There is a huge difference, though.
Norway, for example – you fly mostly in radio contact, changing VFR to IFR is easy (well, at least in my experience, I did it twice only), just request a climb IFR and off you go.
Or UK class G – you just change to IFR (remember – the IFR are simply “fly 1000ft above the highest obstacle within 8km around the estimated aircraft position”) and do whatever you want. Get a traffic service if you want, but not required.
In Germany – huge faff with flight plan filing in the air, the “magic band” between bottom of class E and MRVA you can’t get an IFR clearance through, and the claimed illegality of IFR in class G don’t help.
UK Class A is similar to Germany, or even worse.
Aviathor wrote:
MedEwok wrote:
Back when you did your PPL, did you fly through clouds with your instructor, to get a feeling for what it feels like?
My instructor did that with me at the controls not long ago.
I think doing this under VFR is setting a really bad example for the student by an authority figure. And it is of course completely illegal.
If you want IMC experience, go fly IFR in IMC with a qualified instructor, or on a simulator.
As everyone else I did my 5 mandatory instrument hours during the PPL. While it is useful to learn 180 in actual cloud in straight and level flight, or descending 5s trough a 7/8 BKN where you can gauge the clouds thickness, but you shouldn’t take a habit of doing this. The trick here is to not get confident, cocky VFR pilots have a high attrition rate. When you have prepared for a VFR flight, you know when you enter clouds, you don’t know when you exit them.
You feel very lonely in solid IMC. I had to do it once, of all the weather sites we had looked at, none was even close to how bad it actually was (BKN025 was OVC002). Probably a very local effect, and short lived, by the time we were on the ground it was clear blue sky. I can tell you I was happy to have 10h of IFR simulator under the belt, and very thankful the autopilot kept the wings straight for me while I could focus on getting out of that mess. It took a whole 5s to be disorientated, which never happened with the foggles (even when looking down on the panel I still see a glimpse of horizon in peripheral vision).
Don’t get confident. You do not have the skills. You will kill yourself.
My 5 cents.
Arne wrote:
It took a whole 5s to be disorientated, which never happened with the foggles
I have occasionally felt disoriented when transitioning from VMC to IMC with view limiting devices. Not a big disorientation, but could notice I had to get a better scan in order to keep things the same.
MedEwok wrote:
IMHO the entire differentiation between VFR and IFR is arbitrary and outdated, at least for training purposes
First, I don’t think it’s outdated. The conditions didn’t really change, did they?
It may be arbitrary to some extend, in that it couples the different flying that is required in IMC to a “system” of flight plans, MRVAs, ATC coordination, slots, SIDs, IAPs, etc.
I agree with you in that it is conceivable to enable a system of instrument flying without that entire administrative circus around it. That, of course, exists to various degrees – e.g. IFR in class G in the UK (and in theory, in all “EASA-land”), pop-up IFR clearances in the US, and even the new EASA ratings E-IR and BIR are a way of reducing complexity of IFR flight.
But let’s not be fooled: Flying safely and competetently in IMC requires a whole different skillset (and really, simply, training and currency, because we are no machines, are we) and that hasn’t changed and isn’t arbitrary at all.
MedEwok wrote:
I think because IMC is a normal occurence here in Northern Europe, dealing with it should be part of the standard pilot training
There’s many things that you could argue should be part of “standard pilot training” – all for good reasons (IMC, night, GPS, flying abroad, flying basic aerobatics, …). Yet each element you add will increase the barrier for new PPLs, because it will be harder and more expensive to do the first step. The new EASA ratings are IMHO are very good way to encourage people to step up further without a huge amount of effort – although the number of E-IR holders and aspirants currently are still disappointing, as far as I know.
Patrick wrote:
But let’s not be fooled: Flying safely and competetently in IMC requires a whole different skillset (and really, simply, training and currency, because we are no machines, are we) and that hasn’t changed and isn’t arbitrary at all.
