How Long to Log 1500 Hours?
10-18-2022, 03:22 PM
#11
Gets Weekends Off
Joined APC: Mar 2017
Posts: 451
Originally Posted by Brickfire
If you know you will be building hundreds of hours, buying a 152/172 or a simple experimental would be the cheapest method.
10-18-2022, 04:20 PM
#13
All is fine at .79
Joined APC: Sep 2016
Position: Paahlot
Posts: 4,082
Teaching as a CFI or any other entry level flying job will teach you much more then drilling holes with your own airplane.
Not to mention all the potential drama with airplane ownership.
Realistically it’s 2 years after your CPL that you’ll hit 1500 hrs.
0-CFI will take 6-9 months after which you still have another 1200 to go.
Not to mention all the potential drama with airplane ownership.
Realistically it’s 2 years after your CPL that you’ll hit 1500 hrs.
0-CFI will take 6-9 months after which you still have another 1200 to go.
10-18-2022, 04:41 PM
#15
Gets Weekends Off
Joined APC: Mar 2017
Posts: 451
Originally Posted by MNFlyer4531
How much did the Cessna cost?
10-21-2022, 05:43 AM
#17
On Reserve
Thread Starter
Joined APC: Oct 2022
Posts: 13
Originally Posted by youngmd
Hey, I am 50, and I am just starting. I have 2 hours so far!
10-21-2022, 06:29 AM
#18
Gets Weekends Off
Joined APC: Jan 2018
Posts: 644
First, the good news. Being an airline pilot pays just as well as they all say it does. As a regional captain, I'm taking home over 10 grand a month, and that's after taxes, maxing my 401k, etc, with pilots projected to be in even more short supply over the next 10ish years. The legacies are hiring any regional captain who is willing to put their apps in, and captains I flew with last year in the regionals are captains on 737s or FOs on Dreamliners now, making a quarter million a year with an average of 15 days off each month, and 20 nights in their own beds.
The bad news is that getting to 1500 hours in 2 years while working full-time is unrealistic. This is like getting a STEM graduate degree, followed by an internship, both in terms of money and time commitment. A more realistic timeline is probably 5ish years, and it'll be a grind the whole time where you can't over-commit to family or your other job. Also, if you live in a northern latitude, you'll get a lot less flying in the winter because of weather and icing.
If there's a really good flight school near you that routinely trains airline pilots, then I'd go there and 'pay as you go' to incur less debt while continuing to work. If the only flight schools are mom-and-pop schools that train weekend hobby flyers, then I'd recommend quitting your job and biting the bullet at an airline focused degree-mill-type school like ATP. I went the military route, but I fly with a lot of ATP grads, and what I hear is that it's a lot like going to a grad school where the TAs do all the teaching. Some are good, some don't care at all, but it's on you to succeed and they give you the tools to get there, but there aren't a lot of safety nets if you get a bad instructor. I've heard good things about United's Aviate program, but that requires you to quit your job and move to AZ.
After getting your ratings, I'd highly recommend quitting your job altogether and becoming a full-time instructor. Part-time instructors just don't log much time. Plus, schools tend to feed their full-time instructors students first, then fill in the odds and ends with part-timers. For every hour you fly there's at least an hour of ground training, paperwork, pre-flighting, prepping, etc. Unless you're working for a program like ATP, it's unlikely you'll taxi back to the FBO, one student will hop out and another will hop in. You'll learn a lot as a CFI in the first 200 or so hours, then things will become very mundane. Luckily, CFIing is a great way to network with a lot of operations in your local area, so you can maybe jump from CFIing to a better-paying job flying pipeline, unscheduled air cargo in a twin, ferrying airplanes, etc where a 10-hour day means close to 10 hours of flight time and it's way less mentally engaging than trying to sort through a student's psyche to find the best way to teach them to get past their many hang-ups.
Good luck
The bad news is that getting to 1500 hours in 2 years while working full-time is unrealistic. This is like getting a STEM graduate degree, followed by an internship, both in terms of money and time commitment. A more realistic timeline is probably 5ish years, and it'll be a grind the whole time where you can't over-commit to family or your other job. Also, if you live in a northern latitude, you'll get a lot less flying in the winter because of weather and icing.
If there's a really good flight school near you that routinely trains airline pilots, then I'd go there and 'pay as you go' to incur less debt while continuing to work. If the only flight schools are mom-and-pop schools that train weekend hobby flyers, then I'd recommend quitting your job and biting the bullet at an airline focused degree-mill-type school like ATP. I went the military route, but I fly with a lot of ATP grads, and what I hear is that it's a lot like going to a grad school where the TAs do all the teaching. Some are good, some don't care at all, but it's on you to succeed and they give you the tools to get there, but there aren't a lot of safety nets if you get a bad instructor. I've heard good things about United's Aviate program, but that requires you to quit your job and move to AZ.
After getting your ratings, I'd highly recommend quitting your job altogether and becoming a full-time instructor. Part-time instructors just don't log much time. Plus, schools tend to feed their full-time instructors students first, then fill in the odds and ends with part-timers. For every hour you fly there's at least an hour of ground training, paperwork, pre-flighting, prepping, etc. Unless you're working for a program like ATP, it's unlikely you'll taxi back to the FBO, one student will hop out and another will hop in. You'll learn a lot as a CFI in the first 200 or so hours, then things will become very mundane. Luckily, CFIing is a great way to network with a lot of operations in your local area, so you can maybe jump from CFIing to a better-paying job flying pipeline, unscheduled air cargo in a twin, ferrying airplanes, etc where a 10-hour day means close to 10 hours of flight time and it's way less mentally engaging than trying to sort through a student's psyche to find the best way to teach them to get past their many hang-ups.
