A little advice needed?

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SCAirborne

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SCAirborne
I started my training in PPL 1st week of August. Due to crazy weather here in the Southeast I've only been up 5 times.. 6 this Sunday if the weather holds true. So far just the basic stuff, like descending/ascending turns, elevation changes, flying on course... etc. I know there is no "typical" time as it depends on the skill level of the student, but when would a student expect to start training landings? For that matter soloing? I know I am not ready, and won;t be for a while, but it would be nice to know an average amount of hours that I could use as a gauge on how I'm doing when I finally meet those milestones. Thanks again and love the boards here, amazing amount of info.
 
Welcome,you are going to get plenty of advice. Flight training is an individual accomplishment,don't worry about average time,some pilots are better at different phases of training than others. Like landings.
 
One thing a board like this is not short of...advise.

Wanna become a pilot? Go up in an airplane with a CFI...when he/she says you can take the checkride, then you go up with a DPE and he/she will give you a piece of paper and you are a pilot.

It's that simple.
 
Landing requires the ability to control the aircraft in a stable descent while making turns and changes. It also requires knowing how not to screw up and how to recover from screw ups. That is what you're doing right now. Landings will come in short order once you have the confidence to do it with room to spare.

Also, don't pay much attention to CTLSi. Basically everything he says is useless, incorrect, non-sense. Hence his completely useless response above.
 
CTLSi said:
One thing a board like this is not short of...advise.

Wanna become a pilot? Go up in an airplane with a CFI...when he/she says you can take the checkride, then you go up with a DPE and he/she will give you a piece of paper and you are a pilot.

It's that simple.
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Indeed...says the character with 830+ posts in 3 months as a member. :yikes:

I'm sure you are doing fine - the main thing, IMHO is frequency of flying...especially early on. If you are only getting an hour or so in per week or every other week it's really hard to progress early on. The more you can fly in those early stages the better.

Don't fret on how much time it takes you to solo - it'll come and even then you'll feel like you aren't ready when your instructor jumps out. I think I logged about 200 landings or something insane like that before I was signed off at 17 hours to solo. You'll know when you are getting close because your CFI will schedule a couple lessons back to back where you are just doing pattern work for an hour or two straight. I remember one 2 hour session where I did 25 landings. I was exhausted!!

One thing I started doing pretty early on was booking 2 hour time spots with my CFI. You save so much time getting a solid 2 hours of flying vs doing 2 X 1 hour spots. When you factor in pre-flight, run ups, taxiing, etc... you lose a lot more time the more you stretch that out and you get more accomplished per lesson.

When the weather doesn't cooperate it's frustrating...but that VFR flying. Get used to it. :D

Good luck - keep us posted on your progress!!
 
Everyone is different

Most folks solo in 15hrs or so

If it takes over 20hrs might want to have someone else take a look at your progress/skills

Be sure to fly at least twice a week.
 
SCAirborne said:
I started my training in PPL 1st week of August. Due to crazy weather here in the Southeast I've only been up 5 times.. 6 this Sunday if the weather holds true. So far just the basic stuff, like descending/ascending turns, elevation changes, flying on course... etc. I know there is no "typical" time as it depends on the skill level of the student, but when would a student expect to start training landings? For that matter soloing? I know I am not ready, and won;t be for a while, but it would be nice to know an average amount of hours that I could use as a gauge on how I'm doing when I finally meet those milestones. Thanks again and love the boards here, amazing amount of info.
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I did my solo I think when I had 15 hours and this is due to flying once a week. It really depends on each person, like many have said - the more you fly the better. Twice a week in the start will be great but I couldn't afford it and time was also an issue. Now my solo got delayed by 5 weeks due to weather and finally was able to solo. Each person is different, so I wouldn't bother about making comparisons. Take time to read as well, it saves a lot of time and money when it comes to ground with your instructor and will go a long way when you are ready to do your written exam. So if weather spoils your day, use that time to do some chair-flying and/or study. Which part in Southeast do you fly? I am from the SE too :).
 
