
How to get a Pilot's License in (just about) a week - joshwa
http://www.davincoburn.com/DavinCoburn.com/Fly.html#
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rubyrescue
I spent more money than i should getting my license north of Seattle, and i
don't regret it. it was a confidence builder and something i really recommend
to hacker types - learning to fly is such a perfect combination of the
technical and aesthetic, satisfying the need for beauty, freedom, and aventure
and challenging your mind at the same time.

 _Flying_ , after a while, can become routine and at a certain point the
marginal value is low - it's expensive and if you're not going to be a
professional pilot, it begins to seem like a _very_ expensive and pointless
hobby. but the experience of learning to fly is worth it.

At the time i got my license it was a minimum of 40 hours so the sport pilot
rating makes it a lot easier. however, i'm not sure that at 22 hours it's very
safe to go up with someone else - it's easy to get overconfident in the
pattern, make a turn a little too tight, and stall, and at 1000 feet above the
ground, it's generally not recoverable. i didn't feel super confident in
pretty much any situation (crosswind, busy airport, low clouds, etc) until
around 80 hours.

edit: pattern is the nice little box you make when you're flying around an
airport, preparing to land...
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Airfield_traffic_pattern>

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dotBen
Of the people I know who have a pilots license, the ones who seem
pleased/proud/positive about it are those who are (lucky enough) to own/co-own
a plane.

As was pointed out with me, the right planes don't loose value/much value and
so once you own a plane your running costs are low. Then you can book a
weekend in Tahoe (I'm in SF) and just fly the plane out.

The people for whom flying is expensive is, ironically, those who don't own a
plane and have to rent. By the time you've rented (paid + time to organize
that, you might as well just fly commercially)

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bbatsell
It is absolutely impossible to fly somewhere cheaper than commercial whether
you own or rent — it's pretty basic economies of scale. Private pilots do not
do it to save money; they do it for the love of flight itself.

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Vivtek
This is something I've wondered about for a while. We have a family of four -
where does that economy of scale start to tip the balance? At what point does
the increment of cost for private flight get small enough that you say, "OK,
for being able to fly out of the local airport on a day's notice, that's worth
it?"

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sokoloff
If your frame of reference is an economy coach ticket, if you say "it's more
expensive to fly private", you'll almost never be wrong. (Your economy coach
ticket is _heavily_ subsidized by the first-class and other full-fare
tickets.)

If your frame of reference is a first-class or full-fare business class
ticket, I can often beat or near the airlines on both cost and door-to-door
time. (If the keys to the plane are in your pocket, there's no getting there
an hour ahead, dealing with the parking garage, the TSA theater, maybe a delay
on takeoff for crew or aircraft availability or ATC/ground holds, perhaps
changing planes, waiting at baggage claim, etc. Plus, I can often start and
end the flight much closer to the "doors" I want to be at, leave my shoes on
and carry 4 oz of gel deodorant in my bag if I want.)

As to "that's worth it", I bought a Cessna 182/Skylane (4 seat, single-engine,
160 mph high-wing) a little over 12 years ago, and have flown it for business
travel as well as most of our in-US, east of the Mississippi, personal travel,
as well as a few trips west of the Mississippi. It costs me under $2/mile on
average, and the direct operating cost (aka marginal cost: the cost of an
incremental trip within a year) is just under $1/mile. If I had to, I'd pay 2x
what flying actually costs me without thinking about it.

If you want to travel in your aircraft (as opposed to just going flying), I'd
suggest you take the traditional route and go all the way to the private
pilot's license. Far fewer restrictions, and if you enjoy flying anyway all of
the "extra" time is hardly wasted. IMO, there are too many restrictions on
LSA/recreational pilot's certificate to make it usable to actual go places
with 3 friends, etc. It's nice to be able to fly into BWI for an Orioles game,
or fly up the Hudson River at night, cross Central park and Laguardi tower and
head out on course over the Whitestone bridge. I think it's great that the FAA
created the easier licenses, but I don't think they are practical for
travelling.

