Multi Engine-Piston PIC

[MikeLima]

Hi guys,

After a pause from flying I am looking forward to follow my passion.

I have 1500 TT with 1000 Multi-Turbine experience (King Air) in northern operations, multi-crew environment (mostly medevac and charters, gravel runways up north).
I’ve got a couple of offers for right seat turbine but what I want (and need) is PIC time.

I am currently living in Eastern Canada but willing to move if necessary.
I am going to start knocking some doors for a Twin piston PIC job.

Any tips, ideas or thoughts are more than welcomed; feel free to pm if necessary.
Thanks a lot in advance for your time and fly safe.
Regards

MikeLima

[esp803]

Chase lifestyle, not metal.

Don't worry about the type of machine you are flying, pick the job that gives you the schedule, pay and location you want.

E

[toelessjoe]

Pm me my friend.

- Toeless.

[MikeLima]

Pm me my friend.

- Toeless.

Toelessjoe

I did send you an email as requested however I haven’t heard from you yet.
Anyone else wants to contribute with some tips/ideas?

MikeLima

[YYC the place to be]

It is hard for an employer to hire you as a direct entry captain when you haven't been a captain before. I highly recommend you take a co pilot job, be patient and prove yourself to your employer. If your work ethic and skill are to that company’s standard then you make your move to an entry level Captain spot.

Good Luck

[rooster]

It is hard for an employer to hire you as a direct entry captain when you haven't been a captain before. I highly recommend you take a co pilot job, be patient and prove yourself to your employer. If your work ethic and skill are to that company’s standard then you make your move to an entry level Captain spot.

Good Luck

Bang on brutha!!

ML what makes you so righteous that you feel you are entitled to a left seat job on a multi with 1500TT? That's not a lot of time or experience. You SHOULD be taking a right seat job, until your comfortable with a companies operations, airplanes, routes, and until THEY are comfortable with YOU in the left seat. Companies aren't going to give you a direct entry left seat multi job without you having any prior operational command experience (1500 is SFA for DEC) and ESPECIALLY after 'pausing' from flying. There are pilots with as much as DOUBLE your time who are finally earning their 4th stripe. I doubt you're in the same echelon. Sorry champ, but you're still green. Go EARN that extra stripe with experience, not entitlement.

[iflyforpie]

Really? You need to be a copilot before you can fly a multi engined piston aircraft? I was flying one commercially at 300TT and don't have a single hour of cojo time in my logbook.

Flying a simple twin like a 337 or Islander VFR should be well within the skill level of a 200 hour wonder and a Navajo or a 402 IFR should be good for someone who's has some time under their belt and the required hours for SPIFR.

Lots of realistic opportunities for such in Canada? No. But nothing ventured nothing gained.

[Slats]

+1 to most of what pie said.

1500TT may not be much in the grand scheme of things, but it is more than enough to get you a Navajo captain job. Furthermore, I think you are smart to seek out PIC time. It is one of the keys to successful career progress in a non seniority environment. I know many piston and turbine twin captains who have a total of zero right seat time.

The only caveat that I would add to the previous post is that while Islanders are wonderful, simple, easy to fly aircraft, most of the ones that I am aware of in Canada do some pretty gnarly work that is in fact probably beyond the level of a 200 hour pilot or even a 1500 hour pilot with little PIC time and no bush experience.

I'm quite sure you could easily find a Navajo job. Best of luck.

[Northern Flyer]

Chase lifestyle, not metal.

Don't worry about the type of machine you are flying, pick the job that gives you the schedule, pay and location you want.

E

I don't really agree with this idea. Maybe later in your career but when you are starting out if you want PIC time go out and find it. When I was in a position where I hired people I would definatly consider some one with 1500 hrs and experiance in an IFR environment for a Navajo position as captain.

[indieadventurer]

It is hard for an employer to hire you as a direct entry captain when you haven't been a captain before. I highly recommend you take a co pilot job, be patient and prove yourself to your employer. If your work ethic and skill are to that company’s standard then you make your move to an entry level Captain spot.

