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Flying abroad

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Hi, is a small plane like a Cessna or piper warrier, capable and suitable for flying to Spain/Italy, has anyone ever gone as fas as turkey...

Is it practical to actual fly somewhere like this, stay their for 3/4 nights and then return to uk... Just like your thoughts on this ?

NAte

bristol, oslo

Absolutely! I've flown Cessnas all across Europe, around southern Africa, through Australia and around the western US. And, as you see, lived to tell the tale ;)

Others have flown them (or Pipers) around the world, across the Pacific, you name it.

Now, as for doing this flying from the UK, here it gets a bit trickier (and pricier), as most rental outfits have a certain minimum of hours per day. Mind you, this normally is calculated on a cumulative basis.

Here's an example: the stipulation is minimum 2 hours/day. You fly from the UK to southern Spain, in a spamcan approx 10 hours flying. You do this over 2 days. You then stay 4 days, with the a/c parked, then fly back, again over 2 days.
Total days away - 8
Minimum billable - 16 hours (8x2)
Total flying time - 20 hours
So - you've been away, but flown more than the minimum, so no probs.

It does take some planning, but I've done some fantastic touring as a renter. If you want to do it, it works!

Hi Nate

It is :-) It will require some planning and research, and if you dont have an IR (which I dont), then you need some luck with the weather. Have a look at the 'Articles' tab above. I wrote an article recently that describes my flight from Panshanger to La Rochelle, but there are other excellent reports from people who have done much longer trips. In essence what I did could be extended beyond La rochelle, and some others from my airfield took their PA28's onto Tenerife a few days before. My limitation was time and money really.

Now, as for doing this flying from the UK, here it gets a bit trickier (and pricier), as most rental outfits have a certain minimum of hours per day.

Yes, I would add, it will be a lot easier to do this with an aircraft that you are paying a fuel only rate for (so no hire charges), and you have complete flexibility with your own time, and when the aircraft has to be back home.

Europe is generally easy, so long as you do the planning properly i.e. check airport opening hours, fuel, Customs etc. You can get decent charts for most of it so planning the route is easy also. There are various minor hassles, especially in the south, but basically it's easy.

Turkey is a bit on the margin. The airports there all involve permissions, and (for a foreigner) both internal and external flights need Customs airports (due to artefact smuggling I am told). I've been there and it was a non-event but local pilots organised the permission.

Whether it is "practical" depends on your view of "practical".

In a C150, Shoreham to Istanbul, c. 1400nm, is c. 10 fuel stops! You can probably knock off 2 fuel stops in one day before getting too shagged.

In a TB20, same trip, one fuel stop in Croatia, and total airborne time about 9hrs. A reckless (but very clever) pilot could do it nonstop, with some tailwind, and awfully interesting diversion options...

A PA28-161, say, would be between those two.

If you want to do Turkey nonstop then you need to spend serious money. Extra range, beyond the TB20 kind of figures, really jacks up the cost. Even the bottom end Citation jets aren't much better.

It would be a nice trip but you would need to take time and enjoy the stops. Just stopping for fuel is boring, wasteful, boring, and can be dodgy because the weather can change while you are sitting on the ground waiting for the bowser driver to fill up a couple of Ryanairs... plus they are an administrative hassle because (due to the "Ryanair effect") you probably can't file the flight plan for the next leg in advance.

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

while you are sitting on the ground waiting for the bowser driver to fill up a couple of Ryanairs.

This can happen at any regional airport. Was sitting in Friedrichshafen (no, not Aero) for 50 mins till SunExpress, Freebird and some other holiday jet was happy and full of Jet A1. There is definitely a pecking order.

United Kingdom

ok well sound like some of you have had some very exciting journeys, i do intend on buying an aircraft, and am self employed so rental costs and availability are not a problem...

I plan on doing my my IR, before 2014... but i hear some rules are changing in this area,or it will become unavailable to a ppl holder can anyone elaborate on what the changes are?

and whats the solution to any change ect, as it sound like a pilot is limited purely by the cloud formations unless they have the IR.....

bristol, oslo

Other will be able to elaborate, and Peter has some good links on the subject, but this is how it stands or looks just for Europe.

Currently

  • The UK has the IMC Rating which can be attached to a PPL
  • For UK and elsewhere you can attach a full IR to your PPL. There are 7 quite significant exams and about 50 hours of training + 2 checkrides.

Future

  • A En-Route Instrument rating (like IMCr but without use of approach aids like ILS/NDB) + greater access to controlled airspace.

  • A Competency Based full IR with much less theoretical knowledge and some allowance given for previous IFR experience

  • A full IR aimed for ATPL's

So it will be available to a PPL in a number of forms.

Limitations tend to be in terms of visibility, cloud base (some flying schools will have more stringent variations than the legal minimum), airspace, aircraft, currency and competency to name a few. There is a thing called "VMC on top" which basically means you can as a standard PPL, you fly on top of clouds without sight of the surface, but must have the means to get below cloud without going through cloud.

Ok cheers that has made it a lot clearer thanks mate

Nate

bristol, oslo

Just one small detail, I think:

IR with much less theoretical knowledge and some allowance given for previous IFR experience
A full IR aimed for ATPL's

The "CBM IR" proposal is actually for the one and the same "IR" in flight training terms but there are two theory exam options:

(a) some reduced exam set, perhaps 2-3 exams - private pilots will go for this

(b) the full 14 ATPL (CPL/IR) exam set - all commercial pilots will need to do those

If somebody does (a) and then decides to do a CPL, they will need to do all 14 exams (or the 9 CPL exams and then end up with a real CPL, plus an IR which is good for their PPL only).

The whole CBM IR proposal is still up for the behind closed doors political haggling so anything could happen.

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom
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