Used airplanes are reasonably cheap now, and loans and insurance are easy to
get. (Most airplanes are made of aluminum and have nearly infinite lifespans,
with avionics, engine/props, interior and paint being replaceable items over
the life of the plane. Think of a 30-year old airplane as much more like a
30-year old office building than a 30-year old car in terms of "acceptable to
rely on". They're inspected annually [or ever 100 flight hours for
rentals/commercial usage], and no reason a 30+ year old plane wouldn't be
perfectly reasonable.)

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Retric
Airplanes have less fudge factor and more stress than Office building so while
an office building might last 30-300 years with little problem, all airplanes
have a shorter lifespan. (Assuming regular use.)

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fatigue_%28material%29>

Note: Damage is cumulative. Materials do not recover when rested.

And if you look at the bottom of the page you will find a fairly long list of
airplanes that failed.

~~~
c1sc0
A well-maintained airplane will last a long time. Well-maintained means doing
it the right way: RX components to look for fatigue, etc ... Yes, this costs.
Tthere is some concern wrt. catastrophic failure due to fatigue & ideally you
want to have a full history of _how_ the plane was flown.

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DavinCoburn
Wow guys, thanks for the link! My tiny site just went from 100 hits/day to
3,800 last night.

As an update to that story, I have continued flying — larger things, to more
distant places. (Helping build a Sportsman 2+2 and flying to the Yukon were
life highlights.) In fact, as rubyrescue said, that newfound sense of
confidence has been key in trying for my latest adventure: Living for a month
at Chicago’s Museum of Science and Industry (<http://j.mp/9gtIuc>). If you’re
curious, my application video — with stuff about flying — is here:
<http://j.mp/a7ESd0>

/shameless plug

Thanks again,

Davin Coburn

~~~
mhartl
Dude, that application video is awesome! Thanks for linking it.

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maxklein
What I'd like to do is learn to fly in South Africa. Think about it - travel
somewhere exotic, explore the place not only on the ground, but also from the
air, and go back home a pilot.

Also, I heard South Africa is cheaper and have pretty high quality flight
instruction.

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heresy
Hoedspruit in the Limpopo province is a good place to go for this, it has
flight school due to it also being the location of an air-force base.

It's also in a central location if you're the type of person who enjoys doing
outdoor stuff.

It's close to the Drakensberg mountain range (awesome hiking), like 100km from
the Kruger National Park (recommended at least once), there's a lot of rugged
touristy stuff to do.

Weather is great.

If you're coming with Euros it will be pretty cheap, just don't go to the
tourist traps or decide you need to go do one of the package "safaris" as
those are priced to what rich people can bear.

Disclaimer: I am biased, I grew up 3 hours drive from this area.

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bengl3rt
This is really inspirational. I've always wanted a pilot's license, and now it
seems that at least the first step is easier than ever.

I am terribly afraid of single-engine planes, though. I'd probably get to
sport pilot and immediately keep going to whatever the next level was that
allowed me to fly twin-engines.

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snom370
You're far more likely to kill yourself due to inexperience, than due to
engine failure or any other technical malfunction. You might also consider
getting a glider license to fly motor gliders, as they give you more time and
options to land if you're worried about that.

From <http://www.schiratti.com/humour.html>:

    
    
      Control: You're unreadable, say again.
      Motor-glider: I've turned off the engine, is that better?
      Control: (looong pause)
    

:)

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sohooo
I don't know the pilots DSL, but that link was fun to read :)

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madair
I was in Japan when I got my first drivers license. It took two weeks of
expensive instruction, four separate official tests (two written, two behind
the wheel), and I was told I was lucky I wasn't automatically failed on at
least one of them which apparently is a common practice.

I find it an interesting comparison, not as a value judgment necessarily. I
guess I prefer difficult testing for both drivers and pilots considering that
a awful lot of people kill & die all the time as both.

