KJYO - School Recommendations?

[comco]

Does anyone have experience with flight schools based out of Leesburg, VA (KJYO)? As far as I can tell, there is Aviation Adventures, Av-Ed and Atlantic Airways. Online reviews and mentions on this forum are all pretty positive and/or several years old. Does anyone have any RECENT experiences as a student or renter at these schools or any tips on what to look out for on a first visit?

 

[JoseCuervo]

This might be one of the more entertaining uses of the "poll" feature on a forum. I can't imagine enough respondents that would give you any sort of sample size that would allow the results of your "poll" to provide you with information of value.


I have no input, but wish you the best.

I think your best bet would be to invest in some shoe-leather and go walk around the airport, meeting all of the places.

My guess is that one of them will ignore you, you will stand around hoping somebody talks to you, and finally a receptionist will ask you if you need something, and take your information and tell you someone will call you.

The second one will have somebody with all the answers, they will run you into a back room, explain how you will need to sign a bunch of documents, agree to paying $11k for a license, give you a signon to the scheduler and let you leave.

The third one will have some guy that likes instructing, he will meet you, shake your hand, ask you a few questions, then ask you if you want to go see the plane, maybe even take a quick flight. He will tell you a few stories, ask you if you know "so and so", and escort you out to the flight line.


I know which one I would sign up with.

 

[frfly172]

Two of the three are in the same location in the FBO building. Can't give any info. Use JYO when visiting family. Both look very professional

 

[GeorgeC]

I've flown with Aviation Adventures on a couple of occasions and a coworker got his IR there, all good experiences. No data on the other two.

 

[Brad Z]

Do a search or post a message to the DCPilots yahoo board. There are a bunch of JYO based folks. I'm based at VKX, and can vouch for GT Aviation, but that's about it.

 

[flyingron]

AV-ED has been around forever. I knew some of their instructors and while there was some internal grumbling on the staff, I've never heard of any of the students having an issue.

Adventures seems to be a fine operation, I've got friends who fly there. My only grudge against them dates from some arrogant behavior back when they operated out of VKX.

Don't know about Atlantic.

 

[jpower]

I rent at Aviation Adventures, though I got my ratings elsewhere. They're definitely my vote. Take a look at who wins the AOPA awards. There might be something else at play (they ask a few times for nominations), but I see no reason they don't deserve it. Very professional operation, no complaints.

On the other hand, I've gone into the Av-Ed office a couple of times. Once was when I was checking out places to rent from at JYO. I was met with a guy who was more interested in eating his sandwich than talking to me. Trying to get him to converse was like beating my head with a board filled with rusty nails. Aviation Adventures, on the other hand, was much more along the lines of "Why hello there! How are you today? What can I do for you?" Another was to take a written exam, and while not a bad experience, I also felt like the guy was pretty disinterested in me, even though I had just paid them $150.

 

[flyingron]

I have no confidence that AOPA awards means anything. AOPA doesn't do anything that doesn't result in a pecuniary benefit to them.

 

[jpower]

I have no confidence that AOPA awards means anything. AOPA doesn't do anything that doesn't result in a pecuniary benefit to them.

Could very well be, so take it with a grain of salt, or a whole shaker of salt depending on your opinion on AOPA. It doesn't change my opinion of Aviation Adventures though. Still a great organization.

 

[Flyerr]

I've been flying with Aviation Adventures (aka AvAd, which is different from Av-Ed) for about 7 months now - I completed my IR there and am about to take my CML ride. I'd recommend them.

Flight schools tend to be either very good at the business side of things, but lacking in the flight instruction area, or vice versa. AvAd's management and coordination (timely maintenance, schedule conflicts, resolution of billing issues) tends to be average to slightly below average. Their quality of instruction, however, is excellent. Each of the instructors there (and I've flown with several, and met/talked flying with many more) really seems to care about teaching students. AvAd tends to hire the older, more experienced guys who have already done their airliner/charter time, rather than the young kids just trying to build hours. I'm not saying there aren't any of those, but if you want to learn from a 15k hour former airline or military pilot who really enjoys teaching, there are enough of those to go around.

If you're training with GI Bill, your options are limited to AvAd anyhow. If not, go check them all out, and my bet is that you'll end up at Aviation Adventures.

