RAAus - Time to first solo

[Walter Buschor]

Hi Guy's,

I,ve been reading through his thread and I found it most interesting. So many points of view and all valid. I might as well add my own five cents worth.
I did my PPL licenece at 18 in Switzerland . Prior to learning to fly the "big" one's I flew control - line planes from about 9 and R/C from about 11 years. I did this very well and won a few tropy's . This gave me a "headstart" when taking up flying. I trained on the AS 202 Bravo - a 2/3 seat A/C roughly similar to the Victa Airtourer and also aero capable. I had 6 hours total time when I went solo and did three touch and goes with the fourth being a full stop. Converted to C-150/152 at 16 hours and Piper L4 at 31hours. Had Pax and X-counrty in the"bag" at 36 hours ie: all done. Then went on to accumulate another 65 hours before moving to Aus at 20. Then licenece conversion and aero endorsement on Decathlon VH-MMM and with a total of 122 hours stopped flying for 24 years. Started in RA 2007 and haven't looked back since.

I do think that age has a lot to do with how long it takes. As we get older it takes a bit longer to learn new tasks as we're more set in our ways.

fly safe

Walter

[vhinov]

I am on my 17th hour. Last time my instructor mentioned that I might be ready for solo soon. However it has been mostly nice calm weather so far and the main goal for me was to keep from balooning or bumping at flare ups. Yesterday though was a diferent game. 5-7 knts gusting crosswind. Well, now I know much more about side sliping into the wind and crossed controll technique but the landings were mostly assited and hard. Couple missed approaches. I actually asked the instructor to do couple extra landing because of the weather so I can learn more. Completely agree that more experiance in bad weather helps to fly solo sooner. I am not in a hurry and will spend as much time as I need to get a hold of this stick and rudder trick or in my case yoke and rudder :-)

[motzartmerv]

Not sure I agree with the statement more time in bad wx helps solo sooner..
As a general rule of thumb, 1 hour in bad conditions can put a student back 3 hours.
Have seen this happen repeatedly.
Its not a race, take the time, soak it in, and enjoy.
cheers

[Caithness]

Time to Solo is clearly not a competition - your safety and competency is paramount.

Poor weather will have a major bearing on it. I've had students who could easily have gone solo on a dead calm day, but were still incompetent in X-winds. That doesn't mean "stupid", it just means "not competent". Consequently several weeks could pass with poor weather for solo, but great for other training, so the syllabus can be pushed further whilst waiting for the right moment.

Other factors around confidence and personality (human factors) can have a major influence, despite a student being apparently competent in all other things bar landing the damn thing!
Personally I'm an ab initio RAAus pilot who went solo at 18 hours and won my wings at 37 hours. I might have shaved 2 - 3 hours off those times with better weather as I did all this training during the winter months of 2001 at Murray Bridge across 5 instructors. I distinctly remember the first calm conditions when I could actually sense the a/c respond to my slightest input. Multiple instructors were not a hindrance, but a benefit, though some students who can't handle a lot of changing styles might not agree. In all I've had 8 different instructors in the RH seat.

Now a Senior Instructor with 340+ hours up, I've seen some people go solo in under 12 hours and some take nearly 30 hours. Different a/c will also have a bearing - a Skyfox Gazelle should be easier than a Jabiru or a Texan for example without flaps to worry about.

Our licences are just an early first step in a continuous learning process if we are to remain safe. That's one reason I decided to take up the Instructor rating - you learn even more by teaching something! Students ask the damndest questions!

Safe skies to all.....
Paul Smith, MBLAFS.

[turboplanner]

Good words Paul, particularly about the weather - no point crowing about going solo in 8 hours if you haven't experienced a few weather variations and traffic situations.

[Kevin the Penniless]

If you're a 'born natural' then you'd possible do it but for most people I'd add 50% to that figure.

[Benjamin Pitt]

So when does it come to a point where the instructor has to make a decision to either:

A. Get another instructor to have a crack at progressing the student along.

B. Sit the student down and advise that aviation simply isn't for them.

50 hours? 80?

I'd be worried and wouldn't fly with anyone that took more than 40 hours to go solo.

[shags_j]

Who has enough money to spend that much time training. If it takes them that long to do solo then what about EFL's etc.

[DarkSarcasm]

Originally Posted by Caithness

Time to Solo is clearly not a competition

It may not be but sometimes it feels like it.

If you've been following my posts on here (or if you just look at the survey above) you can see it took me longer to solo. Overall, I don't mind. I know what my problem was (I think underconfidence was also a factor tbh, as well as being short and needing a cushion so I could land the thing properly) and I got good experience at dealing with messed up landings etc by myself (which is experience I'd prefer to get with someone there to help me if I needed it rather than alone). But it feels like I should dislike it, that I must clearly be a particularly untalented pilot or something. It seems easy to look back on it and say 'well you should've just changed that' but at the time it didn't seem so obvious (guess it doesn't help when there's a foot+ difference in height between you), isn't it enough that clearly we worked it out and I did go solo? I know some people suggest that if you take longer to solo you're clearly not destined to be a pilot (and I guess if it's 100 hours + that's probably right)...but can you sit there and really say that someone shouldn't/can't be a pilot because it takes them 40+ hours to solo? - it's their dream and their money (if they're clearly unsafe that's a different matter, but if it's just them taking longer to master one thing...). Although having said that, I half feel I should be like this now.

Once you get your licence, do people still ask you how long it took to solo or is it like when you get into uni and people forget all about your HSC score that ruled your life for a year...?

[rocketdriver]

Originally Posted by DarkSarcasm

It

Once you get your licence, do people still ask you how long it took to solo or is it like when you get into uni and people forget all about your HSC score that ruled your life for a year...?

Darky
IMHO most pilots judge other pilots by the quality of their flying, not by anything else. So if your landings (which everyone watches!) are consistent and look good, and if you are seen to be careful (but not overcautious) in your flight planning and general approach to flying, then you are likely to be judged as a “good pilot”. It comes with time and a focus on trying to get it right every time .. not accepting second best in your own eyes (but also not beating yourself to death when you don’t quite achieve your desired standard) ... then people will begin to say that you are a “natural” pilot (no such thing unless you are covered in feathers and only have three toes .. .and some of them are turkeys!)
You obviously have the desire to succeed and the determination to “get there”, so keep up the good work and don’t worry about what others think. Be the best you can be, always, and you will become one of the best there are ......