Bendy's big adventure? What happened with this?

[Itchy]

Years and years ago Bendy who I might add hasn't been seen for years wrote about buying a share in a light aircraft. She was going to fly across Europe.

What ever happened to this?

Secondly how would one go about undergoing a similar adventure? I've looked at options and a PPL licence is £3000 or so +/- 25% for failing exams etc.

Question is what happens when you get over the channel into non UK airspace and or farther beyond this?

While there are of course specialist forums I'm just wondering if BCF has any experience.

Thanks
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[.....]

Dunno much about it but many years ago a mate of mine flew to America and did and intensive PPL type course over there, he said it worked out much cheaper. Last I heard he was flying fighters in the RAF.

[chickenstrip]

[Polarbear]

She certainly had an aeroplane, I remember her posting a picture of it.
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[Teflon-Mike]

If I reccolect, Bendy did her 'Ameteur Aviator Licence', ie microlytes, rather than Private Pioits. It was always a lot cheaper, and since Y2K they have chaged the regs a lot, and 'microlytes' haven't been hangliders with a strimmer engine on the back for a long while.

Unc, was very into them from the early 90's, starting with a 'weight shift' which is like a wheel barrow with a snomilbile engine on the handles, hung under a kite! Progressed to a 'fixed wing' i the mid 90's, which was like a propper aeroplene... until you got in it, and it was like sitting in a very small tend in the air! That had the sno-mobie motor infront of you; and his was actually on the boarder-line for the weight limit between being a microlite and a light aeroplene.. so close i fact that he had to remove the aviation radio fro the cock-pit before he took it for inspection, as that was the weight difference between the two!

His last one, I think had a VW beetle engine, thanks to reg changes, that meant he didn't have t make equipment 'removeable' and he was wowed that he could actually keep the electric starter!

Oh-Kay.... beyond the Ameteur-Pilots-Licence to fly one; there are a few other certificates you need to get before yo can start doing much more than flying around the air-strip.

First one is the Radio Operators licence; which you need to have to be able to talk to air-traffic-control; which is pretty much needed if you want to fly into licenced air-strips; as you need to ask permission to land, from the air.

That will let you fly aroud bits of the UK from air=strip to air-trip, flying under whats kown as Visual Flight Rules, which basically mean look out the window, dont crash ito anyone/thing!

But, you also need yuur navigators tickets, to say you can read a map, and plot your location, so you dont fly into controlled air-space; which may be required before you get your pilots licence, or on of the tckets will be.

After that; flying ameteur rules, I believe regulations are pretty 'lax', which s tent of the scheme, ad you dont have to file pre-flight plans and stuff; you can get in and go; BUT flying out of distraction, there are rules and protocols you have to abide by, say flying into France, like registering your presence in French airspace with local air-traffic, and I think even making a customs declaration!

Unc used to regularly fly out to Normandy to visit friends at their Chateau, and he shrugged off the 'red-tape', it was apparently 'negligible'....

He did a number of more extensive international tours; flyng into Northern Italy a few times, and I am pretty sure, hopping over the Aegean to Croatia, to drop in on friends he'd made over there i the early 90's when he did a few 'relief runs' in a tyranny van.

His biggest international, he & his missus did, was, oooh, about 2010 I think; they sent a week, in convoy with a dozen other microlyters, flyng accrss Germany & Plans & the Ukraine, to Moscow!

Under Ameteur Pilot rules, they didn't have to file flight plans and stick to them, and he commented that as an organised 'Club'Air-Rally' with club officials doing all the more daunting paper-work, it was easier than flying from the midlands to the Scottish highlands! Along with a quip that it was just as well that they dont have plice planes with plod armed with breathalizers, as their over nght stops were usually vinyards, and most of them were rather worse for wear by the time they got into the air each morning!

So, Ameteur 'microlyte' aviation is a lot more accessible than private pilots... B-U-T.. no longer anywhere as 'cheap' it seems.

When he got into it, probably around '91/92, think he bought the flex-wing pegaus for about a grand, and spent about as much again to get all his tickets; trying to get me to do to too, pointing out it was as heap as my motorbike.

He turned up a month ago, in a Bentley...."Yeah, well, I have given up the kite!" He said.."Man has to have something to get up for in the morning!" He'd been grounded for a year due to a heart murmer, a few years before; and determined to get back, the escalated costs hit him, and that £1000 cheaper to run than a moped, strimmer powered kite, was a £30K air-craft, that cost more to run than... well, a Bently!

So suspect that ametuer pilot s still a lot cheaper than private pilot, but both are these days far fro 'cheap', ad that inter-continental tours, he did in the sports hey-day, are probably no where ear as 'easy'

But there's the hint; research Amateur Aviation and Microlytes, rather than Private Pilots ad Light Aircraft.
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[mentalboy]

[Omega]

I've been looking and as far as I can see the NPPL is still the cheapest and easiest way to get flying something that resembles an aeroplane. It only allows you to fly in the UK but you can fly Bendy's Ikarus during daylight hours and in decent weather with one.

Shares in an Ikarus are available near me for about 35 quid a month and then costs are roughly 40 quid per hour.

I was considering a commercial license but jobs are much too far from certain to make it worth the investment.

Bendy has a video on YouTube introducing her plane. I this k the channel is called flight of Ikarus. The team have a website too but it didn't get updated after the challenge.

[MarJay]

The European flight happened. The record attempt happened, I don't think they broke the record.

Bendy has an NPPL, not a PPL as far as I'm aware, and it allows her to fly microlights. I think since the record attempt she has been very busy with work and hasn't done a great deal of flying. I've not spoken to her for a while though, so I'm not sure. I'm pretty sure she doesn't come onto the forum any more though.

The NPPL was much cheaper than a PPL, and I've heard a lot of bad stuff spoken about the Florida earned PPL's and the lack of experience in the complex UK airspace.
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