Long road ahead

wheelbase · Post by **wheelbase** » Sun Mar 11, 2007 3:16 pm

Having a tough time deciding what to do any help would be qreatly appreciated!
I have 200 HRS CPL/Group 1 a job offer to become a flight instructor once completed the rating. Is this a good path to follow or should I pack my bags and head north for greener fields PLS HELP

noisyride · Post by **noisyride** » Sun Mar 11, 2007 7:34 pm

My advice:
Don't take the instructing job unless you really have a strong desire to teach. Do yourself and your potential students a favour.
I think the most important thing in the industry at this point is to get as much time as quickly as you can. How much would you fly as an instructor?

What other opportunities do you have other than instructing?
If you have a job offer already for another flying job, I'd take it.

I'd stay away from working the ramp right now. Things are moving too quickly to be loading planes. Dues, schmooze. Get into an airplane ASAP.

Good luck!

CLUBY4YEA · Post by **CLUBY4YEA** » Mon Mar 12, 2007 12:57 pm

Take the instructor position, it will give you the needed time and experience. In the mean time, if something new comes up later on, then you can debait if its worth jumping into it or staying where you are. Instructing counts as PIC time, something you'll need down the road when its time to get your ATPL. Good Luck Big B!

Tui · Post by **Tui** » Tue Mar 13, 2007 6:47 am

I think your best bet is to get your foot in the door somewhere you can move up. If you have to start by slinging boxes for Wasaya then at least you're in the company. Insurance requirements are not carved in stone. If the company is willing to pay more (even with past accidents) they can reduce their mins. If the company is stuck, needs a pilot and they like you, they might be better off paying more insurance to get you flying than wait for someone else to come along that they don't know. In today's market I wouldn't be surprised if this starts happening more often.

Dockjock · Post by **Dockjock** » Tue Mar 13, 2007 4:56 pm

Take the instructing job give it 100%. You and your future students deserve that much. Working the ramp loading up a twin turboprop might have more of a 'hero of the north' type of feel to it, but bottom line you wouldn't be flying, and even when you did get flying more than likely it would be as a cojo.
Build your PIC, in these good times for hiring it will readily become apparent how valuable it is to have the ATPL.

wheelbase · Post by **wheelbase** » Tue Mar 13, 2007 7:27 pm

Thanks so much for the feedback!
Iam not just looking to get some bare minimum time and move on, I really do want to help people to learn to fly, flying is a privilege not a right, I hope I can and will make a difference.

The instructor job from my understanding looks like more than just instructing , possibilites include flying some of the club members to several different US destinations for meetings.

overshoot · Post by **overshoot** » Wed Mar 14, 2007 5:26 am

Buddy, stay out of the instructor scene. You aren't doing the flying there unless the student needs you to take control anyway. Things are picking up out there. You will be on the ramp or office for a short time wherever you end up.

Look at it this way... a guy gets on to a company with 200 hours and has no instructing time but puts some time in on the ramp and gets into a Twin something right seat or small piston PIC. He's considered inexperienced for that type of flying. Experience will come and then he will have been noticed by the management and crew with that particular company.

A guy gets on to a company with 800 hours instructing with no air taxi, or commuter experience. Nobody knows him there and he doesn't know the operation well. This he will have to learn. The only advantage the instructor has over the previous candidate is the ability to fly a 172 from the right seat. Now the instructor has to work harder to get to know the crew and prove that his instructor time has prepared him for whiney passengers and real life occurences in an airplane.

I would only go instructing if its something you really enjoy doing. Otherwise go get hired by some air taxi or commuter operation and get well known before you fly for them. In the long run you will advance faster.

Good Luck

Kelowna Pilot · Post by **Kelowna Pilot** » Wed Mar 14, 2007 11:39 am

For the sake of your students, only instruct if you want to instruct, and if you can financially afford to live on instructor wages.

Speaking from experience, there is nothing worse than two things:

1. A time-builder who doesn't really care about you. You're just a means to his end.

2. An instructor who is so poor (the vast majority of them) that he spends every waking moment trying to figure out how to suck more money out of you.

Personally, I feel most instructor time is basically useless. It's only value is it's a number in a logbook to meet insurance requirements.

Things like "learning how to deal with people"... well, c'mon, you've either got that in you or you don't.

Again speaking from experience, I'd say about half my instructors had nice personalities and were professional and fun to be with; the other half weren't nearly so impressive, including one who spent 3/4 of the lesson spewing vile against whatever particular group or individual in society he had a grievance with on that particular day.

flyboynextdoor · Post by **flyboynextdoor** » Wed Mar 14, 2007 3:06 pm

Kelowna Pilot wrote:For the sake of your students, only instruct if you want to instruct, and if you can financially afford to live on instructor wages.

Speaking from experience, there is nothing worse than two things:

1. A time-builder who doesn't really care about you. You're just a means to his end.

2. An instructor who is so poor (the vast majority of them) that he spends every waking moment trying to figure out how to suck more money out of you.

Personally, I feel most instructor time is basically useless. It's only value is it's a number in a logbook to meet insurance requirements.