Like everyone says, it's going to vary a bunch depending on the student and the instructor.

For me, I started training in May and just solo'd in August at around 30 hours. That's four months when flying an average of slightly less than twice per week.

All kinds of things can slow you down. For me, it was motion sickness. I spent my first 15 hours barfing or thinking about barfing. It was horrible. But after I got past that stage, I progressed a lot faster.

You may find that the weather slows you down at times. Or you don't "click" with the instructor. Or the plane isn't available.

It just takes time, and there's no standard formula for it.
 
I won't answer your question in # of hours expected, or give you some completely false indication of how long it takes "most" people, cause that's a load of shiznit. what I will tell you is that training, overall, consists of highs and lows...roadblocks and setbacks, and you will eventually get past all of them in due time, with persistence. right now it's getting past the basics, soon it might be steep turns, then maybe roundout/flare, then prepping for the written or checkride will seem never-ending or out of reach, but you will get to them all in due time. just keep at it and have a blast every step of the sometimes-aggravating-sometimes-freakin-awesome road ahead of you.
 
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It doesn't matter what other people's hours are. You'll hear people on hear solo at 8, 10, 15, 20, 50, or 100 hours. Roughly I'd say the average would be around 12-15 hours. Fly as much as you can and you'll usually see yourself progress quickly.
 
I soloed well past 20 hours into training. Part of it was the year-long break I took, and the other was getting used to handling the plane. There were things I just wasn't comfortable with at an early stage that I got better with later on. It's different for everyone.
 
When you're ready, and not before. How long that takes is a function of so many variables there's no way to say without flying with you in your airplane where you are training. Since your instructor is the only one actually doing that, just relax and listen to him/her, and everything will be fine.
 
eman1200 said:
I won't answer your question in # of hours expected, or give you some completely false indication of how long it takes "most" people, cause that's a load of shiznit.
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Yeah, but that was his question

For the large number of folks I've soloed, the AVERAGE number is around 15hrs.

It's also good to know because if you're sitting at 25hrs thinking it's normal, you should know it's not, and you should identify the problem.
 
James331 said:
It's also good to know because if you're sitting at 25hrs thinking it's normal, you should know it's not, and you should identify the problem.
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Maybe in the planes you fly where you fly them with the type of trainees you have, but that's a totally bogus number for many training situations. So please don't tell anyone that unless you know they're the same type of person in the same type of plane in the same training location where you're working.
 
That number held true for full time career students in taildraggers

Held true for working local aspiring hobby pilot students in a Grumman

Held true for for retired folks in a 172SP G1000

Etc

Of course the only factor that stayed the same was me, ATP/Gold Seal CFI and rather easy going, not afraid to let students make mistakes, and easy to get along with, or so I've been told.
 
SCAirborne said:
I started my training in PPL 1st week of August. Due to crazy weather here in the Southeast I've only been up 5 times.. 6 this Sunday if the weather holds true. So far just the basic stuff, like descending/ascending turns, elevation changes, flying on course... etc. I know there is no "typical" time as it depends on the skill level of the student, but when would a student expect to start training landings? For that matter soloing? I know I am not ready, and won;t be for a while, but it would be nice to know an average amount of hours that I could use as a gauge on how I'm doing when I finally meet those milestones. Thanks again and love the boards here, amazing amount of info.
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  • What are you flying? (technologically advanced aircraft take longer than, say, a Cessna 150)
  • Where are you flying? (Airport, any complicated/crowded airspace? Tower? Oddball runway configs that require special procedures?)
  • How often do you fly? (you said once a week so far, which isn't necessarily bad unless you find yourself regressing a lot between lessons.)
  • What's the weather like when you fly? (lots of turbulence can slow down learning)
  • Is it windy a lot there?
  • Are you following a syllabus? Some of those syllabi, if followed precisely, go slower than necessary *for me* but it all depends on the student and situation.
All of these factors and more, plus personal learning style, play in as well.

