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Part 91 and Low Time Jump pilots, crop dusting, and other Part 91 jobs

Banner towing 2015 season

Old 03-19-2016, 05:23 PM
  #11  
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You're supposed to change accounts between shilling for your company....

An a Major Airline saw 1500 hours of banner towing and no other experience and said "you're in!"

Yeah....sure....
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Old 03-21-2016, 06:43 AM
  #12  
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Originally Posted by CrimsonEclipse View Post
You're supposed to change accounts between shilling for your company....

An a Major Airline saw 1500 hours of banner towing and no other experience and said "you're in!"



Yeah....sure....
Hours are hours in my opinion
If the airlines need pilots and you meet the general requirement , they may take you

As far as him representing barnstormers aerial advertising, I am not too sure
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Old 04-02-2016, 06:24 PM
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Originally Posted by StartUp161WanaB View Post
Hours are hours in my opinion
If the airlines need pilots and you meet the general requirement , they may take you
And those requirements include cross country flying.
Most banner flying is not cross country flying.
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Old 04-03-2016, 06:30 PM
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Anyone have any contact info for banner towing in San Diego for 2016 summer season?
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Old 04-10-2016, 04:58 PM
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Hello,

I'm interested trying out banner towing for a change. How much does it usually cost for tailwheel endorsement + banner tow training? Wanted to decide before the season starts.

Thanks.
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Old 04-23-2016, 06:30 AM
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Originally Posted by CrimsonEclipse View Post
You're supposed to change accounts between shilling for your company....

An a Major Airline saw 1500 hours of banner towing and no other experience and said "you're in!"

Yeah....sure....
For those of you out there thinking about banner towing, you're going to read/hear this type of mentality all the time. DON'T LISTEN!!

I cannot tell you how many people have thrown discouraging remarks my way when I told them I was banner towing to build hours.

Keep plugging along flying 10x more than guys like this who are too afraid to take the jobs on the fringe of the aviation world. You'll land a 121 gig and laugh your way all the way to the majors while your buddies who just can't seem to figure it out are stuck at the flight school teaching mid-life-crisis stricken dads that flaring at 50 feet just aint gonna end pretty.
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Old 04-24-2016, 01:48 AM
  #17  
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Originally Posted by MantisToboggan View Post
For those of you out there thinking about banner towing, you're going to read/hear this type of mentality all the time. DON'T LISTEN!!

I cannot tell you how many people have thrown discouraging remarks my way when I told them I was banner towing to build hours.

Keep plugging along flying 10x more than guys like this who are too afraid to take the jobs on the fringe of the aviation world. You'll land a 121 gig and laugh your way all the way to the majors while your buddies who just can't seem to figure it out are stuck at the flight school teaching mid-life-crisis stricken dads that flaring at 50 feet just aint gonna end pretty.
10x more flying.... (snerks)
afraid... (laughs)
Majors... (guffaws)

Oh honey.... you're precious.

I towed over 3 seasons, when it was the only way to make a living.
I know what it's about.

Look, you want to tow rags, great.

I'm just pointing out all of the bull**** the shill owners are dishing.
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Old 04-24-2016, 05:01 AM
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Originally Posted by CrimsonEclipse View Post
10x more flying.... (snerks)
afraid... (laughs)
Majors... (guffaws)

Oh honey.... you're precious.

I towed over 3 seasons, when it was the only way to make a living.
I know what it's about.

Look, you want to tow rags, great.

I'm just pointing out all of the bull**** the shill owners are dishing.
And I'm pointing out the bull**** you're shilling out about banner towing time not counting for the airlines.

Already did my time draggin rags, moved on to 121. Not a single person even mentioned that the majority of my hours were from banner towing. Although some of the former CFI's in my class had a hell of a time in the sim, I'll tell ya that (no correlation at all, just sayin).

My point being, there are no shortage of narrow minded people out there telling you that banner towing is a good way to rack up worthless flight time. They're full of it. I know because I went through it, and some of the guys I know who are going the teaching route are struggling for hours. Where I towed, getting a day off that week was the issue. More hours than most guys could handle. But thanks for taking the time to call a random internet dude "honey" at 5 am.
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Old 04-24-2016, 02:49 PM
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Banner towing is aeronautical experience. It's neither good nor bad. Nobody is going to fault your hours towing banners. It's not a stellar background that leaps out, but it you're after flying quite a bit, that's what banner towers do; drone around the sky slowly, a lot.

I towed banners, like many others here. I started and ran a banner company. I can compare having done that to having done a lot of other kinds of flying, too. It is what it is. The panacea for springboarding to the airlines? No. It's a good seasonal job, and for someone who lacks the experience to do other jobs, it's not a bad option.

The oft-heard lament that "I don't want to instruct" is a cop-out, and attempts to compare banner towing to instructing or place one preferentially over the other are ridiculous. Each job you do will have merits, advantages, and disadvantages. I'd much rather have an applicant with a broad background from which he or she has learned to fly, than a one trick pony.
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Old 04-24-2016, 04:47 PM
  #20  
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Maybe at another time in aviation history, banner towing wasn't the best option out there. I admit, I wouldn't know. I'm fairly young and new to this. However, I'm intimately familiar with the hiring climate of today, and what the regional airlines are looking for in a pilot. If you have 1500 hours and can fog a mirror, you've got all the experience they're looking for. In this sense, whatever gets you to 1500 hours is the quickest is indeed the best solution, with seniority playing such a large factor in your quality of life at the airlines.

Now I will say, 121 flights are going to be IFR 100% of the time. Everyone knows this. Banner towing will get you absolutely zero instrument time (legal and logable instrument time, that is ). So you've gotta be instrument current and proficient. Can you fly banners for three months in the summer, keep instrument current and proficient in the winter while working on other ratings such as CFI, CFII, MEI and getting xc/night time(while also attending college possibly)? Absolutely. Will this give you a wider variety of experience than just instructing? For sure. You'll certainly be a far better stick than you were before you started. And you'll have a ton of fun doing it.

As the saying goes, there's more than one way to skin a cat. If you're young, have free summers, and are looking to fly your pants off to get to the regionals, it doesn't get too much better than draggin' rags. If instructing is more your thing, nothin wrong with that route mate. My qualm simply lies with guys who don't hold back on saying banner time is useless flight time. It just aint true.
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