Thank you Peter. If it is two years away then I guess it makes sense to do it now. It really is mind numbingly tedious, and I am sure that none of it will add to the skill set - but hey ho that's what we pay our MEP's for. I guess.
If you want the capability now****, you need to do what is on the table now. The CBM IR is perhaps 2 years away. Then you will be 2 years older, and you will be 2 years closer to death Also 2 years closer to failing your medical. Ever since I started my original PPL (July 2000) it was said that a more practical IR is "just around the corner". Now, maybe, it really is a couple of years around the corner. But there are powerful interests that don't want any dilution of the requirements and these have yet to get stuck in.>
Exactly, this is why I decided that now is best time to get an FAA IR rating on top of my JAR PPL. I will do later whatever is required to convert. There are multiple reasons for this decision. I like the FAA approach Just GET IT DONE.... I acquired a PPL Wilbur plastic card 20 years ago and re-activated my FAA medical last week....So I am looking forward to be double qualified FAA and EASA.....
I've been looking at it as well. As an IMC holder with comfortably over the 40 hours instrument-reference time, and a couple of good reasons to want an IR in the next year or two I think this new thang is exactly what I wanted. I don't mind holding off for 6 months until somebody provides an exam course and have already had a conversation with my friendly neighbourhood IRI about it.
Why do an FAA IR at this point? As I seldom fly in any bits of the USA that have heard of IMC, and even more seldom fly an N reg in Europe, not me.
It probably is the straw that will do what EASA really want - kill of the N-reg community in Europe. If they genuinely give us something affordable and achievable in sensible hours, I'm very happy. If course, we've yet to see how it works in practice.
It would be good if anybody seeing anything, posts details of training providers establishing themselves for the new syllabus, particularly the groundschool elements.
Incidentally, when I scan-read that document, I couldn't actually see a requirement for a registered course for the three new IR writtens. Will we actually be able to self-study again?
G
It probably is the straw that will do what EASA really want - kill of the N-reg community in Europe
If they actually deliver on this proposal, it will greatly reduce the growth of the N-reg light aircraft population (which has historically been driven mostly by the accessibility of the IR) but IMHO it won't reduce the present population because those people (which includes myself 
) benefit from the Part 91 operating regime, if non-complex (below 5.7T, below 19 seats, not ME TP or jet).
I was not suprised EASA did not introduce long term parking limits (the only possible means of control) because they are so hard to operate, and have trivial work-arounds.
Moving N to G, with the potentially massive can of worms, just so you don't have to do the BFR every 2 years, is not going to happen.
What it will kill off is the part of the N-reg population which cannot get EASA medicals. Those people will be totally screwed - unless they find some way through the maze to get an EASA initial medical.
I couldn't actually see a requirement for a registered course for the three new IR writtens. Will we actually be able to self-study again?
I don't know what the latest on that is, but that would certainly be a key component in making the IR more accessible. The present system, where you have to give a ground study FTO ~£1000 so they "let you" do a load of homework for them to mark, and then "let you" sit the 7 exams at Gatwick (which they let you do only if the homework was to some (unwritten) standard) is a pure restrictive practice.
A reminder that the period for reactions to the CRD end on Sat 29 Dec. If you support the FCL.008 competence-based modular instrument rating and the enroute IR, please send a supportive reaction to EASA.
How to provide a reaction to the FCL.008 CRD
1) Visit EASA's Comment Response Tool webpage
2) Login with your username/password or Register if new. There is a tab menu along the top includes both these options
3) Click the View Documents tab
4) Select view only CRDs (drop down menu on top right hand side of page)
5) Switch to Page 2 (or show 20 documents per page)
6) Right Click on "FCL.008 Qualifications for Flying in Instrument Meteorological Conditions"
7) Select option "Add Reaction"
8 Select option "Add General Reaction"
9) Enter your (hopefully supportive) reaction (comment).
10) CLICK ON THE SAVE ICON to save your reaction.
You may also wish to express support for the continuation of the IMC rating in the UK.
Thanks for the reminder, bookworm. Supportive reaction sent.
I've done my bit too.
I think that without that very good "menu" from Bookworm, I would not have worked out how to do it!
In fact I found a number of empty comments under my name in the earlier text so clearly I had written some stuff there which didn't get saved...
IMHO, the majority of people will not be able to use this system to comment. If I was in a business whose business is to collect statistically representative data I would never have a opaque website like this. So why do they do it? Presumably it is to minimise the number of comments posted, limiting them to people who are already familiar with EASA procedures and are thus statistically supportive of the agency.
I think that without that very good "menu" from Bookworm, I would not have worked out how to do it!
Absolutely! In fact, there are quite a few comments critical of the system.
Step-by-step instructions were shamelessly lifted from a corresponding post on the PPL/IR Europe forums. Thanks David!
I've just read a letter in Flight Training News by one of the FCL008 members that the latest CBM IR proposal (for FAA IR conversion) is 25hrs flight time by reference to instruments, plus the IR skills test.
Clearly it doesn't leave much time, between whenever the CBM IR arrives, and April 2014 when FAA IR holders (whose "operator" is EU based etc) and who do not have JAA/EASA papers, get shafted by EASA FCL.
Anyway, FAA IR holders who don't have 25hrs instrument time need to log every little bit of instrument time they can!
It's easy to not bother with the 5 mins spent transiting a cloud layer, but on most carefully planned flights at Eurocontrol cruise altitudes that will be your only chance to build the 25hrs.
