Check Ride

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evapilotaz

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So I have been reading these check ride stories. I did my PPL Check Ride in 1998. From reading these check rides stories it seems the check rides are more difficult then when I did mine. I haven't done a check ride since. I do not have any additional ratings. Just a recent flight review. I read somewhere someone Oral lasted 3 hours. :dunno: Mine lasted an hour and was very casual. The flight part was an hour as well not including preflight the plane. I paid the DPE $250 for my ride. It appears people are paying upwards to $500 :hairraise:

Just wondering what the deal is.
 
I can tell you the going rate for checkrides is at least $500 now.

Of the three checkrides I've taken, the DPEs were all professional and fair, so no complaints. Note, these were all 1998 and later.
 
At least $500. Why so much! I'm in the wrong business I guess.
I so glad I did my PPL Training in 1998. I think my costs were around $4500 in a C150.
 
My observation is that the flight part hasn't changed much but the oral has gotten more difficult, the FAA as essentially changed the definition of "Satisfactory Knowledge" of many of the topics, While the PTS standards haven't really changed, what the FAA/Examiners consider Satisfactory Knowledge has. The oral for private pilot topics is essentially done to what used to be considered commercial level knowledge.

Brian
 
Oral is more involved. They follow PTS pretty strictly - and it has grown over the years with special emphasis items. I paid $800 for my Multi Engine Checkride just 2 weeks ago!
 
evapilotaz said:
So I have been reading these check ride stories. I did my PPL Check Ride in 1998. From reading these check rides stories it seems the check rides are more difficult then when I did mine. I haven't done a check ride since. I do not have any additional ratings. Just a recent flight review. I read somewhere someone Oral lasted 3 hours. :dunno: Mine lasted an hour and was very casual. The flight part was an hour as well not including preflight the plane. I paid the DPE $250 for my ride. It appears people are paying upwards to $500 :hairraise:

Just wondering what the deal is.
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The average oral is 2.5, the flight 2. I have heard of some taking 4 for the oral, that must be like taking 5 writtens. It is supposed to depend on how deeply the DPE thinks they have to drill when a candidate is missing more than they should. The DPEs dont get paid by the hour, so taking a long time is a problem for them too.
 
My private oral was about 1.5 hours with about 1.5 in the air. My instrument oral was 2.5 hours and flying was again 1.5 hours. My commercial oral was about 3 hours and flying for 1.5. I paid 450 for my imstrument and commerical and forgot how much the DPE charged for my private certificate. I found my commerical ride the easiest and my private was hardest.
 
As I recall it was a long time ago (early 90s) my oral was about an hour maybe a little longer with reviewing my flight plan certainly not nearly as difficult as some I have read about since. I did score high 90s on the written and I remember he focused mainly on the few questions I missed. Flight was exactly 1 hour according to the log book I would say we covered everything I had expected we would. Also as I explained in another post here we started at his airport (Class C) and finished at my home airport (uncontrolled) and he let me drive him back so we didn't need to fly back which save me a bunch of time.
 
I think there's some skew in the data, as you're only hearing the bad stories here.

My students' orals are about 1.5 and flying is about 2.0
 
Took my private check ride in August 2013. The DPE charged $300, 1hr oral, 1.2 hour flight. Took the ride in a C152 at $88/hr. The equipment isn't new with fancy avionics, but it did the job. I took the cheapest route possible and luckily had a flight school nearby who cares about keeping cost down for students.
 
I'll chime in.
I did every check ride but my private with a Fed. It was so much more relaxing with a fed. I was given an oral. At no time did the fed try to stump me or ask anything ridiculous. Just straight forward like on my instrument rating what symbols were on an approach plated etc etc.
the check rides with the Feds were straight forward. Nothing outlandish. They combined lots of maneuvers so it didn't seem like I had to do every single maneuver.
They also had a way to put me at ease as I was nervous. For my ATP, the oral was more like a conversation.
Back then, the DE for my private charged me $100
For everything else up to ATP was free! In fact after my ATP the fed thanked me for calling. They said they don't do check rides often but enjoy doing them when they can.
 
