IFR study programs

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UngaWunga

Pattern Altitude
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UngaWunga
What's the current favorite IFR study program? Working up the mojo to study for my written again and finally get my rating.
 
How do you like to learn?

Visual / video? Sportys. If you like old school VHS style of content (but all on line) the King program is good

Book style? Gleim.

You will need it practice. Gold Seal is good to get as well for additional testing training

Getting the IR rating is as hard if not harder than getting the ppl. So set your expectations and commitment accordingly.
 
I started with Sheppard Air
https://www.sheppardair.com/instrument-rating.htm

and ended up finishing with Sporty's

I did the written before I started training, it's just the way the scheduling worked out. So I went into it with zero knowledge of anything IR related. Sheppard is mostly memorization, and that was a problem for me. Since there were a lot of things I'd never seen before, trying to memorize things that I didn't understand was difficult. So I ended up researching, reading, and studying the information behind the questions and the answers. That ended up being a lot of work, but very useful for me. At that pace though, Sheppard was going to take a long time. I then switched over to Sporty's, and their videos and tutorials helped fill in gaps. I took a lot of the Sporty's practice tests, a couple a night for maybe a week, while I waited for the written appointment to open up. I ended up scoring well on the written, but there was no shortcut.
 
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What did you use for passing your PPL written? Any particular reason you might not want to drink from the same well?
 
asicer said:
What did you use for passing your PPL written? Any particular reason you might not want to drink from the same well?
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That’s a good question. But - IMHO - the IFR material is different enough that it’s wise for the OP to ask his original question.

I found the PPL material to be more on concepts, and the IFR material more on memorizing sets of rules and procedures. (How to read an approach plate, etc). Oddly, as such I found the video format easier for IFR and the Gleim book format easier for my ppl and commercial written.
 
I started with Sheppard Air, then Kings, then Ron Levy.
 
I also found Rod Machado to have good material.
 
Matthew said:
I started with Sheppard Air
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Sheppard Air is a great program to prepare for the knowledge test - I have used it myself several times, but I would not suggest to start there. As you mentioned, its exclusive objective is to memorize test answers, not to provide background or explain anything. It's a good tool to help achieve a good test score, after the student has at least a basic understanding of the subject matter.

- Martin
 
Martin Pauly said:
Sheppard Air is a great program to prepare for the knowledge test - I have used it myself several times, but I would not suggest to start there. As you mentioned, its exclusive objective is to memorize test answers, not to provide background or explain anything. It's a good tool to help achieve a good test score, after the student has at least a basic understanding of the subject matter.

- Martin
Click to expand...
That’s what I ran into. Jumping straight into it with no prior knowledge prep way like trying to memorize something foreign. Because I ended up doing so much research on my own, digging through all the FAA handbooks so I could
understand the questions and answers, it ended up being a pretty thorough ground school but that’s not its intended purpose.
 
I got my PPL after attending an excellent local bi-weekly evening classroom program. I signed up for an IFR class at another local airport, and found it mostly old aviators reliving their glory days. A waste of my time and money. The Gleim books and other online programs that want you to memorize the questions aren't helpful at all to me because I hate rote memorization and I didn't understand why the answers were the correct answers. I think I'd work best with videos explaining the how & why would work best followed by the rote memorization of the multiple choice answers. I've read the FAA free publications and found them very good, and should reread them.
 
I have heard good things about Sporty’s IFR latest video series.
 
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FWIW - I did the video version (Kings) but created my own written notebook. Took lots of notes during each module, made cheat sheets, etc.

Old school 3 ring binder that I still reference, add new notes, etc.
 
I just finished the Gold Seal IFR course. I used Sporty's for ground school for the PPL knowledge test (in addition to the AFH and PHAK). I would put the Gold Seal course a notch above Sporty's in practical information although it is not truly comparing apples to apples. I will take one of the three Gold Seal practice tests, finish the IFH and IPH, then take the other two tests and sit for the actual assuming I perform satisfactory. I suspect the Gold Seal course has me prepared well.
 
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