Good Luck

Bang on brutha!!

ML what makes you so righteous that you feel you are entitled to a left seat job on a multi with 1500TT? That's not a lot of time or experience. You SHOULD be taking a right seat job, until your comfortable with a companies operations, airplanes, routes, and until THEY are comfortable with YOU in the left seat. Companies aren't going to give you a direct entry left seat multi job without you having any prior operational command experience (1500 is SFA for DEC) and ESPECIALLY after 'pausing' from flying. There are pilots with as much as DOUBLE your time who are finally earning their 4th stripe. I doubt you're in the same echelon. Sorry champ, but you're still green. Go EARN that extra stripe with experience, not entitlement.

He's after a left seat in a light piston twin, not a King Air. 1500 TT with his background, yeah, he's got the experience for some jobs and a/c out there (C337, C310 PA31 etc...) and his post doesn't sound like he believes he's entitled to anything.

[trey kule]

To the OP...a bit different perspective.

1. It costs money to train a pilot for any type of twin work.and turn over is a problem...Companies are not there to help you out with your career wants and needs. Make certain you are willing to commit to a company for a period of time long enough to make the investment in your training. There is nothing wrong with career ambitions and plans, but it is the kiss of death in hiring if a company thinks you are just working for them for no other reason then you "need" some particular thing to move on to the next job..

2. This whole right seat mentality thing seems to be a modern concept where instead of gaining experience, one sort of jumps the cue to the right seat. Lots of pilots have found out the hard way that this is not a great career strategy.
Forget about mulit PIC time. Get any PIC time. Your right seat time may or may not be valuable depending on the company you got it with. Lots of young pilots will tell you how much they have learned and how valuable their right seat time was, but they sometimes dont really know the depth of it as they are simply doing self assessments.
The problem with direct entry into some of the twins is the direct entry Captains really cant fly, and have a terrible attitude as their logbooks show , as yours does, 1500 hours so they assume they are qualified....even if most of the 1500 hrs was spent simply following MacDonald style SOPs and having a Captain that would take over in an emergency.
I look at some of the SOPs for the smaller companies and the FOs are not allowed to land in strong winds, if the weather is below minimums plus 500 feet, or the Captain is to immediately take control in abnormal situations. They have been nothing more than assistants despite their claims to the contrary....then these same FO's think they should suddenly be able to slip into the left seat and do all that ..because...well, because it is a new company, and it you have 1500 hours of right seat time in a 1900D or a metro, well you surely can fly a simple Navajo... No clue that a navajo can actually turn into much more of a tigher than the 1900, and there will be no Captain to take over from them.
One of the questions that is asked in our interview with pilots with this background, is why they did not remain at their previous company and upgrade..The typical answer is because the previous company would not upgrade them without PIC time......so the interviewer may conclude that the pilot thinks that the new company has much lower standards for Captains, and much higher respect for the FO time than the previous company had..Give it some thought......or the pilot thinks that somehow right seat time is so valuable that the simple twins should be a shoo in to fly.

BTW.. As someone mentioned about the islander...Very easy to fly.. Very difficult to fly exceptionally well, and very expensive to maintain if flown by a pilot learning the ropes who does not respect it. And the type of work they do, as was also mentioned , is not what a typcial right seat FO will know much about.

[iflyforpie]

The only caveat that I would add to the previous post is that while Islanders are wonderful, simple, easy to fly aircraft, most of the ones that I am aware of in Canada do some pretty gnarly work that is in fact probably beyond the level of a 200 hour pilot or even a 1500 hour pilot with little PIC time and no bush experience.

I was thinking more bag runs than bush stuff. 200 hour wonders wouldn't get on our 337 doing what we do with it either.

[Northern Flyer]

Just a question, who do you think is more qualified? A pilot with 1500 hours pic instructing in a 150, or a pilot with 1500 hours in the right seat of a light twin?