And the Feds are not out to fail anyone. They want to see you pass
 
From what I've heard, they won't setup an appointment to do a checkride in any sort of reasonable timeframe.

That's just 2nd hand though.
 
Private: 2.0 oral, 2.0 flight.
Instrument: 1.0 oral, 1.5 flight
Commercial: 0.7 oral, 1.3 flight
ME add on: 0.3 oral, 1.0 flight
 
evapilotaz said:
So why didn't everyone use Feds or is that not an option anymore?
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It's an option technically, but not realistically. I asked about just out of curiosity and was told the FSDO won't even talk to you unless you're doing a CFI ride. The reality is that DPE's are the way to go.

The most I paid for a checkride was $400 in 2012, and that was in the DC area which I would expect to be towards the top end. We did about a 2 hour oral (for IFR checkride) and then maybe 1.3 on the hobbs, so about 4 hours from start to finish. I can't imagine giving more than 1 checkride a day, so $300-$400 seems pretty fair to me for a good examiner.
 
kgruber said:
Free.....with the FAA.
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Aw c'mon, Karl. I took my private in 62 from a DE, my commercial and instrument in 66, both from DEs. Took my CFI from FAA inspector Roller and my CFII and ATP from Weldon. You should remember those names. Gotta admit that the writtens were free.

Bob Gardner
 
evapilotaz said:
So I have been reading these check ride stories. I did my PPL Check Ride in 1998. From reading these check rides stories it seems the check rides are more difficult then when I did mine. I haven't done a check ride since. I do not have any additional ratings. Just a recent flight review. I read somewhere someone Oral lasted 3 hours. :dunno: Mine lasted an hour and was very casual. The flight part was an hour as well not including preflight the plane. I paid the DPE $250 for my ride. It appears people are paying upwards to $500 :hairraise:

Just wondering what the deal is.
Click to expand...

When I was an examiner in the 70s I got fifty bucks.

Bob Gardner
 
evapilotaz said:
What was check rides like it the 60's or 70's?
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That was before there was such a thing as a PTS. Examiners worked from an Advisory Circular for each rating/certificate; it was about 4" by 8" and fit in a shirt pocket. Examiners were permitted to select items on which to test the applicant. Applicants were given a destination for a cross-country and 45 minutes to come up with a flight log. That portion, at least, is easier today because the examiner is supposed to provide the destination in advance, just like real life.

Bob Gardner
 
bobmrg said:
When I was an examiner in the 70s I got fifty bucks.

Bob Gardner
Click to expand...

That's probably what I paid in 1974. The DPE was from another airport about 30nm away. Another student flew to the airport, did his oral and did the flight portion while flying back to our home airport.

The DPE finished up with him, climbed out of that C-152 and into mine. He sits there and says plan a trip to xxx. I stand at the door with the seat back down as a desk, draw a line on the chart, come up with a heading, tick off some check points and ete's, write up a flight plan to file, look up the A/FD data and we talk about calling FSS for weather and filing.

I already knew I would be taking him back to his airport and I had the weather for that. The xxx airport was right next door, he commented I had what I needed , let's go. Did most of the flight portion on the way to xxx, a couple of landings there and we stop for lunch. He called in his order on downwind and asked what I wanted, oh, just a burger for me.

After lunch we launched, did the rest of the air work on the way to his airport and a quick oral at his Flight school and I was done. First flight as a PP was to get back to my airport.
 
evapilotaz said:
I scored 94 on the written and the DPE said that was a good score so we will do a short oral test.
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I scored a 98 on the written. My oral lasted 1 hour! The DPE remarked that my high score was "showing off," and that the oral would just cover the required material because clearly I knew my stuff. I was not trying to show off with the 98 I just figured it's my life on the line and I don't want to not know something.

My flight part was 1.2 hours and felt very rushed as we were racing darkness and basically plowed through the maneuvers real fast.
 
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