I lost something today ...

thanks :) .. i thought i would just fly the next bunch of flights for fun, but my instructor offered me a bunch of free flights toward my IFR if done by late next month. he's doing some training at the end of the month that he wants to build more IFR time for.

it's an offer i can't refuse, .. but i still gotta rent the plane and there won't be spare $ to share my new privilege with the people i wanted to right now.

the checkride went pretty smooth. i thought i would be a lot more nervous than i was. my nerves did jump up just before the oral, but he was great and made me feel very comfortable within a few minutes. although the de wasn't alowed to 'teach', i did learn a lot from the experience as well.
 
w00t! You sir are now teh win!

Congratulations.
 
Way to go! As my check ride pilot told me "now you have a license to learn how to be a real good pilot".
 
mmilano said:
"STUDENT" :goofy:
Click to expand...

WOO HOO!!!! I love it when another one gets full membership in the "club", Reminds me when I did it... ooo comming up on one year now :D #1 rule: Enjoy it!

Missa
 
COngrats.

Now you have a licence to learn. Get out and enjoy!
 
Cung...ummm...congrad...hmmmm...congratulash.....ack....congratulations!! That's it! Figured it out! Good job getting through the checkride!
 
Congrats and good job!

If you get a chance, I'm sure many of us would love to read about the checkride.
 
mmilano said:
"STUDENT" :goofy:
Click to expand...

Congratulations, but you've lost "student" only in the bureaucratic sense, I hope. Now you are both student AND teacher. You WILL keep learning...or god help you and us!;)

Sorry, that sounds a bit wet-blanketish, which I don't really mean it to. You've accomplished a great thing, captain. Now you are well and truly Pilot in Command, with all the rights, privileges, and responsibilities pertaining thereto.

:cheerswine:

Judy
 
thanks everyone. of couse i just meant 'legally'.

ok, the check-ride:

the night before he had me do an XC, take-off/landing distances to the 3 fields we were using, and calculate w&b.

first off he mentioned that over the years, he has certified many pilots who are now dead. he talked a little about statistics pertaining to pilot errors/bad decisions. he let me know that everyone is nervous and that i will make mistakes today. it's perfectly normal. he said he will let me know immediately if he determines i'm not going to pass, so if we are still going, then i am doing ok.

we then went through the maintenance logs of the aircraft i was flying. i had to show him how i determined that everything was current. i had to fly to another field the night before to pick up those logs and get a crash course on how to use them the night before :)

the rest of the oral was about 2.5 hours. he went over my homework, and then continued to test me on the pts stuff. there were a few things i stumbled on, but according to him, overall i did pretty good.

pre-flight was pretty painless. he asked me some questions about fuel colors, contamination, and smells. we talked about the oil type and if it was detergent based or not. When I checked the alternator belt, he asked me what it was. He said once someone told him that is what turns the prop. :)

the flight started on the XC with a soft field takeoff. i got to top of climb and then we did diversion. i set an estimated heading to the new destination, then drew my line and calculated distance, heading, time, and fuel. once i had that all figured out, we aborted that route and did steep turns, slow flight, stalls (turning, straight, power on/off), engine failure, and then headed to another field.

There we did short/soft field landings/takeoffs, and a go-around. on the way out, we did some hood work and then made our way back home.

taxied to parking, did my shutdown list, power off, and he said 'congratulations' and shook my hand. that feeling is hard for me to even describe. it was like this entire past 8 months flashing by into a sudden resolve. After that, we de-briefed. He questioned me on some of the manuvers i did, informed me on things I needed to talk to my CFI about and work on, and then signed my temporary ticket.

i probably missed a bunch of details, but this was the jist of it. it was an awsome experience. it would be nice if there were CFIs with this DE's level of knowledge and experience available to learn from.
 
mmilano said:
thanks everyone. of couse i just meant 'legally'.

ok, the check-ride:

the night before he had me do an XC, take-off/landing distances to the 3 fields we were using, and calculate w&b.