I personally would like someone with operational experiance. Some of you are making this flying out to be some super human feat. Imagine 300 hour military pilots landing fighters on an aircraft carrier, or flying complex aircraft over sea's. It's not rocket science, as long as said pilot has a good head on his or her shoulders and flys within their limits it will work out fine

To the original poster good luck with the job hunt, if your in the right place at the right time you will find what you are looking for. There are tonns of jobs available right now.

[YYC the place to be]

Let me clear something up from my last post.

1500 TT flying operationally is good time and an employer would have no problem moving someone to a Navajo captain seat with that kind of time. What I am trying to say is the employer doesn’t know you, they only have a snap shot from an interview and references you provided. That being said they would like to see someone prove themselves supervised by captains before they are put in command. If an employer has seen what you are doing and heard what you are doing from your captains for the last 1500 hrs then they have something to go on. Think of your FO job as an extension of your interview process.

Cheers.

[MikeLima]

Thanks for all the replies; my post is back to life!

No I don’t have any sense of entitlement, take in consideration that I am willing to leave a job with a salary that is at least twice the average Navajo captain salary, so I am willing to make personal and financial efforts to continue “chasing the dream”.

During my FO experience I was lucky enough to fly with great captains who didn’t see me as their assistant or their “flaps operator” as someone mentions here. They always looked at me as a “captain on training” the decisions weren’t made unilaterally; I was treated as a valuable crew member and yes they allowed me to land during rough conditions because according to them I was doing what I was supposed to do so it was no reason to take control. Those captains remain available to provide references if needed.

I am not trying to justify myself here, but in my almost 1000 hours of FO time I had the chance in numerous occasions to land in real black holes, to fly approaches to the minimums in short frozen runways in the middle of the night up north, to fuel a King Air at – 40c., etc
The above mentioned experience plus the advice of my mentors (captains I flew with) I believe will serves me well in a piston captain job. However, I am aware that I still have a LOT to learn. Good pilots are made of three good things: ATTITUDE, ATTITUDE and ATTITUDE, so remain humble and learn from those who are more experienced is the key.

Finally, someone mentioned here that I need PIC experience in order to get a PIC job, can someone explain me this? for me it doesn’t make any sense, how do you get PIC experience on the first place?

Why I am not flying right now?, it has a lots to do with family and personal reasons and the fact the company I used to fly does not longer exist.

Thanks for your comments, don’t forget the reason why I added this post, to get some tips with the goal to land a Multi-engine piston PIC job, it was not intended to create any debate.
Thanks to those who PM me, this post is not dead yet!
Best regards

MikeLima

[+TSRAGR]

Though always a valued crew member, the F.O. in a light twin is there to assist the Captain. The Captains job is to run the aircraft properly. It is an added bonus that you can learn from the Captain but training you is not part of their job. They are there to provide supervision.

Just sayin'.

[Krimson]

Though always a valued crew member, the F.O. in a light twin is there to assist the Captain. The Captains job is to run the aircraft properly. It is an added bonus that you can learn from the Captain but training you is not part of their job. They are there to provide supervision.

Just sayin'.

That would be a pretty bad captain in my books. The ones that make use of you are the ones that I want to fly with, who's to say who the better pilot. One has more experience, but the FO can usually still contribute. An FO position should be a learners permit to become captain, and the "sit down and shut up" captains should try and remember what it was like being an FO eager to learn and advance. (That's likely the problem though, they were treated the same, so instead remember how you wish to be treated and make the flight better for the whole crew.)

[trey kule]

Krimson, I sense you may be a little off on your understanding of why we have two crew in airplanes.

In the FTU, the two people are not crew members trying to work as one....there is an instructor and a student.
In a two crew plane there should be two functioning, qualified crew members. What you are suggesting is that not only should the Captain be the one crew member that is qualified, but they should further dilute their attention to instructing an FO. Do you really think that provides the best use of two crew members, both from an operational and a safety point of view?

Canada is very fortunate that there are enough qualified and experienced pilots, so that the FO's on the major carriers, for the most part, are qualified and experienced (there are some exceptions) The problem is at the smaller carriers and charter operators which, in many case actually operate in much more challanging envirorments, and with less experienced Captains. These operations need strong FO's ,not students in the right seat.

