I'm 18 months from getting out of AD Navy and looking to put together an electronic logbook. I downloaded the freebie from APC and have sampled some on the web. Does anyone have any suggestions or recs on an e- logbook?
It appears the one from APC is just one long spreadsheet starting with FAM 1 in flight school to "wetting down" all on one page. Is there a way to make a page for each month with running totals, similar to the hard copy military logbook? If so, I may need a tutorial.
Thanks!

Justin

 

i went with LogBook pro. i took a look at a lot of different software and really liked this one. after buying it, and using it, it is REALLY user friendly and does a lot of really cool things.

i went over to flight records, got a copy of all of my flights and entered them over the span of 2 weekends. it was a lot of work, but the software really performed well and i think you will be happy.

if you have any specific questions, feel free to PM me..

 

I'm in the job hunt myself and I have talked to at least 20 reservists here at Columbus that are airline pilots. They ALL told me not to bother with an e log. Every one of them went into their interviews with their civilian log book (most of them very little civilian time), and a copy of there AF flight records (several of theses dudes have been hired within the last 6 months at Southwest, UPS, AirTran and Delta). They did print up a spreadsheet with their military conversion time (+ .3 per sortie at Southwest for example) and that was all they needed. They all said the interview flight log check took about 3 minutes (for you AF dudes, the interviewers looked over only the Flying History Report and the mil to civ conversion math). So, I wouldn't waste my time with an e logbook.

 

that is a good point......but if you have about 10 years of civilian time on top of your military time (like me) then, in my opinion, a "one stop shopping" e-log was just the ticket....

to each his own, BUT if you are looking for a good E-Log, i would recommend LogBook Pro....

your call...........

 

I've posted in other threads before that it's very useful to have your own logbook to be able to check AFORMS against (I was floored by how many mistakes were in mine when I really sat down and looked at it). It's also very useful to be able to write comments about your mil sorties -- that will come in handy when it's time to remember some "TMAAT" flights.

I've heard it both ways -- when I was a punk wingman I had a couple retiring O-5s that had interviewed at a couple legacies tell me that all they cared about was the AFORMS printout and that if I was keeping my own logbook I was only wasting my own time and potentially introducing the ability for times to not match between my log and the AFORMS printout. I've also heard from graybeards who say you're missing out on the opportunity to document information you'll never recover if you don't keep your own logbook -- like wingmen, students, mission numbers, targets, tanker tracks, etc.

In my opinion, the benefits outweigh the risks. It took quite some time to consolidate all my civilian time and enter all my AFORMS data (bounced against the partial paper logs I'd kept for my military flying), but it's well worth it now. I can crunch numbers however I want anytime I want without having to bother some AFORMS airman to do it for me. I bet it will also be nice for the airlines that want to convert per sortie versus total time.

I made one of the Excel e-logbooks that is available here on APC -- I stripped away many of the really cool features when I uploaded it, but it is relatively easy to make it do what Justin wants it to do in the original post...

 

Log Book Pro......all I have to say is automatic 8710's! Those things are more a pain in the a$$ than the actual checkride itself.

 

I just spent 4 hours a day on my week long vacation typing 1400 hours of civilian time into an e-log book. It was the biggest pain in the a$$ and I'm going blind from staring so long excel spreadsheeets, not to mention the wife and kids were wondering why daddy was inside all day instead of playing at the beach. However, it is way cool to be able to sort my time any way I'd like. For example, I could easily see how many night instructor hours in a Cessna 172 I have. Or, I could see how much time I have flying a particular aircraft tail number. There is no way to do that with a written log...that is, if you have >500 hours. <500 hours and you could probably get by with punching a calculator, but that would equal the a$$ pain of punching it into an e-log book.

That being said, I also agree with Buzz's "laziness" technique. You'd be just fine with civilian log books and an AFORMS printout of military time. I would prefer this method except I had no way to sort my time the way it's required on some of the applications.

Buzz, I talked to Boom Boom the other day...evidently, you guys were good buds back in the day.

Jeff122...finally got to see one of your posts on here. Will I be able to PM at 25 posts?

 

I use LogBook Pro for my civilian time and AFORMS for my mil time. Never has been an issue at an airline interview.

 

The "AFORMS" seems to be pretty handy...if you're in the Air Force. But the Navy still writes the times down in a hardcopy, handwritten logbook. I know, I know, its antiquated but the Navy is big on tradition.

I've been eye-balling Logbook Pro but was wondering if its worth the high price tag. I've got 7 years of flying to input into a program and I only want to do it once. Thanks for the input!

Justin

 

I have all of my USAF time in an AFORMS product, but have also tracked it in Palm Log. Is there a way to transfer all of the info from my Palm Pilot into LogBook Pro if I purchased it? That would save a ton of time!