cover you for the whole time?

Cheers,

Cam :D

Best advice I can give you fella is to hang fire for a little while longer and wait until there are definite signs of improvement in the recruitment situation, regardless where you end up going to.

I finished at Oxford this year on the integrated course (£48K and a good course with top instructors), but still unemployed. There are a huge number of students like me and many more experienced guys cooling their heels waiting for work. Take this time to earn as much wonga as you can and get some other work experience under your belt before diving into the aviation pool.

As for course costs, don't forget to ad 15 months worth of living expenses into the equation (at least £7K even for a tight wad like me!) and you can see the advantage of earning more money and waitng until there is agood chance of employment. I'm sure you are as keen as mustard to get going and 15 months seems like forever for the job market to recover, but with the valuable gift of hindsight, I certainly wouldn't want to be training at this moment in time.

Give it 6 months and use the time to earn your dosh and research the market VERY carefully. Good luck whatever you decide.

Thankyou for the info.

Well I've already signed on the dotted line!

I will be starting next February. But in the mean time, I am working up those contacts out here in asia. I know it is going to be a case of go where ever the work is. Blood, sweat and tears are all part of the game.

Witchdoctor: What you doing now to make ends meet?

For Number Cruncher - excuse me the rest if this reply is too late posted - I am not working in any Airline, I have just finished my training, so I cannot answer your questions.

Dennisb

Witchdoctor makes a very valid point.

Whilst many will dive into the training system with only thoughts of flying and getting the licence, don't forget you will have to pay back whatever you have borrowed to finance the training.

Currently there is little or no hiring for low hour pilots. From what I can gather from various contacts I have in the aviation world there is little chance of that changing in the near future. Gulf War II and the dodgy world economy are conspiring to screw things up.

If I was on the verge of spending 50-60k I would want a wee bit of certainty at the end of the training course. I struck it lucky and managed to get in with an airline, (not flying sadly), after I finished my training.

Touch n oops

Thanks for the concern buddy (I'm touched - cue groan).

Not enough I have to say. It is vital you keep your flying going after you finish, and as you probably know it is damn expensive. Most operators would want to see some evidence of IFR time preferably on twins, but some expect to see 50 hours in last 6 months. Go work out how much that will cost on top of your ATPL - not pretty.

That's why it is so important that you have plenty of dosh behind you before you launch into it, and also why I recommend waiting until there has been a definite improvement in employment prospects. It is too much money to gamble if you don't have to do it.

Still, looks like it could improve a little in the spring, but there is still a huge backlog of people in the system and it won't be improving that much.

Chin up, you really never know.:)

I'm studying in Jerez at the moment. I have to say that contrary to alot of what's being said here I feel that training through a bad patch in the recruitment of low hour pilots is actually a sensible way to go about things. You could quite easily wait until the market has picked up, start your training 2 months later and 14 months down the line the recruitment boom is over for us low hour guys. It's a calculated gamble, if you like, but from those I've spoken to it's perhaps not as bleak in the near future as had been predicted.

Jerez I'm certain is the place to be for any aspiring metal bird driver. There really is no substitute for good flying weather, it's the missing link in all the British based schools, and couple that with excellent aircraft and by and large good instruction all the components are there for a successful course. That's not to say that certain things don't need ironing out, there are one or two things that do, but the good outweighs the bad.

Oh, and hello to VFE! Hope you're well.

Good Weather!!!
Come on - I appreciate you are there but I do not think you can classify it as good weather for FLYING !

Sure it is better weather for sunbathing that good ole england but lets be realistic and say how many hours are cancelled for poor visibility due to haze (limits are 10k for pre-pt1 and 5k post PT1), crosswind - they managed to pick a school which has the poredominant wind across the runway - Levante anybody??
Oh and have I not mentioned that the temperatures in summer can top 40 degrees c in the planes when you are sitting on the tarmac waiting for ATC to let you go.

Don't get me wrong I think that Jerez is a good school (when compared with the rest of the lot offering Integrated ATPL) and has some great facilities AND good weather in certain months compared to Britain. BUT to say it is great weather and for all the adverts to say how good the climate is, is not really telling consumers what the problems can be. I beleive I heard figures of some students not getting flying for five or six weeks due to the weather. Sure that does not sound bad compared to the UK but when you think these guys are doing nothing but flying and so are just sitting around for the rest of the time then you start to think.

Again, don't get me worng I think Jerez has the potential to be the best by a long way of schools in the Integrated market but I beleive they have a moral and perhaps a legal obligation to tell prospective customers the true story.

In business there is a thing called 'transparency' which all companies are encouraged to follow. How come it does not seem to apply to airlines and companies like BAE?????:confused: :confused:

Well I struggle to think of a region that has a better weather factor in the JAA than Andalucia.

Just a shame the runway isn't orientated more favourably... are they still talking about putting in a second runway for light aircraft? That would sort the problem in a jiffy.

WWW

ps - I really dont think there is a right or wrong decision between these two or indeed Cabair. Its more to do with personal cirumstance - would 13 months in SW Spain be an adventure or would it be 1000nm from your partner? Is Bedford handier than Oxford? Etc. Whichever school you choose it will not have a detectably different effect on your job prospects imho.

How much!?!?
 

It will now cost you a whopping, wait for it, 92 000Euros to get an ATPL from BAe Jerez.

Now that is very, very expensive and out of reach of many!:mad:

Actually Murray that's a good price! When you consider for an ATPL you need 1500 hours including 500 multi crew it's a bargain really!!

Sorry couldn't resist!!! :D

Crosswind limits

Thats what I thought when I looked at their price too...but unfortunatly you only get a fATPL.

Money and Time by the bucket load
 

One of the main costs is achieving the hours
that one needs after the course ie working on
peanuts for a flying school national minimum
wage The LOST INCOME during this phase is as
significant as the headline figure!!

However

If youre sponsored then go for it - these courses
are designed for that purpose - the skills lapse
quickly like a lot of training if one doesnt immediately
put the training to good use......

It has great weather don't get me wrong but just not as good for flying as they like to make out. Much better than Oats I am sure but I did hear that apparently they were getting as many days flying at Glasgow as they do at Jerez or near enough. The point is don't look at it as a selling point on the flying side - it is great for your social life but be aware of the potential delays to your course.

And I heard there was to be no second runway but a parallel taxiway so they can get rid of those pesky small people to let zee big germans in.
:rolleyes: ;)

More Euros
 

BAe just put up the price again - now 92,000 Euros. Isn't that the second time this year?

So OATS renamed their integrated course and now charge £72,000 including accommodation (plus extra for uniform etc!) and BAe now charge £59,500 including accommodation (and uniform). If the choice is really only between these two, I cannot see anyone in their right mind going to OATS, even after BAe's price rise.

God I hope I get accepted by CTC McAlpine.