but i do take home about 15k per month of which 12k is disposable income.
That is a very good budget for buying something very capable and for doing a lot of flying.
However there is another big thing in aviation which money cannot do very much about: the time it takes to get trained (to learn basic flying) and then to learn about "real" flying (going places) which you won't learn about at any flying school.
If you are looking at travelling on business, and you are looking at a really good despatch rate (say 95%) then you will need something a lot better than a PA28. You will need a plane which has a certain level of equipment
The cost of acquiring something suitable will vary. In general you can buy something old, pay little, but pay lots in running and maintenance costs. Or you can buy something new or newer, pay a lot for it, but get years of relatively hassle free flying.
If you want really good capability then you are looking at a turboprop and that will cost you in the region of £1M.
But there is "business flying" and there is "business flying". If you are doing formal customer visits then you need to definitely arrive. In the UK and most of Europe, you also usually need to conceal your means of travel from your customers otherwise they will object to paying for what they see as an expensive hobby. However if you fly to suppliers, business associates, exhibitions, etc, and you can to some degree choose the date/time or the means of travel then a lot more is possible and less capability is needed.
Very rough rules of thumb would be: a 50% despatch rate can be done on a plain PPL, flying VFR. 75% needs a PPL/IR and a capable aircraft (better than a PA28). 95% needs a fully equipped aircraft (de-ice and radar). 99% would need a turboprop.
Yourself, you will need an instrument rating, on top of the PPL. You will need a PPL/IR. But a PPL/IR alone won't teach you to fly usefully around Europe. There is a significant learning curve beyond that.
Many people wonder if they can learn to fly and then fly on their own business. You certainly can, but the required capability takes much more time and money to acquire than most would believe. Aviation is a grotesquely over-regulated world...
You can read some notes on my aircraft ownership here and some trip writeups here. However none of the trip writeups describe trips done to meet a customer.
Peter, much of what you say is correct however if the OP wants to fly for business just around the UK the requirements are perhaps a bit lower.
For UK only you can get by on the IMC Rating, but that forces you to fly at low levels (generally). That is OK in the summer, but in the winter it can keep you in icing conditions for the whole enroute section, whereas with an IR you could just climb up to FL100-150 and sit there in sunshine - example
Note that he also said "If license is completed in Norway will i be able to fly within Uk and Europe? ".
I was talking about the bit:
ability to climb to 25000ft or higher, which implies pressurisation (or alternatively something capable of boring through possibly heavy icing conditions for hours)
which is perhaps overkill for UK only. The rating is not however I agree.
you guys are the best, i wasn't expecting so much help, you have saved me hours of challenging research. i owe you all a beer ;)
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25k capability is for outclimbing "organised IMC".
It will take care of some 99% of warm fronts, and most cold fronts don't have solid IMC above that (CBs can go much higher of course but you will see them visually).
The alternative is really good de-ice equipment - or avoiding frontal weather which is what I do, in essence.
In the end it comes down to the desired despatch rate. Mine is c. 75% which does what I need. That is what one needs to decide on. A lot of people think they can get a PPL and get 100%, especially if they read the Cirrus "like a car" adverts.
In the end it comes down to the desired despatch rate. Mine is c. 75% which does what I need. That is what one needs to decide on. A lot of people think they can get a PPL and get 100%, especially if they read the Cirrus "like a car" adverts.
I completely agree. I had a very high dispatch rate in the Mirage (100% since arrival in the UK) but it was with deice and FL250. And prob some luck. A few flights were delayed and some nearly diverted but altitude and deicing make all the difference. Obviously an IR is essential in that.
TWO distinct types of flying. Different as 'chalk & cheese'.
You get them muddled up at your peril.
VFR - Visual Flight Rules. You can (must) see the ground and a good distance in front of you.
This is all you will do, in essence, while gaining your PPL and after for that matter.
Flying in bad weather is NOT and option.
The next steep, which is a big one, and not to be rushed into is:-
IFR - Instrument Flight Rules. Controlling the aircraft with sole reference to it's instruments.
This gets complected.
The British have a rating called IMCr (Instrument Meteorological Conditions rating) which is a 'watered down' version of the full IR (Instrument Rating) which all the airline boys have (must have) and many pilots on this forum have in either a European or American format (more complications).
This Brit. IMCr (I have one) is not valid outside the UK (basically).
The British IMCr is in for the 'chop' - if you gain one before (can't recall the date) you will be able fly IMC in the UK only)
One the continent I have to stay VFR, with corresponding restriction on what I can legally do (type of weather I can fly in).
ATPIT the only way you can fly in Europe in IMC (Instrument Meteorological Conditions) is to have a full IR.
There is talk about some 'parts' of the British IMCr been usable in Europe (another story) and it will be know as the IMCR (capital R for 'Restricted').
A full IR is a demanding and expensive rating to gain and maintain and Europe is under pressure to come up with something more suitable to the PPL, but they seem to think that the existing British IMCr is not good enough!!!!!
IR flying needs a suitable equipped aircraft, and at the 'top end' an autopilot is very nice bit of kit to have thank you very much!!!
I may not have explained this totally correctly, but its the gist.
IMHO thinking of 'instrument flying' before you've got your 'visual' PPL is rushing things a bit.
1) License - Norway is part of EASA (list of countries here), so that's taken care of. You'll have an EASA PPL, valid everywhere in wonderful Euroland and adjacent territories
I thought an EASA PPL is valid in every ICAO country, LAPL is only valid in EASAland.
VFR - Visual Flight Rules. You can (must) see the ground and a good distance in front of you.
Unless that is yet another UK peculiarity, it's not true. You must see your orientation in space and possible obstacles in all 3 dimensions with a certain distance from them. VFR on top of a solid cloud layer is common. In some airspaces/countries/with some airplanes it's not allowed.
Go to a flying school, take a demo flight and signup for a PPL. Then see how that goes. It is hard to explain and understand all the various limitations of flying and being a rookie, one tends to totally overestimate the capabilities and practicability of private flying.
