PPL Ratings

Ratings and differences training are courses structured to enable you to learn new skills and increase your knowledge, as well as improve your existing skills. You can of course simply arrange some lessons to brush-up your basic flight skills.

IMC Rating

The IMC (Instrument Meteorological Conditions) rating is a very useful rating to improve a pilot's skills, particularly with regard to accurate flying and ATC liaison. It is, however, to be treated with caution as it is not a full Instrument Rating.

Before the rating is issued you must have 10 hours of solo flight subsquent to the issue of your PPL, to include 5 hours of navigation. We recommend that this is completed before you start the IMC course.

The course is a minimum of 15 hours, including instrument flying and instrument approaches. We mostly fly instrument approaches at Cranfield, Cambridge and Southend.

Night qualification

This course is a minimum of 5 hours during which you need to fly 5 solo departures and arrivals.

There is also an instrument flying requirement to be satisfied. We recommend that you have an IMC rating before you consider a night qualification, although night experience flights can be arranged before this stage. This caution is largely due to one's reduced options flying at night: few places are open, you cannot see the weather ahead and emergencies are even more difficult to manage than in daylight.