Just don't get discouraged if you haven't done landings or soloed at some point. As long as you are learning new stuff and making progress then it's OK. You'll have to learn all those other things at some point anyway. And landings will be covered sooner or later.

Have fun!
 
Luckily, I've got the sign out for free advice today.

People and CFIs are different. I wouldn't worry too much about it unless I started creeping up on 40 hours or so.

Where you at in SC? I have a Bo and am fairly tired of solo hamburger runs. I'll let you get some stick time even though you can't log it.
 
Thanks for all the advice. First post ever to these boards. I wish I could log more hours sooner, but I have a full time job/family.. so tough getting it scheduled more than an hour or two a week. Since post I've added another hour in, and I think I'm getting the hang of descending/ascending turns to direction... I miss the altitude by ~100 feet and direction by 10 degrees or so but pretty easy to correct. I just want to make sure I'm tracking along ok... lessons aren't exactly cheap when you throw in aircraft and CFI rates together. Not sure if it was a question or statement but I've been training on a mid 70's Cessna 172 with original indicators, so nothing fancy. My CFI seems great, but then again I don't want to be doing horrible and never know it without comparison. 15 hours to solo seems crazy to me right now in my training. After 6 hours I KNOW i'm not remotely close to grabbing the controls by myself. Hopefully I'll feel a little different after some landings, but as of yet I've just been doing basic maneuvers. Hopefully we'll get to landings soon. Thanks again for all the responses.
 
James331 said:
Yeah, but that was his question

For the large number of folks I've soloed, the AVERAGE number is around 15hrs.

It's also good to know because if you're sitting at 25hrs thinking it's normal, you should know it's not, and you should identify the problem.
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Who says it's not normal? Not everybody flies at slow fields. Some people can get 10-12 landings per hour, while others can get 4-5. That's going to change when the student is ready to solo.

There is nobody at my school who has soloed in under 25 hours.
 
SCAirborne said:
Thanks for all the advice. First post ever to these boards. I wish I could log more hours sooner, but I have a full time job/family.. so tough getting it scheduled more than an hour or two a week. Since post I've added another hour in, and I think I'm getting the hang of descending/ascending turns to direction... I miss the altitude by ~100 feet and direction by 10 degrees or so but pretty easy to correct. I just want to make sure I'm tracking along ok... lessons aren't exactly cheap when you throw in aircraft and CFI rates together. Not sure if it was a question or statement but I've been training on a mid 70's Cessna 172 with original indicators, so nothing fancy. My CFI seems great, but then again I don't want to be doing horrible and never know it without comparison. 15 hours to solo seems crazy to me right now in my training. After 6 hours I KNOW i'm not remotely close to grabbing the controls by myself. Hopefully I'll feel a little different after some landings, but as of yet I've just been doing basic maneuvers. Hopefully we'll get to landings soon. Thanks again for all the responses.
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Don't look at your hours and think you aren't progressing, and don't compare yourself to the 12 hour solos :)rolleyes:). There will be guys on here telling that they soloed in under 10 hours. Some believe that it's a badge of honor.

You will solo when you are ready.

BTW-We all train on mid-70's planes. The planes I train on are 1976 and 1977. I was born in 1976.:rofl::rofl::rofl:
 
My first flight we did turns (climbing descending etc) config changes, how to trim entering the pattern and such. 2nd was a bunch of stalls then take offs and landings. Did that for the next few flights eventually got my medical after dragging my feet for a few weeks and solo'd 8ish hours.

Honestly 5 flights seems a while to not work on landings, (does he just take the controls in the pattern/ on approach and not let you fly) cause my first lesson the instructor told me how to do a soft field t/o and walked me through it during the process, same for landings.

But I don't know how you fly or how your instructor teaches. Mines pretty laid back and is more you fly i'll chime in if needed but I think it also helps that i've been around aviation my whole life.

Just looking at the clubhouse shirttails it seems the low end solo's are 8-10hours (probably 25%) a lot around 15 and 1-2 over 30.

