Menu Sign In Contact FAQ
Banner
Welcome to our forums

Flying Experimentals in Europe

Hello,

I did never look to Experimentals up to now, but i saw this one http://www.pilots24.com/grosser-flugzeugmarkt/ad/1-mots,6/experimental-bx-2-cherry-zu-verkaufen,3859.html#dj-classifieds and i like it, but i have no clou where i could fly it without problems.
Sure some of you know more here.

Thanks
Lucas

I have never flown an experimental outside of Norway myself, but I have never heard of anyone having had any problems whatsoever with this, experimental homebuilt as defined by EASA:

aircraft of which at least 51 % is built by an amateur, or a non-profit making association of amateurs, for their own purposes and without any commercial objective;

Other Annex II aircraft, such as vintage military aircraft, may be more problematic.

Amateur built aircraft are covered by the ECAC agreement found here.

The elephant is the circulation
ENVA ENOP ENMO, Norway

The ECAC doc is a recommendation not an agreement

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

Peter wrote:

The ECAC doc is a recommendation not an agreement

Potato Potato (how is that written in a meaningful way?). It is a recommendation to agree on a basic concept or to ratify the concept, like most international agreements are, including ICAO. That is why further down on that page I linked, the status of that ECAC recommendation is included.

There will also be a similar recommendation/agreement coming now for vintage aircraft, by ECAC.

The elephant is the circulation
ENVA ENOP ENMO, Norway

Hallo Lucas,

since that plane is on Swiss register and you are here as well, you can get in touch with the owner and talk to him.

The Brändli Cherry is a very popular plane, lovely design and quite nice to fly from what I hear. Max Brändli was a very nice guy.

The plane looks quite nice too.

There is a good site for Swiss Experimentals:

As it is purely VFR, you can fly it in most of Europe. The EAS Switzerland can give you all the information about this.

Last Edited by Mooney_Driver at 13 Dec 17:23
LSZH(work) LSZF (GA base), Switzerland

Be aware that some countries require a permit for flying Annex II aircraft in their airspace. I am ashamed to say my own country is one, and even requires some payment for it. I have however a feeling that this is not really enforced.
Also ISTR funny stories about Spain requiring such a permit, yet when one applies for it there never comes an answer.

EBZH Kiewit, Belgium

There is no known enforcement of this stuff.

But your insurance is probably void if a flight is illegal beforehand. That is what UK’s biggest insurer told me. This is a concern unless you think you will never need insurance. I do know people in that category.

Apparently Spain does sometimes reply but after months, which is useless. But then frankly the whole system of permit applications puts a huge damper on international flight. If you set up FR24 alerts on the main non CofA types and watch the flying patterns it’s obvious.

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

A couple of days ago I worked an European-reg RV8 on a domestic IFR flight. I did not inquire if he had an approval for this but actually I doubt it. Most of my colleagues did not even know the aircraft and don´t know anything about the difference of Certified / Annex2 / Experimental aircraft, so don´t expect to be inquired by ATC. A ramp check however might have a different outcome, those guys usually know the paragraphs.

EDFE, EDFZ, KMYF, Germany

Caba wrote:

A ramp check however might have a different outcome, those guys usually know the paragraphs.

I had one in EDLE last year. They told me (friendly), that EDLE is not approved for Microlights and obviously the Europa must be a Microlight since it is powered by a Rotax engine

EDLE

A Europa is definitely not a microlight.
What classifies an aircraft to be a Microlight tends to vary from country to country.
But generally a microlight weights less than 450 kgs with some addition weight allowed for float planes and if carrying a ballistic parachute..
And also additional requirements to do with wing area and stall speed.
So an aircraft that weights below 450kgs may not meet these definitions.
Just because its got a Rotax engine does not make it a microlight.
Theirs some Cessna 150/152,s around that have been re-engined with Rotax,s.

In the UK a small number of airfields have bans on microlight aircraft mainly to do with planning permission however these tend to go back to the old days when microlights first came about were mainly of the weight shift type and used old noisy engines.

As for IR in an experimental aircraft again can vary from country to country, In the UK the LAA are working on getting some permit aircraft to be IFR approved.
I think that some of the Nordic countries allow IFR in permit aircaft.

Southend, United Kingdom
14 Posts
Sign in to add your message

Back to Top