Final Stretch!

jordane93

jordane93

Touchdown! Greaser!
Joined
Sep 9, 2013
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Long Island, NY
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Display name:
Jordan
I only have to do my spin training, one more flight and run through everything in the CFI PTS, and do some ground then I'll be ready to take me initial CFI-A! My CFI is setting me up with a DPE and he's had a pretty good record. My CFI signed off three intial CFI candidates within the past few months and they all passed on the first try. Another student from my school but with a different CFI passed the oral but failed the flight portion. He just went up a few days ago and passed. I got a chance to talk with the guys who took the CFI ride and it seems very straight forward. They all said their oral was about 3 hour and the first hour focused on FOI. I've been at this since October and between weather and scheduling I can finally see the light at the end of the tunnel! My CFI who happens to be the Chief instructor also said he would hire me which is awesome. I'm finishing up my last semester in college so it would be cool to start instructing part time while still going to school. I will give you guys an update on the results on my checkride.
 
You should be good to go,if you feel confident,that's a good thing. Good luck
 
Good luck man! Looking forward to reading your first post as a newly minted CFI!
 
frfly172 said:
You should be good to go,if you feel confident,that's a good thing. Good luck
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I feel pretty good about the oral except for the FOI. It's so dry and I'm still trying to learn the stuff. At least aviation related knowledge is interesting and I enjoy reading about it but the FOI stuff puts me to sleep.
 
kayoh190 said:
Good luck man! Looking forward to reading your first post as a newly minted CFI!
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I'm trying to get it knocked out this month. But between school, work and weather it's going to be tough. The days I don't go to school I'm working and I pretty much only fly once a week. I'm probably going to take a few days off from work to get it done.
 
NJP_MAN said:
That 3 hour oral sounds heavenly.
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Mine was 6.5 and we skipped FOI topics because I held a ground instructor rating.

No way in hell was I gonna correct the guy.

GL OP, It's so much easier after that initial is out of the way. The rest are almost fun.
 
schmookeeg said:
Mine was 6.5 and we skipped FOI topics because I held a ground instructor rating.

No way in hell was I gonna correct the guy.

GL OP, It's so much easier after that initial is out of the way. The rest are almost fun.
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I had an 8 hour affair.
 
Good luck. I'm sure you'll do well!
 
3 hours, wow. I thought I got off easy at 5.5. DPEs like to mess with you on the flight portion and get you flustered. Just be ready for it and follow your checklists!
 
My simulated engine failure happened during the slowest phase of 8s on pylons. The DPE was combining tasks and it was great because it saves time.
 
Awesome, you got it man!
 
Lucky you're doing your ride with a DPE vs a ASI at the FSDO.

That was the only ride I went into fully prepared, and fully expecting that I would fail the first time, per what I heard, passed it the first time with flying colors, it was a ALL DAY ordeal though.
 
Did the spin training today in a 152 and what a blast it was! We did some ground and he had me explain what a spin was, why we do spins, and how to do spins. We took off and climbed to 5,500 and he demonstrated a spin to the left and to the right with a few full rotations. He then had me demonstrate and talk though the spin entry and recovery. My first one was to the left and I think I only did one full turn. I did a few more to the left and right and that was it. The spin was the left was a lot easier to enter than the one from the right as I really had to bank and kick the rudder in. After we did a debriefing, critiqued me and signed my logbook. Overall it was a really fun experience I enjoyed doing the spins. Now onto the last flight in the Arrow and some ground and I should be good to go.
 
Question for you CFIs. How much of the FOI stuff do you actually use? My instructor says my ground is really strong but as I study for the FOI I can't really stay focused. It's really dry. Did you use acronyms? Scenarios?
 
The only real FOI things I use in the day to day are based on primacy and lack of common experience in my approach to instructing. As far as primacy goes, if I don't know something I say I don't and figure it out from there. Making up an answer or telling something them wrong will stick with them. Most new students are completely lost when it comes to aviation material. I do my best to make comparisons to things they already may know and associate it to aviation. That's how I learned. The rest is largely common sense. That is all FOI is; an overly complicated systematic approach to common sense. As far as studying it, acronyms and associating ideas. There are many common themes in FOI.
 
jordane93 said:
Question for you CFIs. How much of the FOI stuff do you actually use? My instructor says my ground is really strong but as I study for the FOI I can't really stay focused. It's really dry. Did you use acronyms? Scenarios?
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Primacy and Common Errors have kept my lessons consistent, and actually stopped my babbling info-stream for things I am not 100% solid on, and can explain in great tangential detail. Amusingly, primacy has limited the things I am willing to teach, an unexpected benefit to the masses. :D

I reference "Maslow" when I want to talk like a dick to people and sound pretentious -- usually in a corporate setting in response to a talking head who injected "paradigm" into a conversation needlessly. (I'm childish when i work at big dumb companies, and the FAA can help you be childish too)

The rest of the FOI dreck fell out of my head the moment I passed my initial. Until then it was a loose formation of awful acronyms and a lot of rote spackling to keep it presentable on demand.
 
schmookeeg said:
Primacy and Common Errors have kept my lessons consistent, and actually stopped my babbling info-stream for things I am not 100% solid on
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Yea I can see why these can be useful. I also think the levels of learning can be useful. Obviously stuff like teaching responsibilities and professionalism is pretty important as well.
 
Since my CFI is off tomorrow I'll be going up with my dad and pretty much run through everything in the PTS. I finally got a day off from work and it's my CFIs day off. Just my luck!
 
No go for the flight a few days ago as it was way too windy. I did ground with my CFI and covered the Arrow systems. I was good with explaining the principle behind how a constant speed prop but really needed to brush up on how the governor, flyweights, speeder spring, etc worked. Then we discussed the powerplant which I also needed to brush up on. Finally went on the landing gear and electrical system which he said I did a good job explaining but wanted me to use more scenario based questions for the abnormal procedures. Tuesday will be my last flight granted I fly to PTS standards and my CFI likes what he sees. After the flight we are going to do our final ground session and cover the FOI material as well as any other questions I may have and then he'll call up the DPE and schedule my ride in!
 
jordane93 said:
Since my CFI is off tomorrow I'll be going up with my dad and pretty much run through everything in the PTS. I finally got a day off from work and it's my CFIs day off. Just my luck!
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CFI with a day off?
Guess I've been out of that game for too long.
 
When I did mine and I was getting close like you I was let down to find out that the DPE's schedule was booked a month out. I hope you don't run into that scenario. However it gave me more time to study by about a month.
 
NJP_MAN said:
When I did mine and I was getting close like you I was let down to find out that the DPE's schedule was booked a month out. I hope you don't run into that scenario. However it gave me more time to study by about a month.
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Yea I want to schedule the ride in on Tuesday. I have a friend who's taking his CFI ride with the same examiner next week and he booked it last week. So hopefully his schedule doens't fill up
 
Today we went over ground (mostly FOI) and we left a message to schedule in the checkride. Now I'm really getting down to final stretch!
 
Tomorrow looks like it's going to rain but I'm still going to go in for the oral and hopefully finish up the flying part a few days later.
 
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