Now my opinion is worth crap but it seems to me that absent any difficulties and assuming someone has some knowledge of flying that 0-5 hours would be flying basics 5-10 working on t/os and landings (thats what about 60 landings by then assuming you stay in the pattern) Then after solo, it would be dualxc instrument and night flying mixed in with your xc solo's in any order until you hit 40 hours+.

EDIT: Talking to my instructor age seems to be a big factor in solo time with the older guys and gals taking substantially longer.
 
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eman1200 said:
I won't answer your question in # of hours expected, or give you some completely false indication of how long it takes "most" people, cause that's a load of shiznit. what I will tell you is that training, overall, consists of highs and lows...roadblocks and setbacks, and you will eventually get past all of them in due time, with persistence. right now it's getting past the basics, soon it might be steep turns, then maybe roundout/flare, then prepping for the written or checkride will seem never-ending or out of reach, but you will get to them all in due time. just keep at it and have a blast every step of the sometimes-aggravating-sometimes-freakin-awesome road ahead of you.
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Having just passed my checkride less than two months ago, the above pretty much sums it up for me. Hang in there, and remember that even on a bad-landing, bad-crosswind, messed-up-all-the-radio-calls kinda day....you're still up there flying while hundreds of millions of others are wishing they could do the same! (Okay, slight exaggeration, but you get the idea...)

Keep committing aviation!
 
Your instructor should be using a printed syllabus, with the step-by-step progression (in skill, not in hours) that builds up to a certificate. You should have a copy of the syllabus. Then you can see where you are, where you are going, and what comes next. Forget about counting hours.

Bob Gardner
 
bobmrg said:
Your instructor should be using a printed syllabus, with the step-by-step progression (in skill, not in hours) that builds up to a certificate. You should have a copy of the syllabus. Then you can see where you are, where you are going, and what comes next. Forget about counting hours.

Bob Gardner
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This is what has helped me the most. It helped me see what I was currently doing, what I was going to be doing and what I had done. The syllabus I'm using has time elements associated with each lesson. In fact the other two I could of chosen both had times listed as well...
 
eman1200 said:
what I will tell you is that training, overall, consists of highs and lows...roadblocks and setbacks, and you will eventually get past all of them in due time, with persistence. right now it's getting past the basics, soon it might be steep turns, then maybe roundout/flare, then prepping for the written or checkride will seem never-ending or out of reach, but you will get to them all in due time. just keep at it and have a blast every step of the sometimes-aggravating-sometimes-freakin-awesome road ahead of you.
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Eman nailed it...I am at the checkride-prep stage and it seems never ending but will get there soon. I am glad I am not alone on these setbacks :).
 
davef22 said:
Eman nailed it...I am at the checkride-prep stage and it seems never ending but will get there soon. I am glad I am not alone on these setbacks :).
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What parts of the checkride seem long? I'm about to start this myself and curious where people have the most issues.
 
Hi, I am also a student pilot (started in July). I fly out of a small, non-towered municipal airport, so we don't waste much time on the ground. I Try to fly once a week but some weeks it just doesnt work out. Once a week seams to work well for me. I am young and have a good memory and i dont think a greater frequency of flights would help me progress much quicker. I solo'd last week with 7.1 hours in the logbook. I attribute this low number to several things. 1. the small airport, 2. I spend all my free time watching youtube videos or reading books and articles about flying, i already know what i am SUPPOSED to do when i go up, i just have to figure out how to do it. 3. MOST IMPORTANTLY: i have a VERY good CFI that has always let me do all of the flying, unless i got into some trouble. I took off and landed on my discovery flight - - of course for those first few flights, my instructor was also on the controls guiding me through it, and i was ready to release the controls at any time should he request it. Dont sweat the hours, there are a LOT of factors in how many hours it takes to do yada yada yada.
 
Just enjoy the experience and learn as you go. Don't beat yourself up. It will come to you. Landing was the hardest for me but like most, once I got it , it was cast in stone. Everyone is different. Read about " big frank" Valesh , hero B-17 pilot who almost got kicked out of cadets because he was a little slow picking it up.. Went on to be one of the best in the 8th airforce. Most everything you need to know can be found from other pilots at your airport. I was fortunate enough to have been single then, and had time to fly 3 times a week. This helped a lot. ( flying a B-17 across the ocean to England at twenty years old , with 9 others depending on you is big time to me.) hard to believe what those young guys did.
 