You have personalized, marginalized, and demonized Captains that dont subscribe to your idea that their job is to instruct when they should be operating as a fully functional crew. An FO is not a learner's permit in the sense that they need experience and instruction to do their job properly.

One of the critical components of two crews is the added level of safety introduced by the PNF monitoring and understanding the situation. Humans make errors. Captains are human. The second person should be providing the added level of safety. There are numerous examples where the Captain made an error, and due to the FO's inexpeience, the error was either not detected, or the seriousness of it not recognized resulting in some bad consequences.

And I have yet to see, in any company policy or SOPs the Captain's position described as a trainer. It is the exclusive realm of the new pilots to demand that without thinking about the flight operations , or really anything but their own career aspirations.

[iflyforpie]

Though always a valued crew member, the F.O. in a light twin is there to assist the Captain. The Captains job is to run the aircraft properly. It is an added bonus that you can learn from the Captain but training you is not part of their job. They are there to provide supervision.

Just sayin'.

Yet one day, this F/O is going to upgrade to captain. They sure aren't going to be a safe or effective one without some passing of knowledge and experience...

[trey kule]

I think we are confusing some things here..An experienced pilot stepping into an FO position is obviously in need of some experience on type, and in the particular operations. And they learn that from experience.
That is much different than what I see some of the new pilots advocating. They want to become an FO without any command experience, or , in many case, very much experience at all (For example never acutally have flown in a cloud, used radar, or done a real approach close to minimums) They are looking to the Captains to literally teach them the basics. The situation is aggravated in complex heavy equiment because they are so automated, that the whole crew must be aware of degraded basic flight skills. A problem if you have had a few years to have them ingrained in you to start with.. A very serious problem if you have not had time and experience to have a decent foundation beforehand.

I used the radar example in particular..When the screen is pretty much all red and you are trying to figure out how to get through it is not the time to be explaining to your FO about recognition of hooks and fingers,...you are looking for resolutions to what could become a coffee spilling experience.

I realize I am wasting my time on the young and ambitious here who simply do not recognize what they dont understand, but hopefully cooler heads will in time prevail...The FAA has seen the light and made the necessary changes to force companies to fill the right seat with qualified and experienced people, and I expect TC will also move, though, if history is repeated it will take one or two rather spectacular and tragic accidents.

As to those who documented their experiences as Fo's one has only to ask if you think you are the general rule or the exception.

Just a question, who do you think is more qualified? A pilot with 1500 hours pic instructing in a 150, or a pilot with 1500 hours in the right seat of a light twin?

depends on whether one of them was from a visibile minority or female.... (joking before anyone takes it seriously)

[Krimson]

In the FTU, the two people are not crew members trying to work as one....there is an instructor and a student.
In a two crew plane there should be two functioning, qualified crew members. What you are suggesting is that not only should the Captain be the one crew member that is qualified, but they should further dilute their attention to instructing an FO. Do you really think that provides the best use of two crew members, both from an operational and a safety point of view?

Trey Kule,

I think you may have misinterpreted what I wrote. I do not literally mean that it is a learners permit to act as an FO, but an FO coming to a new aircraft will need to absorb a lot of new information, and the captain should be there to assist in developing the FO to make the decisions as the PIC. The FO should be fully functional and be able to fly the aircraft no doubt, but there are a lot of steps between that first right seat job and upgrading to the left seat. Every flight is not going to be a lesson, but if the FO is flying a leg and the captain takes control because the weather is near minimums, I don't see how that is going to help when it is time for an upgrade. To put the newly upgraded captain with a brand new FO and send them off into situations where now neither of them has had to make decisions does not seem to wise to me.

The point I was trying to get across was that I wouldn't want to be paired up with a captain who regards his FO as the "flap operator". I am the as you say, the young and ambitious, looking for my first right seat in a few months. Not until 1000 PIC will I even think about it though, so I have at least something to bring to the aircraft. I know I will still have a lot to learn though, and I hope for my sake, and all the others along with me, that we don't get stuck becoming a seat warmer because of how a captain likes to fly. I want to learn as much as possible, and actually be a crew member. It has been a long ride so far, and I'm not in it just for the view.