Things like "learning how to deal with people"... well, c'mon, you've either got that in you or you don't.

Again speaking from experience, I'd say about half my instructors had nice personalities and were professional and fun to be with; the other half weren't nearly so impressive, including one who spent 3/4 of the lesson spewing vile against whatever particular group or individual in society he had a grievance with on that particular day.

Dont liten to this guy, hes got a pretty narrow view on instructing and I bet work in general. I didnt know how much I liked instrucing till I tried it. I get 50-60hrs/month all PIC. Being an instructor you have to take responsibility for the other person's skills which forces you to be a better pilot.

I make more as a class 4 instructor than some first officers do. Granted I'm in a really good company. I never thought I would like instructing but I love it more than any job I've ever had. I dont intend to be here forever but while I'm here I'm gonna enoy it. I could be freezing my butt off on some frozen ramp somewhere, but I get to fly all day mon-fri.

Kelowna Pilot · Post by **Kelowna Pilot** » Wed Mar 14, 2007 4:34 pm

Dont liten to this guy, hes got a pretty narrow view on instructing and I bet work in general. I didnt know how much I liked instrucing till I tried it. I get 50-60hrs/month all PIC. Being an instructor you have to take responsibility for the other person's skills which forces you to be a better pilot.

I make more as a class 4 instructor than some first officers do. Granted I'm in a really good company. I never thought I would like instructing but I love it more than any job I've ever had. I dont intend to be here forever but while I'm here I'm gonna enoy it. I could be freezing my butt off on some frozen ramp somewhere, but I get to fly all day mon-fri.

Gimme a break, my point was if you want to be an instructor and you genuinely care about instructing, then instruct.

Don't be an instructor because you feel you have no other choice, which is the case for a lot instructors.

Okay, so you may make more than an FO as instructor... I'm sorry but I wouldn't rally around the slogan given what FO's make.

I stand by my remark about the value of instructor time. It'd be good for a couple hundred hours to a degree... after that unless you're teaching MIFR, I see little value.
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Cat Driver · Post by **Cat Driver** » Wed Mar 14, 2007 5:41 pm

flyboy....

How many hours flight time do you instruct per month?

wheelbase · Post by **wheelbase** » Wed Mar 14, 2007 6:56 pm

Well I sure am getting some mixed reviews on this subject..
It is a busy place with 1000hrs per year being typical with a couple hundred twin IFR hrs thrown into the mix.
I think it would be a good thing knowing that you helped some people achieve thier licence.. Maybe I'm just a dreamer

180 · Post by **180** » Wed Mar 14, 2007 9:44 pm

noisyride wrote: I'd stay away from working the ramp right now. Things are moving too quickly to be loading planes.

Are you kidding noisyride? Things are moving too quickly for a 200 hour pilot to work the ramp? Smoke another one man...

As for instructing, where the hell would any of us be if our instructors had thought they were too cool to instruct?

Finding a good instructor is key and 'wheelbase' sounds like he wants to teach...who are you to disuade him?

Wheelbase, why go north to a question mark when you can be flying everyday for what sounds like a decent school. Look at it as a stepping stone, fine tune your skills for a year or so and then move up north with 1000 hours PIC and some multi time. (Or go north, hump freight, go right seat, then bang your head against the wall when you realize you can't go left seat without PIC time.)

Good luck.

LostinRotation · Post by **LostinRotation** » Wed Mar 14, 2007 10:39 pm

Wheels.....Do what is going to make you happy. If your not going to be happy teaching, then don't. You have to want to teach....and even those of us who really loved/love it had days that made us wonder.

Bottom line, your at a fork in the road....you only get one go at this so do what your going to have fun doing. Some of the best times I've had in my flying career have been on the ground with the people I've worked with.

Whatever path you choose, if you play your cards right will get you to your goal....but just remember to do your research and enjoy the ride.

-=0=LiR=0=-

noisyride · Post by **noisyride** » Thu Mar 15, 2007 7:49 am

180 wrote:
noisyride wrote: I'd stay away from working the ramp right now. Things are moving too quickly to be loading planes.
Are you kidding noisyride? Things are moving too quickly for a 200 hour pilot to work the ramp? Smoke another one man...

Even 200 hour pilots are finding jobs these days.
Working the ramp should be a last option when you can't find something else. What a waste of time.

4hrstovegas · Post by **4hrstovegas** » Sun Mar 25, 2007 5:11 pm

1000 hrs/year including a few hundred hours twin time? Take the job, at least for a year. But like others have said, you have to want to actually teach, or you'll want to shoot yourself in the head after 6 months.

I taught to around 900 hours, then hit the bricks for charter/sched work. My time was respected by most operators I visited, but ALL of them said the same thing: they didn't look at instructing time past 1000 unless it was twin-heavy. There are a lot of places that will take a guy with 1000 hrs/250 multi in a heartbeat, even if it is teaching time. Hick and Lawrence, for example, look for 1000 hrs/100 multi-PIC, and companies in southern Ontario like Georgian will consdier you with that time, regardless of where you get it.

Just my two cents worth based on my travels.