EatMyPropwash

Matt does a good majority or all of the ground. Tony's last class was my transition class, and he was veeeeery nuts and bolts oriented. Matt is more lights and switches oriented which is how the oral is, for its whole 45 minutes it takes lol, paperwork included.

MrMustache

WHere did Tony go?

Power Leeeeever

EatMyPropwash

Flight Safety as a Saab 340 instructor in Houston, TX . They made him come in on his birthday on Saturday to teach us... he was pretty ****ed.

MrMustache

He'll be right at home there.

OldSF3Dude

Sorry if I came off as arrogant, but you didn't have to go through the heart ache of losing a sim partner like I did. He was devastated. And it wasn't like he didn't try. I hate to see anybody go into this not knowing the facts. It sounds like the guy can go back to his old job if anything goes wrong so I guess his bases are covered and I wish him luck.

Getting hired and ground school isn't going to be the big issue. The difficult partwill be sim. You will have 6 sim sessions to get type rated in the left seat. Not easy. For example, it took my partner 3 sesions to even become close to comfortable with the first flight of the day ground checks! On the Saab there's a lot of extra left seat stuff. It ain't like the old days of just doing FO stuff for initial training. And it ain't like a jet (Embraers in my case) where there's no prop stuff to worry about and there's more automation to help. And in my experience SilverIis the most stingy airline about giving extra training. Maybe more is expected with the ATP law? But I remember years ago places like Eagle gave their struggling pilots enormous amounts of extra sim training. Don't expect that at Silver.

As far as wash out rate, it was one out of three in my class, but myself and another guy were already typed with lots of Saab experience. I believe we were the first Saab class where a PIC type was required to get through training. In other words you were trained to get a PIC type instead of SIC and were given no option in the matter. (And as I said 2 of us came in already PIC typed).Big difference! I heard that the washout rate in the Beech-1900 class before my Saab class was very high, but I have no first hand knowledge of that.

All I'm saying is be careful and don't burn bridges to an old job to come to Silver.

sandrich

I went through training as an SIC and my partner was a PIC. If my memory serves me correctly, both our orals and sim rides were exactly the same. Only thing different was the seat we sat in and the print on our temps... Guess that doesn't matter now though, does it

OldSF3Dude

When I did my Saab type oral at Mesaba when I upgraded in 2001 it was 5 hours long. EVERYTHING was covered. Silver/Pan Am is about 90 minutes and much more relaxed and straight forward. Since everybody now gets a PIC type there is no difference between what captains or first officers get at Silver. The oral at Silver/Pan am isn't a big deal. However, there IS a big difference between getting a left seat ATP PIC type and the old right seat SIC type. I think this is especially true in the Saab where the left seat performs all the first flight of the day checks. Now, perhaps the examiner might even skip this in a ride. In my partners case though he was out between 5 and 6 because he couldn't do this kind of stuff yet consistently and never got to the ride. But, in any case, you have to know it at some point. It seemed to be a difficult task for some people. Plus ATP standardsare ststricter in general. In SIC rides and PCs you can train during the ride. Not so in PIC type rides.

Cruz5350

When I went through my sim partner was getting his PIC type, while not greatly different than my SIC it was enough that I'd be nervous only having 6 lessons.

OldSF3Dude

Yes. 6 lessons is tough. I think 6 is tough enough for just a SIC type. It's really asking a lot for a ATP/PIC type ride for a guy who never flew the Saab, and exponentially so for someone with no 121 turboprop experience.


Back in the day when places like Eagle hired 250 hour pilots they bent over backwards to get those guys all sorts of extra training. I'm not sure if they still do that at some places or not. If some places still do that I think that might be a much safer bet for pilots with no turboprop experience. I'm just putting that out there for new guys to think about. Something to consider. ..

DPApilot

Works well, lasts loooong time.