Where are you in training, and what are your goals?

 

[TUPilot]

I have a flown with some folks that have trained at Aviation Adventures. In general they seem to have a positive opinion of the place. They seem to be "premium service, premium price" which isn't a bad thing if you don't mind spending a little extra for a higher level of service. With one exception, I haven't heard anything negative from a student there not related to price. And to be fair, this was more of a specific instructor issue than a company wide issue.

My one pet peeve with them is every time they transit the SFRA they refer to the VPONX/VPOOP transition, which per the FAA is not proper communication with ATC. Most of the controllers are familiar with it now because they keep doing it, but they really should stop teaching that way.

Ref: http://www.faa.gov/air_traffic/publications/atpubs/fac/1110.html

 

[comco]

Thanks for the quick feedback, everyone! I'm new to DC (and new to this forum), but its great to hear that there are so many GA pilots based here and active on the forum to share experiences. I will check out these schools and report back! Thanks again.

 

[Brad Z]

My one pet peeve with them is every time they transit the SFRA they refer to the VPONX/VPOOP transition, which per the FAA is not proper communication with ATC. Most of the controllers are familiar with it now because they keep doing it, but they really should stop teaching that way.

Ref: http://www.faa.gov/air_traffic/publications/atpubs/fac/1110.html

Exactly what sort of verbiage do they use? I know that VFR waypoints aren't supposed to be pronounceable, or even necessarily known to ATC, but VPONX-VPOOP is pretty well known. That said, and to your point, all they need to tell ATC is that they're direct for the PALEO gate. How they get there is pretty much irrelevent to ATC as long as they stay below bravo.

 

[flyingron]

If you're training with GI Bill, your options are limited to AvAd anyhow. If not, go check them all out, and my bet is that you'll end up at Aviation Adventures.

Av-Ed is a Part 141 school. This shouldn't be a problem.

 

[JohnAJohnson]

10 years ago so take it for what it is worth...

I walked into Aviation Adventures and told them I wanted to start PP training. They assigned an instructor and he performed the take off, climbout, and level off. Somewhere on the other side of the Shenandoah around Winchester, he let me fly and had me do a couple of shallow turns, and then head back into the ADIZ and toward KJYO. He took the controls and started the descent around Purcellville, then he performed the landing. During the debrief he asked when I'd be available for the next lesson and I told him we were done. Walked over to AV-Ed and got my PPL through them. Had great interim check rides from the "Doc". Can't remember his name, but he was a B-17 pilot and retired bird col. BTW, first takeoff and landing (and every other one thereafter) with AV-Ed was done by me.

 

[ethosunum]

If you're not stuck on KJYO there are also schools at KHEF.

I took a Discovery flight with Aviation Adventures and my thoughts were in line with most above. The staff and instructor seemed top notch, but so were the prices.

You can take some discovery flights with different schools to get a feel for them and their staff.

I ended up at another school in Manassas (KHEF) as it was about equidistant for me compared to KJYO, matched up well with an instructor there and the prices were quite reasonable.

 

[[email protected]]