[Northern Flyer]

I'm of the belief that a good captain is in command of his ship but is also a mentor to his first officer. Any captain worth his weight is able to take green FO's and help them become efficient crew members. I think it is obvious that new FO's are going to need mentoring, the same way new captains are usually paired with experianced FO's.

I must admit I find some of the ideas on crew relationships interesting.

[trey kule]

"mentoring" is an interesting word......but lets clarify a few things northern flyer, before you continue to chastise any Captain who does not meet your career expectations.

Safety is bandied about so much these days, that it is almost meaningless to many. But properly operated companies really are concerned about it...If the weather is at minimums the company wants the person who has the best chance of completing the flight safely flying ...and many SOPs stipulate where the Captain must take control.. It boggles my mind that some pilots can be so focused on their own career that they do not get that, and insist that they should not be discouraged from trying to fly to the limits. Someday we will be a Captain they crie...Maybe.

New FOs need to be trained, learn, and be mentored on the type if it is new to them. Company procedures, envirormental issues particular to their flight regime.. They should not need to be "mentored" in basic instrument techniques, or flying in cloud for the first time.
Or flying to minimums for the first time during an operational flight.
It is this large cockpit experience and qualification gradient that is causing the problem. The FOs simply do not have the basic experience, decision making ability, or developed skills and an operational flight is not about providing that for them.. As a result we get the talking sand bag syndrome where the Captain is basically flying single pilot during the highest work load times. This situation has a corrollary where the Captain, themselves is not all that experienced and simply mistrusts the FO...human factors at play. The situation is particularly apparent in smaller operations where there is less training and overall supervision on operational flights.

The whole concept of finishing flght school and jumping into the right seat to "learn" is rather new. Companies like it because it is a source of cheap labor, and for many is simply window dressing rather than an added layer of safety. The impressive automation and technical advances today also play down the need for two qualified crew members in many cases...Plane is flying itself, and needs only one person to monitor, plan, imput.
It is not that many years ago that a small airline was flying around with no right seat instruments....and the FOs were dutifully logging the time. How valuable do you think all their experience was? I personally witnessed one approach where the FO had the wrong approach plates out.. I have also had a few personal situations where the FO wanted to deviate for SOPs "to get the experience". No thought to how that would impact the operations, Pax, company...

Many of the FOs that have bought into this whole career plan have unfortunately found themselves career co-pilots, and like the OP, now are having to go and get some PIC time. Moving to the left seat is not inevitable as some on here think.

[+TSRAGR]

Krimson

Let me clarify my statement. I have never been bullied by a Captain nor have I bullied an FO. I was never a seat warmer and have never used another pilot as one.

The number of times that I have found it neccessary to take control from an FO is a very small one.

Of course FOs should share all flying and other duties and unless the Captain is a complete knob they will learn lots while working with him or her.

That still does not make the Captain an instructor or the cockpit a classroom.

Constructive input should always be considered by a decent Captain but is actioned at his or her discretion. Why you ask? Because at the end of day they are accountable for your actions.

Like it or not that is reality. Aviation is not structured to help us toward our next career objective.

This is going to get me torn apart but I suspect that after logging 1000 hours in the right seat an upgrade is not likely for most. 200-500 hours is usually enough to get the job done in a light twin.

Flame away.

[Cat Driver]

I am quite used to getting criticized for posting how I operated the airplanes I flew, so I may as well share how I looked at the " letting the F.O fly ".

Generally I shared the flying leg for leg and if the approach was in IMC we used the PMA method.

I can count on one hand the number of times I had to use the " briefed " I have control scenario to take over control because the FO was gettong to far off a safe stabalized approach and landing.

In fact during the latter years of my career I let the F.O. 's do 75 percent of the flying because I liked to make them better pilots so if something went wrong and I was raptured during the approach the passengers and the rest of the crew would be safely delivered to the destination.