Originally Posted by
tmontana6
I work in 142 after many years instructing in General Aviation and I can tell you that the environment is completely different. In General Aviation there is a lot of troll DPE that fail people at the minimum mistake or because their approval rate is quite high, because they after retake money, etc, things that usually dont happen in a 121/135 environment where the inspector have completely different attitude
After 3000 hours instructing I can write a book about stupid and unfair checkride failures in General Aviation, messing good pilots careers and how really bad pilots pass all the way with no failures....
this is a pretty interesting thread but just in case any new guys are reading this and worried about how to avoid checkride busts. It’s a question of being COMPLETELY PREPARED.
I went through ALL ATPS without any busts, flight instructing, 9 years at a regional and now a captain at a major having done three type ratings along the way. Never busted anything and I can assure you it’s not because I’m a good pilot but I can also assure you that I know I’ve invested the time and energy to be 100% prepped before each and every checking event.
You have to CHAIR FLY every maneuver over and over and over. You have to know backwards the PTS and the requirements of each and every maneuver. You sit in your bedroom and use your phone to record yourself going through the procedure/maneuver, verbalize to yourself as you’re doing the maneuver: what instrument you are looking at and what corrections you are making. listen to the recording and make sure no step in the procedure/flow/callout is missed.
It takes hours and hours of preparation, On your own, visualizing every maneuver until everything is second nature. That will present itself in the checkride as a confident pilot who knows his $hit and even a DE that needs a couple of busts will hold off on busting you and bust the next guy instead of you (which is what you want).
For those of you out there that successfully get through Checkrides on a wing and a prayer without the work, congrats, you’re probably great pilots with natural skill, lots of aptitude, smart, great memories etc etc. For the rest of us mere mortals, it just takes work.