Good luck
10-21-2022, 06:44 AM
#19
On Reserve
Thread Starter
Joined APC: Oct 2022
Posts: 13
Originally Posted by Duffman
First, the good news. Being an airline pilot pays just as well as they all say it does. As a regional captain, I'm taking home over 10 grand a month, and that's after taxes, maxing my 401k, etc, with pilots projected to be in even more short supply over the next 10ish years. The legacies are hiring any regional captain who is willing to put their apps in, and captains I flew with last year in the regionals are captains on 737s or FOs on Dreamliners now, making a quarter million a year with an average of 15 days off each month, and 20 nights in their own beds.
The bad news is that getting to 1500 hours in 2 years while working full-time is unrealistic. This is like getting a STEM graduate degree, followed by an internship, both in terms of money and time commitment. A more realistic timeline is probably 5ish years, and it'll be a grind the whole time where you can't over-commit to family or your other job. Also, if you live in a northern latitude, you'll get a lot less flying in the winter because of weather and icing.
If there's a really good flight school near you that routinely trains airline pilots, then I'd go there and 'pay as you go' to incur less debt while continuing to work. If the only flight schools are mom-and-pop schools that train weekend hobby flyers, then I'd recommend quitting your job and biting the bullet at an airline focused degree-mill-type school like ATP. I went the military route, but I fly with a lot of ATP grads, and what I hear is that it's a lot like going to a grad school where the TAs do all the teaching. Some are good, some don't care at all, but it's on you to succeed and they give you the tools to get there, but there aren't a lot of safety nets if you get a bad instructor. I've heard good things about United's Aviate program, but that requires you to quit your job and move to AZ.
After getting your ratings, I'd highly recommend quitting your job altogether and becoming a full-time instructor. Part-time instructors just don't log much time. Plus, schools tend to feed their full-time instructors students first, then fill in the odds and ends with part-timers. For every hour you fly there's at least an hour of ground training, paperwork, pre-flighting, prepping, etc. Unless you're working for a program like ATP, it's unlikely you'll taxi back to the FBO, one student will hop out and another will hop in. You'll learn a lot as a CFI in the first 200 or so hours, then things will become very mundane. Luckily, CFIing is a great way to network with a lot of operations in your local area, so you can maybe jump from CFIing to a better-paying job flying pipeline, unscheduled air cargo in a twin, ferrying airplanes, etc where a 10-hour day means close to 10 hours of flight time and it's way less mentally engaging than trying to sort through a student's psyche to find the best way to teach them to get past their many hang-ups.
Good luck
The bad news is that getting to 1500 hours in 2 years while working full-time is unrealistic. This is like getting a STEM graduate degree, followed by an internship, both in terms of money and time commitment. A more realistic timeline is probably 5ish years, and it'll be a grind the whole time where you can't over-commit to family or your other job. Also, if you live in a northern latitude, you'll get a lot less flying in the winter because of weather and icing.
If there's a really good flight school near you that routinely trains airline pilots, then I'd go there and 'pay as you go' to incur less debt while continuing to work. If the only flight schools are mom-and-pop schools that train weekend hobby flyers, then I'd recommend quitting your job and biting the bullet at an airline focused degree-mill-type school like ATP. I went the military route, but I fly with a lot of ATP grads, and what I hear is that it's a lot like going to a grad school where the TAs do all the teaching. Some are good, some don't care at all, but it's on you to succeed and they give you the tools to get there, but there aren't a lot of safety nets if you get a bad instructor. I've heard good things about United's Aviate program, but that requires you to quit your job and move to AZ.
After getting your ratings, I'd highly recommend quitting your job altogether and becoming a full-time instructor. Part-time instructors just don't log much time. Plus, schools tend to feed their full-time instructors students first, then fill in the odds and ends with part-timers. For every hour you fly there's at least an hour of ground training, paperwork, pre-flighting, prepping, etc. Unless you're working for a program like ATP, it's unlikely you'll taxi back to the FBO, one student will hop out and another will hop in. You'll learn a lot as a CFI in the first 200 or so hours, then things will become very mundane. Luckily, CFIing is a great way to network with a lot of operations in your local area, so you can maybe jump from CFIing to a better-paying job flying pipeline, unscheduled air cargo in a twin, ferrying airplanes, etc where a 10-hour day means close to 10 hours of flight time and it's way less mentally engaging than trying to sort through a student's psyche to find the best way to teach them to get past their many hang-ups.
Good luck
10-21-2022, 07:03 AM
#20
Line Holder
Joined APC: Jul 2022
Posts: 62
From what I've heard, at my age, it's probably better for me to stay with the regionals and accumulate my seniority than to transfer to a major and start the process over.
By the time I start flying as an ATP, I'll be 52-53 years old. I don't have time to shift around. Plus, SkyWest and many other regionals just bumped up their compensation and benefits significantly, giving me less incentive to transfer to a major.
By the time I start flying as an ATP, I'll be 52-53 years old. I don't have time to shift around. Plus, SkyWest and many other regionals just bumped up their compensation and benefits significantly, giving me less incentive to transfer to a major.
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