Where to live now?

[Big Pistons Forever]

Yes I can say from personal experience the Military is very good at taking something that should be a lot of fun and absolutely sucking the life out of it.

Flying instruction was my first flying job 34 years ago and even when I moved on to other kinds of flying I always kept up my instructor ratings and instructed part time.

I still get a kick out of seeing the Ah ha moment when the student “gets it”

FWIW I fairly quickly developed a rep as a hard ass instructor. I told students I was tough but fair and rode the lazy, unmotivated students like a cheap donkey using the FISR method. They either got with the program (sometimes) or got another instructor (usually). Fortunately for me when I was instructing full time it was a big enough school that there were enough good students for me to stay busy and in effect I ended up high grading the student body.

Later as a part time freelance instructor I could pick and choose the students up front

[Colonel]

Most people get their instructor ratings because they have very little flight time
and they use it to build time so they can fly twins. Etc.

That's normal - just how civilian aviation works.

I was really weird (go figure). I didn't get my instructor rating to build time, I
had a day job as an engineer. But I loved to fly. I loved airplanes. And maybe
I could help other people learn to master what I loved so much.

One of my worst problems with aviation was the bullshit. There's something
about aviation that attracts bullshit. People spew all sorts of irrelevant nonsense
that distracts you from learning what you need to know. That bugged me. I
wanted to distill aspects of aviation that were considered black magic, down
to their few simple essentials.

Because if you look at an airplane, you have a wing that pushes air down, and
an engine that pushes air back. That's really it.

I am a minimalist. I spent my life trying to simplify and prioritize. What's
important, and what's not. If you watch a master, there is nothing extra there -
only what he needs. And he does it so carefully and precisely.

People need good role models. I am not one of them, but ... learn from the
masters.

[Squaretail]

I would like to hear from the instructors about why you instruct and what you do like about it for once.

I’m coming up to renew my class 1 for the third time and am debating on whether I should bother. I probably will if only for the reason that I can still convince myself it’s worth it. I came to instructing as a pilot with some experience past my CPL in the bad ol’ days where a second winter job paid for me to be what amounted to a volunteer pilot adventurer in the summer. For some reason I usually got tasked with training green employees in stuff like chainsaw safety and making safe ditches to work in, it occurred to me that teaching flying can’t be more hazardous, and should have less drunks and criminals to work with.

First instructing I find has a good sense to it of contributing to the greater GA good. Some might equate this as like volunteering at a soup kitchen, but ultimately, there’s only one way there is going to be new pilots to carry the banner out there if you are interested in recreational flying being around to the end of your life. If you have worthy knowledge, it needs to be passed on, and sometimes in an official capacity as it were.

Second, maybe again as a way of paying it forward, I can also say to myself that I indeed helped others learn better than I was helped to learn. Maybe as a way of proving to myself that the carrot can be more effective than the stick. As BPF says, there is pleasure in seeing someone else make a breakthrough, especially when it’s visible and decisive. I personally don’t like to think of myself as a teacher, I only help others learn, and a lot of that is just making sure they don’t hurt themselves in the process.

Lastly, as a completionist, I take some satisfaction in taking part in reaching an objective. I love first solos and passed flight tests. I even take a small bit of satisfaction when the last signed and stamped piece of paper goes in the envelope to be approved by the regulator. All hurdles jumped in the way of a new pilot, it’s like the system was beaten even by playing by its own rules. What can I say? To quote Denis Leary: “happiness comes in small doses folks.”

There is of course just the fun of flying around, which on the face of it one can joke that it beats doing “real” work. But I have had enough really bad days in airplanes to know not to tempt fate anymore by thinking a bad day in an airplane can’t be that bad. But I won’t bore you with the bad days. Suffice to say I’ve largely burned out on instructing, and it felt like the bad days started outweighing the good ones.

[Colonel]

I’ve largely burned out on instructing

Boy, do I hear you. That's the circle of life, though. You learn and get
qualified and experienced and knowledge and skill, then you pass it
on to others, then if it works out, you can create a few new instructors.

But there comes a time when you just want to sit on your front porch.
You know. Relax and throw (mostly) empty beer bottles at the passers-by.

[Liquid_Charlie]

I know chuck is as I was, and I'm sure there are others here but young guy and solo on a taildragger in 5 to 8 hours and never a second thought, it was the norm and of course the private in 35 hours, I know things change and now students deal with radios ( too much in my opinion) and busier airspace but strip it all away and the basics are still the same. It does mean that I think these flight schools are "padding" and dragging training out. There is also the fact that students are not likely getting the concentrated training like instructors of the past.

I don't like dwelling on the past but in this case rules, theory and schools have managed to diminish the stick and rudder skills.

