Advice before starting pvt pilot training
A buddy in CA (near San Luis Obispo) is looking to start his private pilot training, and emailed me asking for tips. These are mine so far. Pilots, aviation types, please feel free to add your thoughts to the comments.
- Take a ground school. Most places don’t require it but will offer it – you might have to ask. You’ll spend a lot less money over the course of your training. You pay your instructor by the hour, and you’re billed a ground instruction rate and a flight instruction rate. If you do the ground school, you’ll have a small classroom setting, and spend less time learning from your CFI the things you would have learned in ground school.
- One of the more intimidating aspects is the radio/communications. Chances are you’ll be at a non-towered field. That means there is no one in the tower telling you what to do. It is a little like a 4 way stop instead of a traffic light. No big deal. You just announce where you are, what you’re doing.You will be flying in controlled (talking to ATC) airspace at least some of the time. liveatc.net is a great resource when you’re on the ground. You can listen to live air traffic control. You won’t understand anything they’re saying at first. Don’t worry about it. You’ll start to recognize phrases even if they don’t entirely make sense. They will in time. By listening to it, you’ll start to pick up the cadence – which is important because having that feel of the cadence lets you quickly decipher a set of rapid-fire instructions. Once you’re used to listening and talking on the radio, it isn’t nearly as fast as it seems.
KSBP (San Luis County Regional Airport) is southeast of San Luis Obispo, and it is a towered field. The tower is open from 0600-2000 (6am to 8pm). Outside of those hours it is as if there weren’t a tower. You can listen to KSBP at liveatc: http://www.liveatc.net/search/?icao=KSBP I wouldn’t expect to hear a whole lot though, it is class D airspace like Bolton – from the stats SBP looks to be maybe a little busier than Bolton.
I personally like flying out of a towered field. I’m 100% responsible for my aircraft, but it is nice to know someone else is watching out for me.
- Grab MSFT flight simulator and a flight yoke. Maybe rudder pedals. I know it sounds dumb, but it helps. If nothing else, you’re a little more familiar with the instrument panel, and things like what to expect the needles on the VOR (one of the nav instruments) to do as you’re tooling around. My instructor was actually able to give me specific things to do in the sim to help me. Your MSFT sim time does *not* count for anything official. The sim is fairly accurate, but one thing it does not do for you is give you the physical sensation, which is a big part of private VFR flight.
March 16th, 2010 at 23:01
Congratulations on starting the aviation adventure! Here are my top 5 suggestions for getting started:
1.) Make sure the instructor’s teaching style and your learning style match. Your life depends on the skills you learn, and you need to be focused on those skills and not on figuring out what the instructor is teaching or how to communicate with him.
2.) Ask the potential instructor to show you the syllabus he uses. If he doesn’t have one, find a new instructor.
3.) For ground school, get the DVDs and test prep software from Sporty’s or King Schools. Both are well done, and can get you the most of the knowledge portion at a very reasonable cost. Ground instruction with your CFI will fill in the weak spots and any areas you have trouble understanding.
4.) Make sure you have the finances to fly at least 3 hours per week. More is better, but if you can’t commit to 3 hours a week for 20-25 weeks (typical total time to checkride), save up until you can.
5.) If possible, get some time (or even a rating) in a glider first, and/or do your first 10 hours or so of powered flying in a taildragger. You’ll be a better pilot for it. If you’re not able to do either, pay attention to how much your instructor emphasizes use of the rudder pedals. It should be a lot.
Feel free to e-mail me at w9mdc@arrl.net with any questions that come up, and keep me posted on your progress. I suppose I can count our flight in December as your “intro flight”!
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April 5th, 2010 at 20:00
This came across my twitter feed a few minutes ago: http://blog.aopa.org/letsgoflying/?p=613