Min Hour Requirements & the Real World
 

Hello all,

I have a question in regards to "going over" FAA minimum hour requirements for PPL, Instrument and Commercial.

I just finished my PPL Part 141 and am well above the minimum required 35 hours. More like 60 hours. My question is, is it common to go over the minimum required hours for instrument and commercial ratings as well? If yes, any estimates of how much more for each of the ratings?

Thanks for any help!

Most people go over on private. The hardest thing is starting fresh. Instrument is about the same length, sometimes a little less. By commercial, most people are at 200 hours and 50 FTD hours. Very few people I have seen go over. Even ones that took 100 hours on their private.

Unless, you are a 141 school. Then you have to do whatever is on the minimum training for their syllabus.

Typical figures for Part 61 schools-

PPL 60 hours
IR 125 hours
COMM 250 hours

Part 141 schools tend to do things in about 10% less hours each. If you want more data, I recommend consulting AOPA website.

These are my personal numbers (Part 141 school):
PPL 54 hours
IR 83 hours
COMM 140 Hours

In our school they made us get multi private prior the multi commercial so the 140 hours TT includes the PPL, IR, Multi private, multi commercial...
Good luck in your training!

Typical in my neck of the woods.

Private: 70-80 hours.

Took me 74 for PPL Part 61 and about 55 for IR 141.

I had over sixty when I soloed and almost 200 when I took and passed my Private checkride. I also got seventy on my written. Looks like an awful bad pilot doesn't it? The truth is I worked for a busy flight school at a busy airport. I got a big discount on the aircraft and free instruction. My Private cost me less than $600 out of pocket; but I worked my butt off. The high times were due to a mixture of free flying, which was abundant, in addition to my normal instruction and that I used whatever instructor was available. I had over fifteen different instructors as a primary student. Therefore none of the instructors knew where I was with my training and until near the end never managed to stick with one instructor long enough to get soloed. On the written I got cocky and I really did know all the answers (I studied my tail off and was totally immersed in it at work, It proved to be the only time in my life where I really did know all the answers) On purpose, I answered just enough questions to score a seventy... I almost failed my checkride for flying too good, really! The examiner got really upset with me instantly recovering from the unusual attitudes and said if I did it again he would fail me as he though somehow I was looking. He say my hous and low score and thought I was marginal so my recoveries did not compute with him. I solved the problem by telling him I would contact approach contol and show him a nice ILS! He said take me back to the airport. The rest of the flight was complete silence. He gave me my certificate with no debrief other than "Get your instrument rating..." So more to the subject; Don't worry about your time and don't take the ride until you are confident and capable. Stay focused and be serious. Don't let anyone including an instructor push you. Study way more than you need to. Good Luck, you will be fine

Yep. To get to those "minimums" you basically have to MASTER everything the first time you do it. That doesn't make sense does it? It's possible to get good at it with minimal practice if you are doing a lot of extra study, and maybe you do MS flightsim or xplane and fly all the approaches already, practice holding and tracking skills. Make you try to ride along every day in the back with someone every day you aren't flying with your instructor? Maybe you have your own aircraft and can "practice" with another pilot. That's why the rules are written so you "can" do them in those reduced hours, but it's not very common. 54 or 60 hours is totally normal. It doesn't matter if it's part 141 or 61 IMO. Even though the syllabus for the 141 may be down closer to the "min", you'll notice that it takes people relatively the same amount of time to learn something, if everything else is equal and it's just a 141 program vs 61. If there is a significant difference in the quality, it's not necessarily that you'll get that many less/more hours, it's more likely that you'll fail the checkride, so better to play it safe and pass the first time (or first time as much as possible).

That sounds similar to the dilema I find myself in. I am currently going to FSA, and one option is to do Private Multi, then Instrument and Commercial on the Seminole, then do a Single add on in the end.

The other option is to do everything single engine, then a multi add on in the end.

The difference in the price is around $2,000. But, if I do private multi I get nearly 60 Multi hours (including PIC for the MEI) versus 19 Multi hours in the add on if I do everything single. And probably no Multi PIC at all for the add on rating.

The big risk, of course, is needing remedial flights on the Seminole. That will quickly add cost and make the private multi route far more expensive. See below both program descriptions:

System Error - FlightSafety Academy

One on each page.

Private Multi is really attractive, but I fear for my budget. . .