It is not when you solo that counts but how much you know when you do solo that really matters. People have been known to solo in as little as 5 to 7 hours. Most of these people are generally clueless when you ask them what makes the airplane turn, what are the causes of and what is the airplane doing when it is in a slip or skid. To Answer your question 15 to 20 hours is not uncommon.
 
Hi and welcome, SCAirborne.

Have patience. I can tell you from personal experience that you CAN achieve a PPL flying once a week. That is pretty much what I did. I had kids, a job, etc., just like you. I did basically the same thing working on my IR, which I also got. Just enjoy the learning. It is supposed to be fun.

As far as hours to solo, my first log book is in the lockbox at the bank, and people here may flame me, but I have no idea how many hours it took me to solo. What difference does that make, unless you feel like your CFI is milking you. If you cannot trust your CFI to be honest and straight-up, you might want to look around for someone else to teach you how to fly.

Again, welcome, and enjoy the experience. There is nothing else quite like it.
 
SCAirborne said:
I started my training in PPL 1st week of August. Due to crazy weather here in the Southeast I've only been up 5 times.. 6 this Sunday if the weather holds true. So far just the basic stuff, like descending/ascending turns, elevation changes, flying on course... etc. I know there is no "typical" time as it depends on the skill level of the student, but when would a student expect to start training landings? For that matter soloing? I know I am not ready, and won;t be for a while, but it would be nice to know an average amount of hours that I could use as a gauge on how I'm doing when I finally meet those milestones. Thanks again and love the boards here, amazing amount of info.
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Don't worry about it at this point. You aren't flying frequently enough to work on landings effectively. If you are working on fundamental ground reference stuff in winds right now, your instructor is doing the right thing in regards to efficient training to get you done in 40 hrs. Where you solo in those 40hrs is irrelevant for the first 25, you are completely on schedule. At 25 you have to answer some questions for honest evaluation, but until then, you are doing fine as long as you are learning and progressing at what you are doing. Trust your instructor to know what to train most effectively in what conditions. You don't want to start learning landings in adverse winds, you wouldn't be getting a good value for your money and time flying.

Read the PTS and try to maintain a broad overview. Actually you should keep the PTS with you and make self evaluation and whatever other notes in it and track your own progress. There will be times when it seems that no progress is being made and you know you're not at PTS, don't worry, take a nap right after one of those flights instead. The brain processes information while we sleep, hence the directive to "sleep on" decisions. Good luck, have fun, and just do what you can. Save up money so when the weather breaks you can go fly twice a day for 3 days in a week, that is the week you work on your landings. Train efficiently, a good instructor will do this. Always monitor your progress against the entire PTS, under that light is how you determine if your CFI is best serving you, not just on how fast you achieve milestones. The object is for you to become a skilled, knowledgeable, pilot in the next 40 hrs. Flying once a week makes that almost impossible though, that really requires 3-4 flights per week or more, and intensive study on your part.

Also take this opportunity to learn to trim for airspeed and use your throttle to control descent. If your instructor has you trimming for every change in speed, they are being very effective in your training. If not, let me take this opportunity to introduce you to that concept. Trim for every speed on final and control your rate of ascent or descent, detailed by the landing point going up or down in the windshield, by adding or subtracting throttle. Practice slow flight as well, the stall warning should stay on.
 
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SCAirborne you're probably doing just find at this stage of training but you'll start to notice your confidences improving. So the only advice that I will give is this, your CFI is there to handle any situation that you might find yourself in, and having confidence in that you can afford to relax, as much as possible, and learn and do the flight maneuvers that your CFI is teaching, understand that, and you'll improve at a faster pace. You're working toward confident and proficiency in flying an aircraft. Oh, and one more bit of advice, have FUN!
 
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