first off he mentioned that over the years, he has certified many pilots who are now dead. he talked a little about statistics pertaining to pilot errors/bad decisions. he let me know that everyone is nervous and that i will make mistakes today. it's perfectly normal. he said he will let me know immediately if he determines i'm not going to pass, so if we are still going, then i am doing ok.

we then went through the maintenance logs of the aircraft i was flying. i had to show him how i determined that everything was current. i had to fly to another field the night before to pick up those logs and get a crash course on how to use them the night before :)

the rest of the oral was about 2.5 hours. he went over my homework, and then continued to test me on the pts stuff. there were a few things i stumbled on, but according to him, overall i did pretty good.

pre-flight was pretty painless. he asked me some questions about fuel colors, contamination, and smells. we talked about the oil type and if it was detergent based or not. When I checked the alternator belt, he asked me what it was. He said once someone told him that is what turns the prop. :)

the flight started on the XC with a soft field takeoff. i got to top of climb and then we did diversion. i set an estimated heading to the new destination, then drew my line and calculated distance, heading, time, and fuel. once i had that all figured out, we aborted that route and did steep turns, slow flight, stalls (turning, straight, power on/off), engine failure, and then headed to another field.

There we did short/soft field landings/takeoffs, and a go-around. on the way out, we did some hood work and then made our way back home.

taxied to parking, did my shutdown list, power off, and he said 'congratulations' and shook my hand. that feeling is hard for me to even describe. it was like this entire past 8 months flashing by into a sudden resolve. After that, we de-briefed. He questioned me on some of the manuvers i did, informed me on things I needed to talk to my CFI about and work on, and then signed my temporary ticket.

i probably missed a bunch of details, but this was the jist of it. it was an awsome experience. it would be nice if there were CFIs with this DE's level of knowledge and experience available to learn from.
Click to expand...

They're out there (not me in many respects) but would you really pay for a CFI of that caliber ? Also, so much of real effective flight training is academic.
Good narrative. I liked the alternator drive belt.
Click to expand...
 
Congratulations!

Pilot!
 
mmilano said:
"STUDENT" :goofy:
Click to expand...
Congratulations! :cheerswine:

But it wasn't the first thing that came to mind when I read you "lost something..." :eek:

Must be my state of mind tonight. :redface:
 
mmilano said:
It would be nice if there were CFIs with this DE's level of knowledge and experience available to learn from.
Click to expand...

There are, I wouldn't be surprised if the DE is a working CFI, many are, typically with several thousand hours of flying time in various jobs. Several I know are also charter pilots. You do have to be ready to pay their rate, but I typically find it isn't exhorbidant and typically is a value considering the caliber of instruction you get.
 
really? he said he wasn't allowed to instruct because he is a DE. he is a corporate jet pilot.
 
mmilano said:
really? he said he wasn't allowed to instruct because he is a DE. he is a corporate jet pilot.
Click to expand...

That must be relatively new then. The guys I knew couldn't instruct you and give you your check ride, but they could do either or.
 
mmilano said:
really? he said he wasn't allowed to instruct because he is a DE. he is a corporate jet pilot.
Click to expand...

The DE that I took my check ride from also instructs. My guess is that they are not allowed to checkride their own students tho. Of course my DE does check rides and tailwheel training only, just cause he loves to fly stick and rudder planes.

Missa
 
interesting.. he seemed pretty clear on what he meant by that. very odd.
 
Missa said:
The DE that I took my check ride from also instructs. My guess is that they are not allowed to checkride their own students tho. Of course my DE does check rides and tailwheel training only, just cause he loves to fly stick and rudder planes.

Missa
Click to expand...

As some of you know my Grandpa is the DE at KPTS, i did all of my training with him except for the last 3 hours in which i went to another instructor and they signed me off for the checkride. I took the Check-ride with Grandpa as the DE. (even though he didn't seem like grandpa during the check-ride, i am pretty sure it was him)
 
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