[Squaretail]

I don't blame the schools. Schools are businesses and have responded to market pressures. What passes for flight training these days is what people want. The paying customer's vision of what a pilot is, is a white collar guy, who pushes buttons, monitors screens, and above all talks to controllers on the radio in an authoritative voice. I personally like the idea of having a school that runs out of a square field with a windsock in the middle, and the only electronics the airplanes have is a battery powered intercom. We don't need to lose our voices and go deaf after all, we can leave that bit of old school flight training behind. But this isn't a viable business unless you're somewhere with lots of people (Florida or California) with lots of money, and you're content entertaining a lot of tire kickers and a few serious students. Who you might have to charge a lot of money to to make it viable. Or in the soup kitchen mentality of flight training, you were content to lose money at it. You'd probably also have a lot of people come by to tell you you're doing this wrong, either not modern enough, or not old-school enough. Many students would walk away when they seen the spartan panel. More when they found out it didn't have a radio, the rest when they found out it was made in the 40's. Its a small market this style of flight training is aimed at. Even most of the Americans I see selling this are doing it in new Huskies and the like - and it ain't cheap, and they still focus on playing with the gizmos too much for my tastes.

Keep in mind most schools are going gangbusters right now, which just blows me away. They probably know something I don't know. So its really hard to tell them they're doing it wrong. They're making money, and kids are completing their dreams of getting a seat in turbine powered airplanes.

[Colonel]

Right. The objective of a flight school is not to produce skilled pilots.

I really doubt that even makes their top ten priority list.

PS I have never understood people that tried to make money in aviation.
Aviation is a great place to spend money. Believe me when I tell you this.
If you want a million dollars, go into aviation with two million. Or ten.

Lest you think I am being overly cynical, let's see what Warren Buffet says:



If you have any interest in money, you should note that aviation is a capital
intensive commodity business. You know. Financial suicide.

[Squaretail]

Right. The objective of a flight school is not to produce skilled pilots.

I really doubt that even makes their top ten priority list.

Well that's not entirely true. I mean you could cynically say that about every business. McDonald's objective is also not to make burgers, Ford's objective is not to make trucks. Every business's objective is to make money, at least that's the objective of any sustainable business. A flight school's plan to make that money is by selling training to student pilots. Arguably to sell that training they need to assure its enough quality to fulfil the student's objective, just like burgers and trucks must be a certain quality to sell. Obviously that quality of skill is sufficient to appease the customer's wants. Now that quality can be pretty low - the Walmart business model. If the quality of skill that's being sold is low, that's because that's what is demanded by the customer. The big demand on flight schools are convenience, speed and price. Usually in that order. Next would be image and dream fulfilment.

Personally the only way I would see change, is if there were greater demand for skilled pilots in industry, but there isn't. They're happy with their side of the dream fulfilment because it means cheaper pilots.

[Colonel]

you could cynically say that about every business

Well .... that's a problem when you're hiring a trade. Be it a plumber
or lawyer or doctor, you really don't know what you've got until it's over,
because you don't know anything about plumbing or the law or gross
mushy stuff.

When it comes to hiring trades, first comes the test, then comes the lesson.
Hard way to learn. There's a guy called Mike Holmes that makes a very good
living dealing with this. Mike Busch, too.

I've never seen a flight school that advertises,

"We teach to the absolute lowest skill level!"

I doubt you ever will. Even if they do.

PS I was not a normal flight instructor. I liked to see tailwheel, aerobatics
and maybe a pinch of formation before PPL. They didn't seem to mind.

The proof was in the pudding. My old home airport had one paved runway,
and frequently the wind was blowing strong after a cold front, 90 degrees
to the runway. Windsock was straight out. On days that PPL's would decline
to fly, I would send my students solo in.

See, that's the difference that quality makes. Contrast that with the puppy
mills that produce CPL's that struggle with 5 knot crosswinds. They approach
much too fast and lock up the brakes, trying to stop. 21st century pilots.

I blame the parents. Er, instructors.

[David MacRay]

I don’t know how they rate speed wise but convenience has been eliminated at the place I occasionally rent a plane and sitter at.

I have almost never been able to book a plane sooner than three plus weeks from the day I would phone to ask.

Then upon arrival nearly 100% of the time they give the 172 I requested to someone else. I get to fly a surprise plane, often one without the adjustable seat I can lower, so I get to spend 1.8 leaning to the side and dragging my headset on the ceiling.

Insurance and being at what is considered a busy airport these days probably makes speed impossible. Some older fellows talk about low times to solo back in the 1950s, well it’s 20 hours charged until a PPL can solo on the scary conventional gear planes now days.

That’s enough whining about that for now.