Exactly. As I wrote above, those 50 training hours required to gain an instrument rating (a few less for the CB-IR, but still 35 IIRC) have not been established to create income for the flying schools. There are natural talents out there you could finish their PPL in 25 hours and an IR in a additional 20. But the average student needs all the hours allocated fo the training (at least most of the students in whose training I was involved did). Which means that removing that “arbitrary” distinction between PPL and IR training would double the number of training hours and of course the cost of the license. For what purpose?
I think because IMC is a normal occurence here in Northern Europe, dealing with it should be part of the standard pilot training
It’s always amusing to see an intelligent, educated and scientifically minded person get into the PPL business, and see which bits they would like to change 
I won’t claim to be any of the above but I used to do exactly the same, asking questions which used to drive instructors mad. One of my best ones was asking a famous career instructor/examiner (who was at the time a part time solicitor also) what stops one just flying across to France at 100ft, below the radar… she got very upset and very pompously too
If flying was invented today, it would be banned, because it is so obviously unsafe! But assuming it wasn’t banned:
But we are where we are. We have the PPL, with the 10k price tag, which is nearly useless IF used absolutely 100% legally, except on Sunny Sundays. We have the PPL/IR with the 30k price tag, which almost nobody is doing (partly this is because you need a lot more mental agility, good access to a decent plane, etc… if you gave a PPL/IR to every PPL holder, some 95% of them would find it useless).
And the training industry and the whole supporting airfield infrastructure has to make money somehow. They need the 10k product even if it isn’t very useful. A 30k product would kill it.
An ultralight PPL won’t cost much less if you want to train pilots who can reads tafs/metars, read a map, avoid CAS etc and won’t bust the local big airport CTR in a 30-up formation non-radio (happens fairly often) 
The best thing one can do if one wants real capability is
I also think there is a big difference between a flight planned to enter IMC (usually conducted by a pilot with an IR following an IFR flight plan), and one that enters IMC unplanned (usually from a VFR flights).
In the first case, you are planning to enter IMC, and when you so, things have settled down, you know the heading you and altitude you need to follow, you know your route, and you know your plan for getting back down. A nice calm environment.
The second one, an unplanned entering of IMC, is more challenging. You were probably dealing with bad weather, leaving your original plan trying to find a way around it, and end up entering IMC without a plan for how you’re going to get to where you’re going, how you’re going to get back down, and what terrain you need to avoid etc.
The second situation is much more challenging, and probably taken on by a pilot who is less skilled with IFR flight. Really a bad combindation!
dublinpilot wrote:
n the first case, you are planning to enter IMC, and when you so, things have settled down, you know the heading you and altitude you need to follow, you know your route, and you know your plan for getting back down. A nice calm environment.The second one, an unplanned entering of IMC, is more challenging. You were probably dealing with bad weather, leaving your original plan trying to find a way around it, and end up entering IMC without a plan for how you’re going to get to where you’re going, how you’re going to get back down, and what terrain you need to avoid etc.
The second situation is much more challenging, and probably taken on by a pilot who is less skilled with IFR flight. Really a bad combindation!
I have occasionally entered IMC in class G without a flight plan (both legal and practical in Sweden up to the highest of 3000’ GND / 5000’ MSL) just for a bit of airwork in actual instrument conditions. I have an IR and in all cases the cloud base was well above the MSA but I still felt slightly uneasy.
That sort of thing needs to be done frequently – every week or two. In IMC you are only as current as your last flight
Peter wrote:
But we are where we are. We have the PPL, with the 10k price tag, which is nearly useless IF used absolutely 100% legally, except on Sunny Sundays.
This is simply not true, not even for the UK. Around here, there are very few days (maybe 50 per year?) on which you can not legally fly VFR. There are far more days when you can’t legally fly IFR with a light aircraft because it is not certified for icing. At typical SEP IF flight levels (maybe FL50..150) one can encounter ice on 200 days per year in central Europe.
