Hello and help! (PPL or LAPL or UL)

mh wrote:

Their reluctance to engange in any form of standidization discussion during the European harmonization of aviation led to the exclusion of microlight flight time towards the european pilot licenses

Wrong, or misleading. Microlight flight hours will count towards LAPL and PPL. However, this is country specific I believe as each country can set upper limits that are lower than what the EASA regulations open up for? In Norway, for PPL it is 10% of PIC in a microlight, but never more than 10 hours. For LAPL it is 50%, but max 15 hours.

You can get a LAPL in 30 h, and 15 of those hours can be as PIC in a microlight (airplane style microlight, not a trike or auto-gyro or something).

This means, you can start with a simple microlight, fly and have fun, then if you want something more, you can get the LAPL with only 15 h of flight training. You can also go to full PPL, but this requires 35 hours. You will also need the theory.

What you cannot do is to include microlight hours in a LAPL/PPL logbook. Microlight hours will only “count” when obtaining a LAPL/PPL license.

What the LAPL/PPL schools do not tell you is that very few get the license with the minimum hours (30/45) For them, this number is a theoretical minimum. I don’t know what the average is – 60 for a PPL with no flying background? Also, the quality of instructors vary hugely.

What the LAPL/PPL schools do not tell you is that very few get the license with the minimum hours (30/45) For them, this number is a theoretical minimum. I don’t know what the average is – 60 for a PPL with no flying background?

Yes, exactly, which is why

You can get a LAPL in 30 h

is meaningless. Almost nobody can do it in that time (genuine ab initio, obviously – if you have unlogged flying time then that’s different) and be able to go anywhere.

Also, the quality of instructors vary hugely.

It does everywhere…

Another reason most people take much longer is that most people fly only at weekends / cannot afford lessons too frequently / etc so they don’t build currency. In the UK the average PPL takes 1 year, when it could be done in about 4-6 weeks if you “lived” at the flying school and flew at every technically OK opportunity. But this affects all types of flying license.

LAP or PPL? Check requirements to carry pax. For LAPL you need to have 10 hrs AFTER license is granted. So you need to fly on your expense. So it’s worth flying that 10 hrs inside PPL training. so unless you have medical reason LAPL is not going to save you too much money.

I did it in Germany, which was only an introduction to the BRS system and one flight. A week later i had the UL licence. It expired after ten years, because i had the Piper …

Some of the UL’s i have flown (Savage, Remos, FK9, Dynamic, Pioneer, Breezer, Eurostar) are very nice and good light aircraft – and enough airplane for many pilots.

The Savage for example is a modern Cub design with very nice flying qualities. Tom, the German dealer, has landed his on top of Zugspitze, Germany’s tallest mountain with + 10 k ft, on skis.

This might be an extreme example, especially considering e.g. Switzerland is an EASA country, and I anticipate any Brexit that leads to a full exit from the single market would have to be a pragmatic one (and a longer-term affair), so I think of this as more of a rhetorical question which is useful in focusing my decisions on how to get airbourne covering all bases and getting the most versitile solution. Whilst I don’t want this post to get political (we’ve already been through a philosophical stage!), I quite fancy being able to fly-in to Shoreham (where I used to live), and other UK airports, (holding one or two licences but definately two passports!) from time to time to visit my home country unimpeded……

I am sure this will never be a problem. The UK CAA put a statement on its website, right after the Brexit vote, that they will continue with EASA. Anything else would not make any sense, practically speaking.

Also the UK does not separate the Customs v. Immigration facilities. Both are addressed by sending in the GAR form. Brexit may be an issue for the other (non UK) airport though; you will need to use a Customs+Immigration (rather than just Immigration) airport. However, again, most of Europe does not separate Customs and Immigration. The cases where they do are quite obscure and very few people knew about them anyway.

I would forget the LAPL though, for reasons already posted. The advantage is negligible and the limitations may be significant. For example if you have a full ICAO PPL then you can pick up a full standalone US (FAA) PPL by doing the 1 exam, a few hours of flight training, and a checkride, and that US PPL will be valid for life (needs a medical and a BFR every 2 years if you want to fly on it).

Jamie wrote:

If there are any pilots here who have been through the PPL/LAPL to ULM conversion

I did in Norway. Here the microlight license is 25 h. To take passengers you need a total of 50 flight hours, and a passenger check. From PPL to microlight it is this passenger check essentially, and an oral check (conversation really) to see if you know the microlight specific rules. You still have to have 50 flight hours to take passengers (which you may not theoretically have with a fresh PPL/LAPL). Anyway PPL to microlight is a non issue.

My main point is that microlight to LAPL is also very easy (15 h of training), and microlight license is 1/3 to 1/2 of a LAPL (1/4 to 1/3 of a PPL). There is no use taking a license to drive a bus, if a VW Golf or a motorcycle is OK with you. It is cheaper, faster and much more fun the other way (much more flying hours per €). As a hobby what you are looking for is value (fun per dollar if you want). You can be loaded with money, but find the EASA bureaucracy and all that follows a real PITA (low value). Likewise you can be tight on money, but find the total freedom or wind in the hair or oil on the fingers will give you the creeps (low value). It’s this value aspect you should investigate, and invest in when you have sorted it out. The fact that a PPL gives you the ability to fly a turboprop around the globe, means nothing if the value in that is irrelevant or you simple cannot afford it.

Jamie wrote:

It seems that with no prior flying experience, one may as well go for the full PPL vs the LAPL (I don’t think there is any reason I couldn’t get a Class II medical)

I think that is the right thing to do. I believe, the LAPL(A) is a niche license which is really only suitable in certain cases. One of them is, as you say, if you can’t get a class II medical. Another one is if you convert an LAPL(S). Another one is for people who want to get a license just to tick off a life achievement.

But we’ll know in a couple of years.

I believe, the LAPL(A) is a niche license which is really only suitable in certain cases.

Exactly. As the LSA license in the US, microlight license / LAPL in Germany are more often not seen as entry into aviation, but as means to keep flying when the pilot gets older and has found what kind of aviation he wants to retire with, with lately more momentug towards the LAPL over the microlight license, at least that is what the license numbers show.

Anyway the routing PPL and then Microlight offers all worlds for lowest money over beginning with the microlights.

Real cheap flying, however, is done with touring motorgliders. In our club the TMG is just 70% cost over the microlight with essentially similar restrictions.

@Jamie, you have a whole new universe with many possibilities to have fun waiting to be discovered. Don’t let anyone tell you that you only need to fly like he does and that you must just go solo for burger runs or tow gliders. Nice aviation but if you want to travel and have your aircraft take you to all kinds of places, then just go ahead, do so and enjoy the vast cultural differences accessible in short time only by general aviation. Above all: Always remember that you fly to have fun :-)

microlight license is 1/3 to 1/2 of a LAPL

No way. Or only if you again start to compare apples with bananas. Of course if you teach microlighting in a club and the LAPL in an expensive school, like when you compared self-maintaining a Dynamic against dropping off a ragged towplane at a maintenance shop. In our club the difference between LAPL and Microlight license is just 660€ if you consider minimum flight time. So LAPL first would be 1140€ cheaper to both licenses over going microlight first, even if the reduction of 15 hrs would be accepted from microlights towards LAPL. If (most likely) the experience is not credited you add 3135€ to both licenses, just by changing the order of licenses. Thus I can’t recommend going microlight first. I do recommend adding the license though, if the applicant is light enough to fit into the mass restrictions of Microlights. Same for the TMG.