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With your Private Pilot’s Licence (PPL), the world opens up to you like never before. You will be able to travel to new places and experience life from an entirely different perspective.

South Coast Flying Group operates a CAA Declared Training Organisation (DTO), with registration number GBR.DTO.0170.

We offer training for: Light Aircraft Pilot Licence; Light Aircraft Pilot Licence to Private Pilot Licence; Private Pilot Licence; Class Rating (A) SEP (Land), TMG, etc.; Night Rating and IMC from Shoreham Airport in West Sussex.

Due to being a members group we only take on a couple of students at a time, to keep good availability of aircraft hire. Please enquire to see if we have any spaces available for student.

Take a look at what’s possible

With your Private Pilot’s Licence (PPL), the world opens up to you like never before. You will be able to travel to new places and experience life from an entirely different perspective.

A Private Pilot Licence is the minimum licence you will need to fly a plane solo. It allows you to control a non-commercial private aircraft and can either be the best way of taking up flying as a hobby or a great first step to starting your commercial pilots career.

Training Facilities

As a Declared Training Organisation (DTO) that is registered with the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA), South Coast Flying Group is able to train pilots from scratch.

You can only learn to fly with a certified training organisation, like SCFG, and it’s worth looking around to find one with good aircraft availability and reasonable membership requirements.

For a UK Private Pilot’s Licence for a fixed-wing aircraft, the PPL(A), you will need to prove at least 45 hours’ flying time, which includes a minimum amount of time flying solo. You will need to pass nine written exams, most probably a practical radio exam if you plan to fly in controlled airspace, and a final practical flight exam, known as the ‘skill test’.

You have to be declared medically fit to fly, by issue of a Class 2 certificate, by an aeromedical examiner (AME) but note these specialist doctors are few and far between – it’s most unlikely your GP is an AME. The CAA website has many resources for aspiring pilots, which can be found here.

Your Private Pilots License (PPL)

At the end of all this, if you are granted your licence, you will be able to fly in a fairly basic aircraft. You can’t get your PPL and then jump in any plane you like, nor can you fly any other type of aircraft such as a helicopter, hot air balloon or glider. You won’t be able to fly at night, in cloud, if it’s too windy etc. In fact, any additional qualification or ‘rating’, will require more training, more time and more money.

Your plane will have a single, piston-powered engine, a fixed pitch propeller and fixed landing gear, i.e. it doesn’t retract after take-off. It will probably take either two or four people but if any of them is large in any dimension and you want to have enough fuel to go very far, they will probably need to stay on the ground.

Instructors’ Fees

Few, if any, people make much money from general aviation (GA) and when you consider the cost of an hour’s instruction is a fraction of that of a plumber or car mechanic, you start to see why. Most instructors are self-employed and charge a very modest amount for their time, anywhere between £40-60 per hour, depending on what they are providing training for.

Like planes, instructors also tend to charge for their time when the propeller is turning although they also charge for ground school training and many of them are CAA-certified examiners who can take you through the written part of the course.

SCFG has instructors who can take students through almost all aspects of their training and then on to additional qualifications (or ‘ratings’) such as a night rating, IMC rating and even aerobatics. The Club also has examiners available for most PPL ratings and is well connected for other courses such as Radio-Telephony (RT).

Save Time

We use a cloud-based booking, flight-logging and billing system that reduces paperwork and admin.

Save Money

There is no need to buy shares or pay into costly maintenance funds. A low monthly fee is all that’s required for members to access all of our services.

Go Flying

Once your license and medical status are confirmed, you must have a check-ride with one of our instructors, then you are free to hire our aircraft.

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