I have flown with Aviation Adventures and Atlantic Airways. Both good schools.
Similar experience to others at AVED (a little disinterested) when I took my written test but they also look professional.
Some thoughts and experience to add to the mix.
The Redbird motion sim is between the AVAD and AVED offices - useful for instrument and ground training and cheaper than taking a plane out (and it counts towards your time - somewhat)
One thing to look at is the type of plane you are going to train in. I started off in AVAD in a steam gauge 172 which was fine to learn the basics (and cheap - relatively) but got a little hairy for me flying out of KJYO when it got busy.
I solo'd at AVAD and for a number of reasons (active traffic, weather, GPS) decided to move to glass cockpit - of which there are a number at AVAD but I also researched what I wanted to fly longer term and ended up with a Cirrus (at the moment although flight design C4 looks interesting!) so I moved to Atlantic Airways (different building to AVAD and AVED) which is predominantly a Cirrus school (but they have Diamonds and aerobatics planes as well). Not sure what else AVAD have but as they have a number of other schools at other nearby airports you will have access to a lot of planes - and often can fly a few maintenance runs which cost little (to get a plane to the maintenance shop at FDK for example) to build hours
I trained in a G1000 172 which took a couple of hours of ground sim (Atlantic have a smaller redbird with no motion but again fine for ground sim hours) and a few hours air time to get familiar with the glass.
I (eventually) got my Pilot Pilot certificate in February this year and am now transitioning to Cirrus SR20 (the least powerful of the Cirrus family but it is pretty much identical to the beefier SR22 so the transition up is going to be easy - or so I am told) for instrument (essential very similar glass cockpit to the 172 G100 but some different flight characteristics - faster, low wing vs high wing, composite instead of metal).
For me the choice came down to 3 things:
1) Availability of the plane i wanted to fly - at AVAD the G1000 172s always seemed to be booked when i could fly and although Atlantic only have 1, I could actually book it a lot easier. Atlantic also have a 182 for bigger passengers/longer trips (AVAD also have at least 1 182 from memory)
2) Ability to transition up to the plane i want to fly longer term - I really like the Cirrus (parachute, 21st century technology but a little harder to fly than a 172).
3) Instructors. My initial instructor as AVAD was fine and I really like flying with Ray Haan who was Chief Instructor when i was there but i felt that the instructors at Atlantic were more suited to the future of what I wanted to do - they are all cirrus transition instructors and fly a LOT commercially in the same airplanes).
SO I guess my advice would be walk around to each school and see how they feel, think about what type of plane you will end up flying in and whether Cessna or Cirrus or Diamond is the way for you to go (or others...) and whether your should go for steam gauges first or glass.
I actually thing my steam gauge experience was useful (if i have a catastrophic electronics failure for example) but the lack of active traffic and a parachute means that I don't plan to fly steam gauges again.
If you need more info pls reply or contact my via email...(Ive just joined this forum so not sure if i can post my tel no or email here)
Jon

 

[flyingron]

Frankly, I have nothing but unkind things to day about the Redbird toy. It is nothing more than a gimmick and deviates so far from actual flight or even instrument behavior to be counter productive at any level of training.

 

[[email protected]]

If you mean the motion aspect of the sim being a gimmick I would agree with you Ron
However, my personal experience in transitioning from steam gauges to G1000 with the non-motion Redbird was v useful - esp when I could stop the sim and look at the manual to work out which key to press!. I still think the UE for all these devices has some way to go....
I practiced using the Redbird (no motion) for about 4 hours or so before I flew the G1000 Cessna for the first time and was familiar with most elements at the end of this time - ie where to look for airspeed, how to set up a flight plan, use the GPS, lean the engine, find the airport data etc.
So my point is that for a few 10's of dollars I got some good experience that made the transition to flying the real plane a lot easier....and probably saved me more than 4 hours in the air at $150/hr where the learning curve would have meant i wouldn't have retained as much.
Furthermore, I ended up building a sim at home (3 screens, plus 2 touchscreens for the PFD and MFD) to practice the new lot of elements I need to be intimately familiar with for both IFR and the Cirrus learning curves. Again, this is saving me flight time (although it doesn't count for hours as the Redbird does) and building muscle memory as to where to go to load an approach etc (with the ability to press pause at any time - eg when calculating how to enter a hold!). Also, i can do this when there is a foot of snow outside..Clearly not the same as flying but with a tuned flight model and specific settings for realism in FSX it gets fairly close to the characteristics of a plane.
There is a really useful feature in FSX that allows you to selectively fail plane components at random which I think is a great way to improve reflexes - especially when transitioning to another plane when the emergency procedures are different.
I'm also playing with an element called VATSIM that interfaces to ATC controllers for practicing IFR comms that looks great if I can get it working!
I also use my rig a lot to fly routes to new airports and check out landmarks and get organised before I fly the route for real. Brings another meaning to "being familiar with all available data"....

 

[dans2992]

Look at pilotedge.com for ATC as well. There is a charge, but it's better quality.

 

[jpower]

For me the choice came down to 3 things:
1) Availability of the plane i wanted to fly - at AVAD the G1000 172s always seemed to be booked when i could fly and although Atlantic only have 1, I could actually book it a lot easier. Atlantic also have a 182 for bigger passengers/longer trips (AVAD also have at least 1 182 from memory)

That's funny--every time I want to fly a 172 there, the G1000s seem to be the only ones available. They do have a 182, and they also have a Cirrus SR20 and a Columbia 400.