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cameldrv
If you're looking to get into flying, and put off by the expense, try
sailplanes (gliders). I learned first in gliders, and then got my airplane
rating a few years later, but I still go out to fly sailplanes on the weekend,
because gliding is more of a sport, and more engaging once you already know
how to fly.

More importantly, for a lot of people, it's much cheaper than flying airplanes
-- typically less than half the cost.

It's also a more social type of activity, as gliding is mostly organized
around clubs, which exist to provide instruction and tow planes. You'll meet
lots of great people in the club. In airplanes, you typically don't have a
whole lot of routine contact with other pilots, because you just drive out to
the airport, get in, and go.

If you're interested, ssa.org is the national organization, and they have a
list of local clubs.

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noonespecial
I learned to fly at Winchester Regional. All of these places are familiar. The
Shenandoah is a fantastic place to learn to fly if you can.

Once you get the stones to go in and out of Front Royal, drop me a line, we'll
go out for a beer and talk about those power lines...

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clueless123
Flying is not inherently dangerous, but is terribly miss-forgiving of your
mistakes.

IMHO, getting a license in a week is just not enough enough time to get scared
enough times to understand the risk/responsibilities involved with flying.

You really need to give your brain the time to assimilate the reality of what
you are doing , before you can really be a safe pilot. (Same goes for any
other non-forgiving activity.. Skydiving, Paragliding, etc.)

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dws
The title is a bit misleading. The author mentions in passing that he took an
at-home ground school course and passed the FAA written exam before flying.
Studying to pass that test, and studying to retain some knowledge that can be
useful when actually flying, can take more than a week itself.

The other major omission is learning to fly in or through heavily controlled
airspace. There are a lot of rules and procedures, especially radio
procedures, to learn and practice, and they really need to be practiced with
an instructor to get some of them to stick. An instructor can teach to you to
communicate effectively with air-traffic control in ways that home-study
courses won't. Expecting to learn that in a week and retain it is nuts.

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clueless123
By far the cheapest way to experience flying for the true love of it, is to
join a soaring club.

Sailplanes require far less maintenance and are cheaper to operate (try flying
5 hours for the cost of a tow + $20/hr rental) (in the US)

Flying them is enormously rewarding as you are 100% concentrated on what you
are doing, is quiet, peace full and depending on where you fly, you may be
rewarded with spectacular views of the world from way above.

Finally, for the inner geek, flying gliders competitively is a highly
technical/mental activity, top pilots tend to strongly correlate with
engineering and science professionals.

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run4yourlives
He made a major mistake with his little "forget the plan, I'm going south"
adventure on his last solo.

What really gets me is I don't think he knows how much of a bad idea this
really was... and more importantly how much this attitude could burn him in
the future.

Admittedly I don't know the eastern US well enough to understand how much of a
detour this was, but a mid-flight change with limited daylight hours into
unknown weather patterns is a good way to get yourself into trouble fast.

A perfect example that suggests you should take longer than a week to fly an
aircraft.

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MarkBook
Paramotoring looks more accessible
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TlbQ0xbbpOQ>

~~~
astrec
I fly a paraglider which is essentially the same thing only unpowered. At
around $10/hour it's within reach of most people. Takes around 7-9 days to get
a restricted license in most countries. Then you just grab a friend, walk your
back pack up the hill and, if the weather gods are agreeable, launch.

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Groxx
I've been interested for quite a while in investigating flying ultralight /
microlight planes, maybe gliders or even pedal-powered planes. Haven't ever
done so though, nor do I know _at all_ where to start looking, and have
nowhere near the money I'd need to actually do any of it.

Until then, however, anyone here have experience with any of the above? Is it
worth it? Anything major to watch out for?

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jmg
an amazing gift I received for a birthday one year was a gift certificate for
a beginner flight. Something to keep in mind (or to ask for!)

