Question about training costs

"Mortimer Schnerd, RN" wrote:
80 hours is a hell of a long time. If I had to guess, I'd say you dragged it
out over too long a period, calendar wise. I flew every other day until I
was finished.

Having worked at a flight school, 80 hours is *not* uncommon or unusual;
40 hours is possible, but is *not* the norm (at least not at our school,
and it too was a Cessna Pilot Center, using their cirriculum). I don't
know what your situation was when you did your training, but most of our
customers flew twice/week except when nearing their checkrides.

Some students would take a couple of weeks off for family vacations, or
for the holidays, or for other personal priorities, and that always
requires some extra time for review when they return, but 80 hours
wasn't unusual at all.

unicate wrote:

Having worked at a flight school, 80 hours is *not* uncommon or unusual;
40 hours is possible, but is *not* the norm

It also depends on to what standards they teach. Are they happy to teach
you to the point to barely pass the checkride? Or do they want to make
you a safe pilot? Are they happy when you can somehow bring down the
plane on that 10'000 ft runway or do they expect a point landing where
you touch down within, say, 100 ft of the defined point each time? Do
they throw in a lesson of developed spin recovery and an introduction to
mountain flying? etc. etc.

Stefan

Stefan wrote:

It also depends on to what standards they teach. Are they happy to teach
you to the point to barely pass the checkride? Or do they want to make
you a safe pilot? Are they happy when you can somehow bring down the
plane on that 10'000 ft runway or do they expect a point landing where
you touch down within, say, 100 ft of the defined point each time? Do
they throw in a lesson of developed spin recovery and an introduction to
mountain flying? etc. etc.


You gotta be kidding me. I jad my checkride with a guy popularly known as "Col.
Goddamnit"... a retired USAF type who didn't suffer bad flying gracefully.
Trust me, I wasn't allowed to slide by the skin of my teeth. Nor was I unusual
in my area.

I was taught to make every landing a short field landing. That way, when
presented with a genuinely short field, it was no big deal; you didn't have to
do a thing differently. I was expected to touch down on the numbers,,, every
time. There was no "chop the throttle on the threshold" crap.

Stalls were expected to be full stalls. It didn't matter whether it was a light
single or a heavy twin. You might say it was getting ready to stall, but you
held the back pressure until it broke.

There's a lot of things that aren't taught today because the instructor is
afraid you'll kill him. Spins?



--
Mortimer Schnerd, RN

VE